The Saturday Mothers and the Commission Against Enforced Disappearances of the Istanbul Branch of the Human Rights Association (IHD) reacted to the exclusion of their demands from the final report of the parliamentary commission established on the Kurdish issue.
In a written statement, they recalled that the names and stories of the disappeared were presented to the commission and stressed that it is a serious contradiction for a report prepared with claims of democratization and social peace to omit grave human rights violations such as enforced disappearances. They said that the failure to include the statements of families of the disappeared in official records perpetuates a policy of denial and impunity.
The Saturday Mothers said that social peace cannot be achieved through denial, but only through acknowledging the truth, adding that their struggle is not bound by official texts and that they will continue to seek justice for the disappearance.
The statement set out the following demands:
* Decisions of the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) and the Constitutional Court must be implemented in full.
* Arbitrary bans at Galatasaray Square must come to an end.
* An independent and effective Truth Commission must be established within the Grand National Assembly of Turkey (TBMM) to investigate enforced disappearances.
* The state must acknowledge its responsibility in the crime of enforced disappearance.
* The fate of those forcibly disappeared must be disclosed, and their remains must be returned to their families.
* Impunity practices that protect perpetrators and those responsible must end; justice must be ensured through effective and impartial investigations.
* Enforced disappearance must be defined as a crime against humanity; statutes of limitations must no longer serve as a tool of impunity, and no one must ever again be forcibly disappeared.
* Turkey must sign, ratify, and implement the United Nations International Convention for the Protection of All Persons from Enforced Disappearance and the Rome Statute establishing the International Criminal Court.
Leave a Reply