AMED - IHD and relatives of the disappeared asked for the fate and perpetrators of Mehmet Ertak, whose detention in Şirnex was denied despite the testimonies of eyewitnesses and a JİTEM member. 

 

The Human Rights Association (IHD) and relatives of the disappeared gathered once again in front of the Right to Life Monument in Koşuyolu Park in Rezan (Bağlar) district of Amed (Diyarbakır) with the slogan “Let the disappeared be found and the perpetrators be tried” in the 811th week of their protests. Participants carried photographs of the disappeared and a giant banner with the pictures of the disappeared was laid on the ground.

 

STATEMENTS OF EYEWITNESSES 

 

Speaking here, IHD Amed Branch Chair Ercan Yılmaz said: “In August 2024, we are still here today demanding that the fate of our relatives who were forcibly disappeared be investigated. We are facing a government that has closed its eyes and ears to these squares on this issue” and demanded that the fate of the disappeared and their perpetrators be found. 

 

Then the story of Mehmet Ertak, who was detained in Şirnex (Şırnak) on August 20, 1992 on his way back from work and was not heard from again, was read at this week's protest. 

 

The story read by Berfin Elçi, a member of IHD's Board of Directors, is as follows: “Mehmet Ertak, a 32-year-old father of four, lives with his family in the Rezuk hamlet of Şirnex. Ertak works as a laborer at a coal mine in Şirnex. The whole family is under intense pressure and threats because his brother went to the mountains. Mehmet Ertak was detained twice and severely tortured during his detention.

 

On August 20, 1992, he set out with three of his relatives, Abdulmenaf Kabul, Süleyman Ertak and Yusuf Ertak, to return home from work. The car they were in was stopped at the Bakımevi checkpoint by plainclothes police officers. After an identity check, Mehmet Ertak was detained and taken to Şırnak Security Directorate. An acquaintance of theirs, Abdullah Ertuğrul, who was detained the next day and released two days later, told the Ertak family that he had been held in the same cell with Mehmet for a day while in custody. Three people witnessed him being taken into custody and six people witnessed him being tortured in detention.

 

The father İsmail Ertak applied to the prosecutor's office and witnesses who had seen Mehmet Ertak in detention testified before the prosecutor's office. When no results were obtained, on September 10, 1992, father İsmail Ertak applied to the Governor's Office. Governor Mustafa Malay questioned a witness who had seen Mehmet Ertak in custody and asked the gendarmerie and police whether Mehmet Ertak was being held in custody. The police reply that Mehmet Ertak has not been detained.

 

ORHAN DOĞAN BRINGS IT TO PARLIAMENT

 

The incident was brought to the Parliament through Şırnak MP Orhan Doğan on October 27, 1992 with a parliamentary question. In his response to the parliamentary question, İsmet Sezgin, the then Minister of Interior, stated that Mehmet Ertak had not been detained. All the applications made by the family were fruitless. Mehmet Ertak's detention was denied.

 

JITEM OFFICER TELLS EVERYTHING

 

Murat İpek, a JİTEM (Gendarmerie Intelligence and Anti-terror Unit) personnel working as an 'interrogator' for the Şırnak Security Directorate, confessed in 1997: 'We killed and buried Mehmet Ertak on the orders of Şırnak Security Director Necati Altuntaş and Anti-Terror Branch Director Mehmet Kaplan. He said that all the executions they carried out were carried out with the knowledge of Ünal Erkan, the then Governor of the State of Emergency. Despite all legal attempts and the confessions of the JİTEM member, Mehmet Ertak was never heard from again and his body was never recovered.  

 

ECHR CONDEMNS TURKEY

 

Having failed to achieve a result in domestic law, the case was brought to the European Court of Human Rights by lawyer Tahir Elçi on October 1, 1992. The European Court of Human Rights unanimously convicted Turkey on May 09, 2000, concluding that the government was responsible for the disappearance of Mehmet Ertak and that state authorities had caused it.”

 

After the reading of the story, the statement ended with a sit-in protest.