The Armutlu massacre trial started
[Taken from Ekmek ve Adalet ("Bread and Justice") weekly magazine, May 20, 2002, No.9, page 7]
The trial has started concerning the November 5 and 13 (2001) attacks in
Armutlu directed at the Death Fast resistance, in which four revolutionaries
were murdered. But as with previous massacres, this trial is not a trial of
those who carried out the massacre, it is a trial of those who survived the massacre.
With regard to November 13, the State Security Court No 6 has held the first
court appearance: Selma Kubat, Guzin Tolga, Eylem Goktas and Gamze Turan
were brought from Bakirkoy Prison for Women and Children, while Zeki Dogan,
Sinan Toku , Ahmet Guzel and Vedat Celik were not brought to the hearing
from prison on the grounds that "notification was not received". Moreover,
Hakki Simsek, Ozkan Guzel and Serap Boyoglu, who were charged but are not
currently imprisoned, also appeared in court.
While about a hundred people who had come to observe the trial were outside,
unable to enter the building, the prisoners shouted "Long live our Death
Fast resistance!" as they were being removed from the prison vehicles.
At the hearing, the prisoners presented their defence in both oral and
written form.
In their defence, the prisoners bore witness to the massacre that took place
in Armutlu. They described in detail how in both the first and the second
operation the same bloodthirsty behaviour was displayed, with the police
shouting, "We're going to kill you like dogs" while they threw gas canisters
aimed at causing suffocation, took careful aim and fired their guns.
Witnesses again and again reported how, just like on December 19, 2000,
shots were fired without any prior warning being given, and gas, nerve gas
and dozens of different types of bomb were used. And the witnesses also
stressed that this was done by those who carried out the massacre, not by
those who are now on trial.
Two of the murderers also made an appearance at the court hearing. When they
should have been sitting in the dock as the accused, the policemen Yusuf
Erturk and Necdet Urger were in court as the aggrieved parties on the basis
of an illegal document, and in court they mouthed a defence consisting of
lies that others had made them memorise.
Word for word, their defence statements were the same, and in their
inadequate attempts to whitewash the massacre they said peculiar things
like, "I fell", or "I fainted", as though they wanted to arouse pity for
themselves and as though they were not the ones who had committed murder.
Behic Asci, one of the lawyers present at the hearing, stated that no proof
had been offered for the claims they were making and he said, "This is an
attempt to settle scores with those who started and carried out Death Fast
actions in order to protest against the F-Type prisons." He called for those
imprisoned to be released.
When the appeal for their release was not accepted and the next hearing was
postponed to 9:35 on August 28, 2002, the prisoners again shouted slogans
and denunciations as they left the courtroom.
Murder Then Prosecute
This is a classic example of the oligarchy's approach to the law. From
Ulucanlar to Burdur, from December 19 to Armutlu, it was not the murderers
who were accused. Despite this, it was not possible to hide the truth. Their
faces and hands were polluted at every trial they started in order to
whitewash the murderers, and the truth came crashing down on the heads of
those who committed massacres.
There was nothing in the Armutlu massacre that was a big secret for anybody.
In front of everyone, with the accompaniment by TV cameras, a city
neighbourhood was surrounded, showered with bombs and bullets and hundreds
of its people choked by gas fumes.
It is the duty of everyone, especially jurists and the defenders of rights
and freedoms, to frustrate the "murder and then prosecute" games and to
shout out the truth in the face of the murderers.
Background information on Armutlu massacre, click here