On 20 June 2024, a fire broke out in the village of Köksalan (Tobînî), located in the Çınar (Xana Axpar) district of Diyarbakır (Amed), and quickly spread to the Mazıdağı (Şemrex) district of Mardin (Mêrdîn). Fifteen people lost their lives in the disaster. The fire, reportedly sparked by power lines and intensified by strong winds, raged for hours without any aerial response. Despite urgent calls from local residents and politicians, helicopters and planes did not intervene until the morning hours, by which time villagers were already burying their dead.

The fire caused severe material and emotional devastation across the affected villages. Yet even a year later, electricity and water shortages persist in the region. Residents state that their losses have not been compensated, and that no steps have been taken to heal their wounds.

The fire began around 10:00 p.m. on 20 June, when electrical wires snapped and ignited dry grass. Fueled by strong winds, the flames quickly spread from the village of Köksalan in the Çınar district of Diyarbakır, reaching the nearby villages of Yazçiçeği (Herberê), Bağrık, and Ağaçsever (Botika), and eventually extending to the villages of Yücebağ (Kelekê), Şenyuva (Şevaşî), and Yetkinler (Dirine) in the Mazıdağı district of Mardin. Fifteen people, including one child and two women, lost their lives in the fire. Thousands of acres of cultivated farmland were reduced to ash, and nearly a thousand small livestock were killed.

Despite eyewitness testimonies and photographic evidence pointing to faulty power lines, the electricity distribution company DEDAŞ has not accepted any responsibility for the disaster.

Although four expert reports were submitted during the investigation, no significant progress has been made over the past year. The investigation remains open, but the perpetrators have not been held accountable. Villagers continue to call for justice, insisting that those responsible must be prosecuted.

In the village of Yücebağ, located in the Mazıdağı district, where ten people lost their lives in the fire, a deep sense of sorrow and silence still prevails. Villagers point out that justice has not been delivered in the year that has passed, and say they now refer to every holiday since the fire as a “black holiday.”

Sadık Demir, who lost two of his siblings and many relatives in the fire, tearfully described the immense pain they suffered and the chain of negligence that led to the tragedy. He said, “We want to know why this fire started and who is responsible for it. We are not asking for anything else. We just want justice.”

The fire spread everywhere in an instant with the wind

Sadık Demir described that dark day in these words: “We were drinking tea at home when suddenly we heard a loud explosion. Then the flames engulfed everything. My two brothers, my cousins, and I ran outside. When we saw that two shepherds in the neighboring village were trapped in the middle of the fire, we rushed to help. We got on a tractor and headed toward the fire, but the flames, fueled by the wind, quickly overtook the vehicle. Most of the eight people on board either died or were severely injured.”

As the fire grew out of control, Sadık Demir was forced to turn back. He prevented women and children from entering the danger zone, placed his mother in a vehicle and sent her away, and then survived by taking shelter in an onion field with his aunt.

I realized my brothers had burned the moment I looked up

Sadık Demir also described the chaos that unfolded after the fire: “I ran toward the burning area, shouting my brothers’ names. Along the way, I saw many people who were severely injured. I approached them with a bottle of water. They were unrecognizable, only their belts remained on them. Some villagers mistakenly took my brother’s body, thinking it was their own relative. I searched for him in the fields for about six hours. My father later identified him at the hospital morgue by his fingers.”

Demir added that during the fire, no ambulances entered the village. They had to carry the bodies and the wounded on tractors to the roadside to reach the ambulances. He also noted that the hospital had no burn unit, and the doctors merely issued referrals for transfer.

The helicopters came for show, they flew over us as we carried the dead’

Demir stated that the response to the fire came far too late, and that the helicopter only arrived the next morning as the bodies were being transported: “The fire brigade came late, and the helicopter only flew overhead in the morning. They came just to be seen. If they had arrived in time, maybe so many people would not have died.”

They want us to forget the case

Sadık Demir also noted that the legal process has stalled: “A whole year has passed, but there’s been no progress in court. DEDAŞ is busy intimidating people. We want to know what caused the fire and who is responsible. They want this case to be forgotten. On the day of the fire, the gendarmerie and special operations forces never left Köksalan village. That means they found something but we still don’t know the truth.”

These people died because of negligence

Sultan Demir, a relative of Sadık Demir, said they could not forget what happened. Having lost many young family members in the fire, she expressed her grief with these words: “They were all young, they were all our loved ones. The fields have turned green again, but they will never return. Neither the military nor the helicopters came. Three villages were left on their own. If they had intervened in time, maybe we would not have lost so many lives. These people died because of negligence.”

We will never forget what we lived through

Sultan Demir said that holidays have lost their joy since the fire, and that they now spend every special day visiting the cemetery, emphasizing that nothing feels the same anymore: “A year has passed, but neither our pain has eased nor our problems have been resolved. They still have not revealed why fifteen people died. No one has been held accountable. We will never forget that day, not until the day we die.”