Atakan Mahir (İbrahim Çoban), a commander of the People’s Defense Forces (HPG), fell a martyr during the Turkish army operation in the countryside of Dersim’s Pülümür district on August 11.

After Mahir’s body was taken to the Forensic Medicine Institute in Malatya province, his family members, accompanied by HDP (Peoples’ Democratic Party) deputies, went to the Institute and identified him.

According to reports, the governor and gendarmerie officials subjected the family to an imposition, stating that they would give the body on condition that HDP deputies do not attend the funeral, threatening not to give the body in the contrary case.

The family finally received the body on Monday and set out for their hometown, Aktil village in Elbistan district of Maraş province. The family was strictly pressured to bury the guerrilla commander as soon as they reach the village which was in the meantime heavily blockaded by Turkish military forces.

In addition to hindering mass participation in the funeral, Turkish state forces are also preventing the family from practising the religious duties as per Alevi faith and traditions in the Cemevi (Alevi place of worship) in the village before the burial.