The Rights Initiative (Hak İnisiyatifi) issued a report on 28 disappearances which are known as Black Transporter incidents. The report paid attention to the tortures and the silence of the government.
BOLD – The Rights Initiative Association in Ankara published an investigation and research report on illegal detentions that were held by public officials since 2016.
The report included the cases of abductions which were supposedly done by public servants since the state of emergency declared after July 15, interviews with the relatives of the missing people, the question proposals given to the TGNA on the subject, the claims submitted to the case files and information obtained from open internet sources.
PUBLIC SERVANTS IN CIVILIAN CLOTHING
In the report, there were allegations that a total of 22 people were illegally abducted before February 2019. There was also information about the people who were allegedly kidnapped and detained, Mustafa Özgür Gültekin, Zabit Kişi, and Ayten Öztürk who stated the details of tortures during their detention on their defenses in judicial processes.
The report stated that in February 2019, a total of six people were illegally detained, and it was emphasized that they were still missing.
The information in the report was obtained by interviewing first-degree relatives and lawyers of those detained after February 2019, It was claimed that: “Yasin Ugan and Özgür Kaya were detained with an operation in front of civilians in the house they live by a team of several people, like Mustafa Yılmaz who was on his way to work in front of his house. Salim Zeybek’s wife Fatma Betül Zeybek also expressed that, his husband was detained by armed persons after a chase while she and her husband were in a vehicle, including their children. The same people transported her to Ankara”
PERPETRATORS SHOULD BE REVEALED AND PUNISHED
By addressing the governors of the state, the report requested, “to investigate these allegations by the public authority, to inform the public about these allegations, to take action for the immediate elimination of violations and punishment of perpetrators if these allegations are correct.”
16 PEOPLE WERE DETAINED IN ANKARA
Some of the findings in the report were as follows: As previously mentioned, it was alleged that a total of 28 people were illegally detained by persons who identified themselves as public servants since 2016.
It was considered that 26 of the 28 people were the supporters of the Gulen Movement and at least 16 of them were allegedly detained in Ankara. On the other hand, in cases of alleged unlawful detentions since 2016, it was often stated that Volkswagen Transporter vehicles were frequently used just like the reminiscent of Toros vehicles in the 1990s.
ABDUCTIONS ARE TORTURED
The court defense of Ayten Öztürk who is the only woman among the abductees had also wide coverage in the report. It had excerpts from the Ozturk’s court defense which state that she was subjected to falanga, sexual harassment, burning her body, dehydration in a period of 6 months. The report asserted that all abductees were similarly tortured too.
UNACCEPTABLE
The report noted the following on the allegations of forced abductions and detentions: “In particular, the narrative of the persons interviewed by our association on these allegations is sufficiently detailed and consistent with other narratives.
If these claims are true; it is necessary to mention that rights and principles which are accepted both in international human rights texts and in the Constitution of the Republic of Turkey like freedom and security of person, prohibition of torture and ill-treatment, right to a fair trial and presumption of innocence, in some cases in particular the right to life seriously violated.
Regardless of the alleged offense, everyone can only be detained, questioned, tried and punished under the law. If various organs of the state apply some solutions to bypass legal procedures to overcome some difficulties, they create terrible problems that cannot be compensated and they are never acceptable.”
The report stresses that: “The fate of 28 people who were forcibly disappeared is different from each other and there is no satisfactory information available. Some of them are still missing, some of them are prisoners in jail, and some may have gone abroad after being released”
THE NAMES OF THE MISSING PERSONS
The names of the missing persons before February 2019 and the dates of their disappearance are as follows:
Sunay Elmas (27 January 2016), Ayhan Oran (1 November 2016). Mustafa Özgür Gültekin (21 December 2016), Durmuş Ali Çetin (17 May 2017), Hüseyin Badce (28 February 2017), Mesut Geçer (26 March 2017), Turgut Çapan (31 March 2017), Önder Asan (1 April 2017) Cengiz Master (4 April 2017), Mustafa Özben (9 May 2017), Fatih Kılıç (14 May 2017), Cemil Koçak (5 June 2017), Murat Okumuş (16 June 2017), Enver Kılıç (30 September 2017), Officer (30 September 2017) 30 September 2017), Hıdır Çelik (6 December 2017), Ümit Horzum (6 December 2017), Ayten Öztürk (13 March 2018), Orcun Şenyücel (21 April 2018), Hasan Kala (20 July 2018), Fahri Mert (12 August) 2018), Ahmet Ertürk (16 November 2018)
The missing persons after February 2019 and the dates of their disappearance: Gökhan Türkmen (7 February 2019), Yasin Ugan (12 February 2019), Özgür Kaya (12 February 2019), Erkan Irmak (16 February 2019), Mustafa Yılmaz (18 February 2019), Salim Zeybek (20 February 2019)