Family of Gülistan Doku attacked by police in Ankara

22-year-old Gülistan Doku disappeared on 5 January 2021. Immediately after her disappearance, it was feared that she might have been the victim of a violent crime. Only one day earlier, her ex-boyfriend Zainal Abakarov had forcibly tried to drag the young woman into his car. Doku resisted and passers-by who had witnessed the incident informed the police.

However, the police ruled out the man, whose stepfather – now suspended – was a police officer in Dersim, as a suspect relatively early on. The authorities have no other leads, however, even though almost every neighborhood in Dersim is under surveillance 24 hours a day with surveillance cameras and directional microphones. Instead, the police suspect that the student committed suicide. Abakarov has gone into hiding and allegedly cannot be found.

Gülistan’s mother, Bedriye Doku, father, Halit Doku, and older sister, Aygül Doku, had requested a meeting with the Ministry of Justice to demand the exposure of the young woman’s aftermath.

When the family’s request to meet with Minister of Justice Bekir Bozdağ was rejected on the ground that the minister was “not available”, the family members started a sit-in protest in front of the ministry building in the capital Ankara, displaying the photographs of Gülistan Doku.

During the sit-in, the police attacked the protesting family members and forced Doku’s mother, father and sister into a detention vehicle. The whereabouts of the family members remain unknown.