Turkey: “Addressing disappearances of the past to dispel the clouds for the future”

GENEVA (15 September 2016) – The Working Group on Enforced or Involuntary Disappearances said today that is imperative for the Turkish Government to address past violations and that this is “especially important given the critical period Turkey is living today.”

Presenting the report* on its visit to the country in March 2016, the group of experts noted that so far there has been no political will to recognize and to come to terms with the serious human rights violations occurred in the 1980s and 1990s, including enforced disappearances.

“The current political environment and legal framework, coupled with the so far diffident efforts of the law enforcement and the judiciary to address past enforced disappearances, casts serious doubts on the relatives’ possibility to achieve truth, justice and reparation,” the experts stated.

“Turkey needs to come to terms with its past and turn this page once and for all. This would be particularly important to give a clear signal in the current difficult situation,” they stressed. 

The experts note that important challenges remain to comprehensively address past enforced disappearances and to prevent their recurrence. “Enforced disappearance has not yet been introduced in the legislation as an autonomous crime; there are virtually no convictions for enforced disappearances, the fate and the whereabouts of many disappeared persons is still unknown, and many of the burial sites have not yet been investigated,” observed the experts.

“We also expressed concern at the situation in the south-east of the country, where a wide security operation has been in place since July 2015, situation that may facilitate the occurrence of human rights violations, including enforced disappearances,” they added.

The members underlined that the report presented to the Human Rights Council does not reflect information on the attempted coup of 15 July 2016 or on the situation thereafter. “However, we have jointly with other mandates called on Turkey to uphold its obligations under international human rights law, even in the current time of declared emergency following the attempted coup.”

“The Working Group stands ready to continue closely cooperating with the Government of Turkey and to provide its technical assistance as appropriate,” the experts concluded. 

(*) Check the Working Group’s report on Turkey (A/HRC/33/51/Add.1): http://www.ohchr.org/EN/HRBodies/HRC/RegularSessions/Session33/Pages/ListReports.aspx

ENDS

For more information on the Working Group on Enforced or Involuntary Disappearances, log on to: http://www.ohchr.org/EN/Issues/Disappearances/Pages/DisappearancesIndex.aspx

Check the Declaration on the Protection of All Persons from Enforced Disappearance: http://www.ohchr.org/EN/ProfessionalInterest/Pages/EnforcedDisappearance.aspx

For more information and media requests, please contact Ugo Cedrangolo (+41 22 917 9286 / ucedrangolo@ohchr.org) or write to wgeid@ohchr.org

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