PRESS RELEASE
Partiya Serbestiya Dêrsımi – PSD, 19th February, 2005THE TURKISH ARMY OFFICER AND GOVERNER ARE NOT ABOVE THE LAW
Dersim (“Tunceli“), is a province under Turkish colonial rule. It is a highly militarized zone. In 1994, hundreds of villages were destroyed and thousands of people forced to immigrate. In the same year a series of other crimes had been commited during the military operations carried out by the Bolu Commando Regiment. Sixteen villiagers disappeared. Seven of them, a little girl included, were from Işık and Serin families living in a small village called Mirik, whose fate and whereabouts are not yet known.
These cases were recentle brought before the court by a local lawyer, Hüseyin Aygün, who also as a human rights defender wrote some articles about these crimes in a local newspaper called Munzur Haber.
That`s why he became a target for the province`s army commander, Namık Dursun, backed by the governer of the province, Mustafa Erkal. Hüseyin Aygün was recently accused as a “traitor“, “an enemy of the Turkish state“ and strongly adviced to leave his profession by Namik Dursun, who continued to make similiar threats afterwards.
Though these events were made public at the Turkish parliament, the goverment has not yet taken any action.
We, the members of the PSD (Freedom Party of Dersim), call on the Turkish authorities, first of all, Abdülkadir Aksu, the Minister for Internal Affairs, and Abdullah Gül, the Minister for Foreign Affairs, who is also the State Secretary in charge of the hüman rights, to stop Namık Dursun and urge investigations into disappearances and other hüman rights abuses. Anyone involved in these crimes must be held fully to account.
We, the members of the Freedom Party of Dersim (PSD), urge the world media not to remain silent about these worrying developments in the province of Dersim.