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Police detained 62 people during demonstrations yesterday (July 20) to mark the anniversary of the 2015 ISIS bombing in the mostly Kurdish-populated southeastern province of Urfa.
In İstanbul, the Suruç Families Initiative organized a demonstration in the city's Asian-side district of Kadıköy. When the crowd attempted to hold a march after the event, police used tear gas and rubber bullets against them, detaining many people.
Eight journalists were also injured by rubber bullets and police shields.
Moments of police officers attacking journalists:
Each time you watch journalists being attacked, intimidated, tear gassed in Turkey, remember that it's YOUR right to information which is attacked, violated and tear gassed no matter where you are.
— TRFreePress (@TRFreePress) July 21, 2021
Protect your source to information!#JournalismIsNotACrime pic.twitter.com/97ybc7O9mb
In Ankara, the capital, and İzmir, people were also allowed to gather but prevented from marching. A total of 62 people were detained in the three cities.
Journalism organizations denounced the police violence towards reporters in Kadıköy.
"The institutions that cannot understand that the press is an indispensable part of democracy in Turkey trigger verbal and physical violence against journalists to hinder the people's right to information," the Turkish Journalists Association said in a written statement.
The International Press Institute (IPI) said, "IPI condemns the police violence against journalists seriously injured while covering protests yesterday in Turkey."
The Journalists' Union of Turkey (TGS) released the photos of the injured journalists on Twitter and said "We condemn this systematic police violence aganst journalists."
Polis İstanbul’daki Suruç anmasını takip eden meslektaşlarımıza plastik mermilerle saldırdı. Gazetecilere yönelik bu sistemli kolluk şiddetini lanetliyoruz. Sorumlu polisler hakkında işlem yapılmasını talep ediyoruz. Artık yeter!
— Gazeteciler Sendikası (@TGS_org_tr) July 20, 2021
@_erdemsahin pic.twitter.com/MpiwqTDtSf
The Suruç MassacreUpon the call of the Socialist Youth Associations Federation (SGDF), around 300 young people came together in Suruç in Turkey's southeastern province of Urfa on July 20, 2015. They were there to bring toys and humanitarian aid to Kobanê in Syria. While they were in front of the Amara Cultural Center for a statement for the press, a suicide bomb attack was carried out. 33 people lost their lives in the attack: Koray Çapoğlu, Cebrail Günebakan, Hatice Ezgi Sadet, Uğur Özkan, Nartan Kılıç, Veysel Özdemir, Nazegül Boyraz, Kasım Deprem, Alper Sapan, Cemil Yıldız, Okan Pirinç, Ferdane Kılıç, Yunus Emre Şen, Çağdaş Aydın, Alican Vural, Osman Çiçek, Mücahit Erol, Medali Barutçu, Aydan Ezgi Salcı, Nazlı Akyürek, Serhat Devrim, Ece Dinç, Emrullah Akhamur, Murat Yurtgül, Erdal Bozkurt, İsmet Şeker, Süleyman Aksu, Büşra Mete, Duygu Tuna, Polen Ünlü, Nuray Koçan, Vatan Budak, Mert Cömert. It was identified that Şeyh Abdurrahman Alagöz was the one who carried out the bomb attack that claimed the lives of 33 people in Suruç. A confidentiality order was imposed on the file on July 23, 2015 on the ground that "the examination of the documents in the file would jeopardize the purpose of the investigation." Judicial processFiled by the Şanlıurfa Chief Public Prosecutor's Office 18 months after the massacre, the indictment demanded that three defendants, one of whom was arrested, be given life sentences aggravated for 104 times each. Yakup Şahin, one of the defendants, was arrested as a suspect of the October 10 Ankara massacre, which claimed the lives of 103 people in 2015. According to the indictment, Deniz Büyükçelebi and İlhami Ballı, the other two defendants, are in Syria. The lawsuit filed into the Suruç Massacre started 21 months after the incident at the Şanlıurfa 5th Heavy Penal Court on May 4, 2017. The only defendant of the case who was not a fugitive did not attend the hearing. In the final hearing of the case filed against the public officials on January 9, 2017, Mehmet Yapalıal, the then district security director of Suruç, was fined 7,500 lira for "neglect of duty and misconduct in office." The court has ruled that he shall pay the fine in 12 instalments. There were two police officers as defendants in the second case against public officials, who are still tried for "misconduct in office" at the Suruç Penal Court of First Instance. |
(KÖ/VK)
