The Kurds of Turkey (March 1988), and Destroying Ethnic Identity: the Kurds of Turkey, an Update (September 1990)
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TTTHE KKKURDS OF TTTURKEY: K: KILLINGS,,, DISAPPEARANCES AND TORTURE DD TT A Division of Human Rights Watch TTTHE KKKURDS OF TTTURKEY: K: KILLINGS,,, DDDISAPPEARANCES AND TTTORTURE March 1993 Helsinki Watch A DivDivisionision of Human Rights Watch 485 Fifth Avenue 1522 K Street, NW Suite 910 New York, NY 10017 Washington, DC 20005 Tel: (212) 972972----84008400 Tel: (202) 371371----65926592 Fax: (212) 972972----09050905 Fax: (202) 371371----01240124 Copyright 8 March 1993 by Human Rights Watch. All rights reserved. Printed in the United States of America. ISBN: 1-56432-096-0 Library of Congress Catalogue Card Number: 93-223310 Human Rights Watch/Helsinki (formerly Helsinki Watch) Human Rights Watch/Helsinki is a nongovernmental organization established in 1978 to monitor and promote domestic and international compliance with the human rights provisions of the 1975 Helsinki Accords. It is affiliated with the International Helsinki Federation for Human Rights, which is based in Vienna, Austria. Jeri Laber is the director; Lois Whitman is the deputy director; Holly Cartner and Julie Mertus are counsel; Erika Dailey, Rachel Denber, Ivana Nizich and Christopher Panico are research associates; Christina Derry, Ivan Lupis, Alexander Petrov and Isabelle Tin-Aung are associates; ðeljka MarkiÉ and Vlatka MiheliÉ are consultants. Jonathan Fanton is the chair of the advisory committee and Alice Henkin is vice chair. TTTHE KKKURDS OF TTTURKEY: K: KILLINGS, D, DISAPPEARANCES AND TTTORTURE Acknowledgments......................................................................................................................................................................................................i Introduction....................................................................................................................................................................................................................1 Southeast Turkey........................................................................................................................................................................................................6 Abuses by security forces ..................................................................................................................................................................6 Abuses by the Workers' Party of Kurdistan (PKK)................................................................................................................11 Killings and disappearances ............................................................................................................................................................................14 Killings in house raids ........................................................................................................................................................................14 Killings of peaceful demonstrators............................................................................................................................................14 Disappearances......................................................................................................................................................................................15 International standards for the use of lethal force...........................................................................................................15 Suspicious killings ............................................................................................................................................................................... 17 Torture............................................................................................................................................................................................................................23 Suspicious deaths in police custody........................................................................................................................................23 Recent cases of torture.....................................................................................................................................................................25 Istanbul .....................................................................................................................................................................................27 Ankara .......................................................................................................................................................................................29 Adana..........................................................................................................................................................................................31 Antalya .......................................................................................................................................................................................31 The government's steps to end torture....................................................................................................................................36 Law reform....................................................................................................................................................................................................................39 Political freedom......................................................................................................................................................................................................42 Free expression ........................................................................................................................................................................................................45 Freedom of the press..........................................................................................................................................................................45 Freedom of assembly .........................................................................................................................................................................46 Freedom of association......................................................................................................................................................................47 Recommendations .................................................................................................................................................................................................48 To the government of Turkey..........................................................................................................................................................48 To the Workers' Party of Kurdistan (PKK)................................................................................................................................49 To the government of the United States..................................................................................................................................49 Appendix A.....................................................................................................................................................................................................................51 Appendix B....................................................................................................................................................................................................................54 Appendix C....................................................................................................................................................................................................................55 AAACKNOWLEDGMENTS This report is based largely on a ten-day Helsinki Watch fact-finding mission to Turkey in August 1992 during which Lois Whitman, Deputy Director of Helsinki Watch, met with government officials, lawyers, human rights activists, journalists, recent detainees and others in Istanbul, Ankara, Adana and Antalya. It was written by Lois Whitman and edited by Jeri Laber, Executive Director of Helsinki Watch and Erika Dailey, Helsinki Watch Research Associate. Much of the material included appeared in Broken Promises: Torture and Killings Continue in Turkey, a report issued by Helsinki Watch in December 1992. i IIINTRODUCTION Kurds in Turkey have been killed, tortured and disappeared at an appalling rate since the coalition government of Prime Minister Suleyman Demirel took office in November 1991. In addition, many of their cities have been brutally attacked by security forces, hundreds of their villages have been forcibly evacuated, their ethnic identity continues to be attacked, their rights to free expression denied and their political freedom placed in jeopardy. This is the third report that Helsinki Watch has issued since 1988 on the plight of the Kurdish minority in southeast Turkey.1 It describes some of the events that have taken place since Prime Minister Suleyman Demirel's coalition government took office and their effects on the Turkish Kurds in southeast Turkey. By way of background, Helsinki Watch reported in 1988: The Kurds -- there are some twenty million in the world today -- have never had a country of their own, although they lay claim to a large region which they call Kurdistan and have shared a common language, religion and culture for thousands of years. The oil-rich, mountainous region that the Kurds