Where is Bahtiyar Fırat?

Click to read the article in Turkish / Kurdish

Released after he had been detained in İstanbul Airport and followed by the police afterwards, Bahtiyar Fırat has been missing since then.

Speaking to bianet about the incident, his wife Esra Fırat says, "My husband was going to go to Iran a week ago to have a dental treatment and visit his relatives. That was why he was in İstanbul Airport.

"He called me and said, 'After I passed the passport control, people who said they were from the National Intelligence Organization (MİT) detained me and interrogated me. I missed my flight. I am now going to a hotel.'

"After he left the İstanbul Airport to go to a hotel, he called me again from the taxi and said, 'The vehicles carrying the police officers who took me into custody have just surrounded me. Don't try to search for me if you do not hear from me in one or two hours.'

'We are really concerned. In the beginning, the prosecutor in Yüksekova would meet us. He does not anymore, no one gives us information."

'Are we back in the 1990s?'

Concluding her remarks, Fırat says: 

"We cannot reach Bahiyar. Are the incidents of White Toros* that occured in the eastern and southeastern provinces in the 1990s back?

"On October 18, the public prosecutor got his hands on the file and he has been insisting on not giving us any information about it. Which police officer prevented him from boarding the plane?

"On what grounds was he prevented from boarding the flight? What is the information about the police and why did they attempt to prevent him?

"These questions of ours are left unanswered. There must be camera footage around the airport area, it can be understood from them; however, we cannot reach any footage and we have not been informed.

"When an exit stamp is put on the passport, it means that the person has left the country; we want to learn with what order this stamp has been revoked."

(EMK/SD)