The new Turkey |
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14-Aug-2019 |
10 Augist 2019: Court arrests 4 men allegedly abducted by Turkish intelligenceFour out of six men who were allegedly abducted by the Turkish intelligence agency in February and were missing for months were arrested by a court on Friday evening over Gülen links, according to Deutsche Welle Turkish service. Yasin Ugan, Özgür Kaya, Erkan Irmak and Salim Zeybek have been in police custody since July 28. Gökhan Türkmen and Mustafa Yılmaz, who were also abducted in February, are still missing. Ömer Faruk Gergerlioğlu, a Turkish deputy and human rights activist, called the court ruling a “scandal,” reporting that the detainees did not even know the names of their attorneys, who according to officials they hired. Lawyers from human rights organizations were removed from the corridors near the courtroom by the police, the DW report stated. Turkey accuses the Gülen movement of orchestrating a 2016 coup attempt, although it strongly denies any involvement. Since 2016 at least 24 Gülen-linked individuals have gone missing. Two of the abducted Gülen followers told Correctiv, a non-profit investigative newsroom in Europe, they had been subjected to torture and ill treatment by intelligence officers at a secret site in Ankara. --------------------------------------- Turkish police raid house of abducted civil servantThe wife of an allegedly abducted former civil servant announced on Twitter on Tuesday that the police searched their residence, although there is still no information on the whereabouts of the man since he disappeared 33 days ago. Fatma Betül Zeybek, the wife of former Turkish Telecommunications Authority (BTK) employee Salim Zeybek, said police raided their house at around 1:20 am and asked about her husband. She criticized the police for the raid and for failing to search for her husband despite her appeals. According to his wife, on the evening of Feb. 21 a group of armed men stopped their car and kidnapped Salim Zeybek. Although the men told her not to inform the police about the incident, she filed a complaint with a prosecutor a few days later. The couple’s two children were also in the car at the time of the abduction. Meanwhile, human rights activist and deputy from the Peoples’ Democratic Party (HDP) Ömer Faruk Gergerlioğlu is continuing to post messages on social media on the growing number of abductions in Turkey. On Tuesday the deputy wrote, “Everyone is talking about the upcoming elections, but as a human rights defender, I care about these six abducted men,” listing the names and number of days missing: Salim Zeybek, 34 days; Erkan Irmak, 38 days; Yasin Ugan, 42 days; Özgür Kaya, 42 days; Mustafa Yılmaz, 36 days; and Gökhan Türkmen, 47 days. Gergerlioğlu also questioned if these abductees are being tortured somewhere in an effort to raise awareness of the issue. Most of these people are affiliated with the faith-based Gülen movement. A German media outlet named Correctiv last fall published a detailed report stating that Turkey tortures abducted people in secret detention centers. (turkishminute.com) 27 February 2019: ENFORCED DISAPPEARANCE: Two more men abducted in Turkey
Fatma Betül Zeybek, the wife of Salih Zeybek, said her husband was abducted by armed men in the Turkish province of Edirne on the evening of Feb. 21. Writing from her husband’s Twitter account on Monday, Zeybek said the family’s automobile was stopped by armed men at the Havsa toll booth in Edirne while their 6 and 9-year-old children were in the vehicle. The woman said the men threatened to harm her family if she reported the incident to the police and that that was the reason she waited five days to file a criminal complaint at a prosecutor’s office against the perpetrators of the incident. “Only today was I able to file a criminal complaint [against the abductors]. I have not heard from my husband for six days. I am worried for his life, I don’t know where he is,” the woman tweeted, asking for assistance from Turkish authorities to find her husband. The wife of Gökhan Türkmen, who also wrote from a Twitter account created on behalf of her husband (@gokhanturkmen07), reported that she had not received any news from her husband for 20 days, asking for help from the Interior Ministry and the Antalya Governor’s Office. Forty-two-year-old Gökhan Türkmen, a civil servant dismissed from his job during a state of emergency declared after an abortive coup on July 15, 2016, is believed to have been abducted on Feb. 6. According to his family, Türkmen was hiding from persecution and torture after his house was raided by heavily armed counterterrorism police in his absence in August 2016. When his mother went to the Antalya Police Department for help, she was reportedly told that a car belonging to Turkmen had been traced to Ankara. However, the family reports that Özmen’s car has been in a parking area since he left the house to go into hiding. Moreover, the family was told that Türkmen recently used his credit card and two new sim cards that were activated in his name. The family was shocked as he had left his credit cards at home. The family is concerned about possible attempts to plant evidence to incriminate him. Last week Özgür Kaya and Yasin Ugan, both of Ankara, were reportedly abducted by armed men from their apartment building, with police saying they have no information on their whereabouts. However, Turkish journalist Cevheri Güven discovered that the Ankara Police Department filed a report on the abduction of the two men earlier this month while at the same time denying any knowledge of the incident or their whereabouts. With the two new cases this week, the total number of people reportedly abducted in February has now reached four. No information regarding the allegations of abduction had been released by any Turkish authorities as of the time of writing. (SCF with turkishminute.com, Bold Medya)* |
* Source: https://stockholmcf.org/enforced-disappearance-two-more-men-abducted-in-turkey/ |