Maat: Turkey disavows all international obligations related to enforced disappearance

Akil: Erdogan is practicing repressive tools against opponents in order to stay in power

Today, August 30 of each year marks the International Day of the Victims of Enforced Disappearance, which has become a global problem and is no longer restricted to a particular region of the world, which made the United Nations General Assembly express its concern in particular about the increase in cases of enforced or involuntary disappearances in different regions of the world. World, including arrest, detention and kidnapping.

The report of the Working Group on Enforced Disappearance has expressed its concern about allegations related to the practice of extrajudicial kidnapping in Turkey, since the failed coup attempt in July 2016, the Turkish regime has escalated its repressive practices against opposition parties and groups with arrest campaigns and many violations that have escalated under the Emergency Law. Which was imposed after the failed coup, and then made matters worse by the application of the anti-terrorism law, according to which many human rights were violated.

The toll of the enforced disappearances came during 2018, (940) cases of disappearance, and nearly 3,248 people were killed and buried in 253 mass graves, and the refusal to surrender their bodies to their families, which illustrates Turkey’s use of repressive methods and brutal killings with the aim of threatening opponents. There is no guarantee of trials. Justice and the kidnapping of opponents for long days and subjecting them to torture, then appearing guilty of terrorist cases.

For his part, Ayman Aqil, head of the Maat Foundation, said that Turkey has not only practiced enforced disappearance within the borders of its country, but also outside its borders, as, in cooperation with the Malaysian authorities, two Turkish men residing in Malaysia were kidnapped and arbitrarily arrested and deprived of their right to a fair trial after they were handed over to Turkey and detained there. The two men were arrested by the Malaysian authorities and extradited to Turkey, detained in an unknown location, and then transferred to Denizli prison in June 2017.

Aqil added that Turkey refuses to sign the International Convention for the Protection of All Persons from Enforced Disappearance in order not to provide a cover for protection for politicians, dissidents, human rights activists and civil society organizations for enforced disappearances in Turkey and to ensure that this authority uniquely exercises repressive tools in order to remain in power.