Numerous people remembered the victims of the Gazi massacre on Sunday and demanded the punishment of the perpetrators. 28 years after the massacre of the Alevi community perpetrated from 12 to 15 March 1995 in Istanbul's Sultangazi and Ümraniye districts, those responsible for the crime still enjoy impunity. "The shooters and masterminds are at liberty and in the protective custody of impunity granted to them by the Turkish state. This state of affairs must end. We will fight for this," said a statement by the ‘12 March Platform’, which together with Alevi groups organised the commemoration march.

The demonstration started in front of the Gazi Cemevi (Alevi place of worship) and ended at the local cemetery where most of the victims of the pogrom are buried. The route led, as it does every year, past those places in the neighbourhood where the massacre took place. At each place, a pause was made and those present laid red carnations. Among the participants of the commemoration march were also members and associations of the Peoples' Democratic Party (HDP), the Socialist Party of the Oppressed (ESP) and the Labour Party (EMEP).

Many people carried pictures of the victims and held up placards with inscriptions such as "Murderer State". A spokesperson for the platform called out the names of those killed, and the crowd replied each time, "Here!" The names of the provinces hit in the severe earthquakes of 6 February were also shouted. "Government, resign" could be heard from the demonstration after each mention.

The commemoration was accompanied by a large police contingent, which relied on conflict from the beginning. The police intervened in the demonstration several times to confiscate allegedly banned posters and flags.

A rally was held at the Hüseyin Altın Park, where Erkan Şimşek, who lost his sister Dilek Şimşek in the massacre, recalled the political atmosphere of the nineties and the circumstances of the Gazi massacre, in which at least 22 people were murdered and hundreds more injured by ultranationalists and the police.

It all started when "unknown perpetrators" from nationalist circles hijacked a taxi in Gazi on the night of 12 March and cut the driver's throat. As they drove by, they shot indiscriminately with automatic weapons into Alevi cafés, cultural houses and pastry shops, killing one person and injuring countless others. The vehicle was then set on fire.

Protests then broke out in front of a police station 200 metres from the scene. The peaceful demonstration escalated when a military tank drove into the crowd. The "security forces" murdered 20 demonstrators, five of them in Ümraniye, by targeted gunfire and wounded at least 300 others during these days. The pogrom was accompanied by systematic mass arrests, house searches and police raids in several neighbourhoods of Istanbul. Some of those detained, like thousands of other people in Turkey, are still considered "disappeared" today.

"State terror has always been part of everyday life in Gazi," said Erkan Şimşek. Especially in the 1990s, he said, the policy of oppression escalated. "The state tried to crush the revolutionary groups in Gazi and intimidate the democratic population by deepening the Alevi-Sunni polarisation of society.”

“To date, only two police officers involved in the massacre have been convicted. Adem Albayrak received three and a half years in prison for the murder of four people at a show trial, while his colleague Mehmet Gündoğdu, who killed two people from Gazi, got off with an eighteen-month sentence. But those actually responsible have not been brought to justice until today," Şimşek said, naming their names: Tansu Çiller, then Prime Minister of Turkey, who is seen as responsible not only for the Gazi massacre but more generally for the pogroms of the 1990s; Nahit Menteşe, Interior Minister of the Çiller government; Hanefi Avcı, Chief of the Directorate of Police Intelligence; Necdet Menzir, Istanbul Police Commissioner; Mehmet Ağar, Chief of the General Directorate of Police; Hayri Kozakçıoğlu, Governor of Istanbul as well as their assailants.

Following the demonstration, the crowd marched to the Gazi cemetery and commemorated the victims.