On the 655th week of their campaign, the Human Rights Association (IHD) Amed Branch and relatives of the disappeared issued an online statement under the motto "Let the disappeared be found, let the culprits be convicted." It was demanded that the perpetrators of the murder of Mikdat Özeken, who was transported to the Karli village in Yüksekova district of Hakkari and executed at the Battalion Command on September 27, 1994, and whose body has not been located until this date, be found.

ÖZEKEN'S STORY

According to IHD Amed Branch Secretary Ferhat Berkpınar, who described the events based on Mikdat Özeken's brother İrfan Özeken's statements, soldiers under the command of Yüksekova Battalion Commander Mehmet Emin Yurdakul raided the village of Karlı on September 27, 1994, and confessor Kahraman Bilgiç also participated in the raid. He said that they had brought Mikdat Zeken and Münir Sarıtaş, who had travelled from Yüksekova to the village to harvest wood for the winter, with them.

Berkpınar told that during the raid, all the locals were rounded up in the village square and Abdulkerim Yurtseven, 75, was tortured and his ribs and spinal bones were fractured. Berkpınar stated that Yurtseven, Özeken, and Sarıtaş were later taken to the Yüksekova Battalion Command. Berkpınar cited İrfan Özeken as saying; "Abdulkerim Yurtseven died on the route. Since they witnessed the incident, my brother and his friend were cruelly tortured so that they would not speak, and they executed them in the battalion so that they would not talk about it in the event of being released.”

Berkpınar stated that Özeken's mother went to the Battalion Command and was told that "we sent your son to the Hakkari Brigade Command," but after 10 days of persistence, the Hakkari Brigade Command responded, "Your son is in the Yüksekova Battalion Command." Berkpınar stated that when the woman returned to the Yüksekova Battalion Command, Battalion Commander M. Emin Yurdakul told her, "I burned your son to death in this cauldron. If you come back, I'll burn you in the same cauldron."

TURKISH GOVERNMENT FOUND GUILTY

Berkpınar stated that confessor Kahraman Bilgiç received 10,000 Mark from the family in exchange for bringing back Özeken and later left Yüksekova. He noted that Turkey was sentenced to pay compensation in the case presented before the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR).