The charges pressed in the Cizre Chief Public Prosecutor’s Office for close to 150 deaths in the basements of 3 separate buildings during the self-government resistances in Şırnak’s Cizre district between December 14, 2015 and March 2, 2016 are being dismissed. The families who lost their relatives had pressed charges through the Libertarian Lawyers Platform (Özgürlükçü Hukukçular Platformu - ÖHP), and they are all dismissed with the same reason now.

The Chief Public Prosecutor’s Office has issued dismissals for 34 of the appeals up to date, claiming that those who lost their lives had been “members of a terrorist organization”. The prosecutor dismissed the cases on the grounds that “the incidents have justification compliant with the law”. The decree claims that the security forces partaking in the operations had been acting in compliance within the bounds of “legitimate defense” as defined in the Article 25 of the Turkish Penal Code. The prosecutor also claimed that there has been no evidence to suggest the bounds of “legitimate defense” were exceeded, despite the fact that many of the deceased had lost bodily integrity and many bodies are still missing.

Families’ lawyers from the ÖHP have appealed the dismissals and stressed that the government is acting against their obligations to the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR). One of the families’ lawyers Nevroz Uysal said they have 110 cases at hand. Uysal said all the cases have been dismissed with the same reasons and that the prosecutor’s office does not have any evidence other than anonymous witness testimonies. Uysal added that anonymous witness testimonies are added to the cases of people of all ages and genders who have been killed so that Turkey can come out of unharmed, and pointed to the discrepancies in the case files.

Uysal said the case files don’t include how the deaths occurred and continued: “Voice recordings, radio communication and armored vehicle camera footage are not included in the files. There was no healthy investigation in the scene. The location the prosecutor’s office found the bodies doesn’t match the information provided by the families. The clothes of the deceased have been removed, but they are neither inspected nor given to the families.”

Uysal stated that considering the deaths “legitimate defense” is not right, and added the following regarding the statement included in the decrees that “proportional force was implemented”: “Were the fires that broke out caused by artillery fire by the security forces, or was it something else? Why weren’t the fires put out? Why didn’t the prosecutor’s office issue a statement on these fires? Trial has been prevented through use of disproportionate force. The right to life has been violated for all the people here. The sole duty of the state is to protect its citizens. Even if they are “members of a terrorist organization”, the state is obligated to try and capture them alive. If the force used was proportionate, why wasn’t there even one person who was captured alive? Why do the bodies have dozens of bullet wounds? If the force used was proportionate, how can there be so much death and destruction?”

Uysal pointed out that the most fundamental duty of the prosecutors is to “create justification” for the killings and added: “The victims are all made out to look like suspects now. Even those who don’t have the secret witness testimonies are seen as ‘terrorists’ just because they were in the city at the time.” Uysal said that they had made appeals to the ECHR before the Libertarian Lawyers Association (Özgürlükçü Hukukçular Derneği - ÖHD) and Mesopotamia Lawyers Association (Mezopotamya Hukukçular Derneği - MHD) were shut down by Statutory Decrees and continued: “The ECHR has organized these according to type. The ECHR’s demand to join the cases has been approved. Turkey responded to the court in its own way, even though it was delayed. But these responses are not enough. Right now, we are preparing our appeal to Turkey’s response.