Bar associations, lawyers groups and human rights organizations in Turkey are denouncing authorities for delaying the repatriation of the bodies of two Kurdish journalists who were killed in an apparent Turkish drone strike in northern Syria, the Stockholm Center for Freedom reported.
The Diyarbakır Bar Association said in a statement that the families of Nazım Daştan and Cihan Bilgin, along with lawmakers and civil society representatives, have been waiting at the Habur border gate for nearly 48 hours to cross into Iraq’s Kurdistan region to retrieve the bodies. The group argued that the delay obstructed the journalists’ “right to burial” and their families’ “right to mourn.”
“Under humanitarian law, the treatment of the deceased, burial and mourning rights have clear protections,” the association said, citing the Geneva Conventions and rulings by the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) that regard failure to release a body as a potential violation of Article 8 of the European Convention on Human Rights.
Journalists Daştan, 32, and Bilgin, 29, were killed on December 19 near the Tishrin Dam, east of Aleppo, while covering clashes between Ankara-backed forces and US-supported Kurdish fighters.
Although Turkey has been accused in several media reports of deliberately killing the journalists in a targeted strike by an armed drone, the Justice and Development Party (AKP) government has remained silent in the face of these allegations.
The Human Rights Association (İHD) Diyarbakır branch, which also released a statement, said an appeal had been made to the Turkish Foreign Ministry and parliament’s Human Rights Commission but that there had been no response. The group described the situation as a “process that has turned into psychological torture.”
“The families of Cihan Bilgin and Nazım Daştan have the right to bury their loved ones according to their beliefs and traditions,” the İHD said, urging authorities to end the delays.
The Lawyers for Freedom Association (ÖHD) further called on all bar associations, lawyers groups and democratic public institutions to speak out against what it described as an arbitrary restriction on fundamental rights.