Human Rights Watch and a nongovernmental organization in Turkey have condemned the lack of legal action against public officials due to their role in the death of thousands of people in major earthquakes last year, describing the situation as “deeply troubling” and “unacceptable.”
The earthquakes, which devastated 11 provinces in Turkey’s south and southeast, left more than 53,000 people dead and hundreds of thousands injured or displaced while causing massive devastation.
Although the trials of real estate developers, building inspectors and technical personnel have started in recent months and news of convictions of some of them has begun to emerge, not a single public official, elected mayor or city council member has yet faced trial for their role in approving numerous construction projects that fell far short of safe building standards or for failing to take measures to protect people living in buildings known to have structural problems in a region with a high risk of seismic activity.
HRW and Citizens Assembly, a nongovernmental organization, formerly known as the Helsinki Citizens’ Assembly, promoting human rights, democracy and peace, said on Wednesday that there has been little action despite evidence that officials authorized and approved defective buildings that collapsed.
Only 3 public officials investigated
Expert reports commissioned by public prosecutors in regions hardest hit by the earthquakes, and seen by HRW, identify municipal officials, alongside private contractors and builders, responsible for defects in buildings that collapsed in the southern province of Kahramanmaraş and other places. Citizens’ Assembly has asked state authorities to provide information about the number of cases in which permission has been granted, as Turkish law requires, to pursue a criminal investigation against a public official. Citizens’ Assembly had received information that permission to investigate just three public officials has been granted, with the authorities for the most part refusing to provide answers.
In Turkey, the investigation and prosecution of public officials for crimes committed in the course of their duties is subject to a law requiring state government authorities, depending on the status of the individual in question, to grant permission for the process to start. Prosecutors have no right to proceed with an investigation without this permission, regardless of the amount or quality of evidence implicating a public official in a crime. They must first send the evidence recommending criminal investigation to the relevant administrative authority, which will then conduct a pre-investigation of its own to determine whether to give the prosecutor permission to proceed.
“It is sobering for citizens in the earthquake-hit region to find out that cases against municipal officials who signed off on defective building projects seem to be barely moving forward,” said Hugh Williamson, Europe and Central Asia director at HRW. “Over a year after the earthquakes, the failure to demonstrate progress damages public trust in the government’s commitment to securing justice for the victims.”
In January 2024, Citizens’ Assembly filed information requests with the Interior Ministry, the governor’s offices of the 11 provinces in southeastern Turkey devastated by the earthquakes and the 46 relevant district governor’s offices in those provinces. Citizens Assembly asked how many applications to pursue criminal investigations prosecutors had filed and how many investigations they had been permitted under provisions of the Law on Trials of Public Officials into current or now retired appointed officials and elected officials such as mayors and city council members for their role in licensing and overseeing deadly construction projects or failing to take adequate steps to mitigate the risk of harm.
While in four cases, the governor’s offices and a district governor’s office said permission on whether to investigate is pending, the Islahiye district governor’s office in Gaziantep province said permission to investigate three public officials has been granted, and in two of those cases the decision is being appealed. The majority of authorities, however, failed to provide any data, claiming that such information falls outside the scope of permitted freedom of information requests or concerns confidential information.
HRW also conducted research in the city of Kahramanmaraş, in Kahramanmaraş province, one of the places most affected, examining the progress of investigations and trials of private contractors and technical personnel responsible for collapsed buildings in which there was huge loss of life.
Victim blames public officials
A man who was rescued from block E of the Kahramanmaraş Ebrar housing complex reflected the views of many, saying: “The first person I blame here is not the contractor. First of all, I blame those who gave permission to build the block. Whoever has the smallest finger in the permitting processes, allowed the building to be built, and turned a blind eye to its inspection, I blame them.”
HRW examined 14 expert reports concerning large apartment buildings in Kahramanmaraş that collapsed, killing most of their residents, as well as six more concerning buildings in other provinces. Of the 14 commissioned by the Kahramanmaraş Chief Public Prosecutor’s Office from university construction engineering departments, all but one report point to serious failures by builders to adhere to applicable technical standards, with municipal building department officials apparently turning a blind eye by issuing building permits for flawed projects and later signing off on inadequate and unsafe finished construction.
These expert reports have provided the basis for indictments of private actors and give ample basis for investigations of public officials, many of whom are identified by name, HRW and Citizens’ Assembly said.
Justice remains elusive
The lack of investigations into public officials severely hampers proceedings in these cases, HRW and Citizens’ Assembly said. Courts hearing the cases are being prevented from determining the full background of how builders on trial were able to flout applicable building regulations to secure permits, evade thorough inspection and sell to the public buildings that were known to be unsafe.
Municipalities have also failed over many years in their duty to take bold steps to mitigate the risk of earthquakes to the local population, ignoring the recommendations outlined in the reports of Turkey’s Disaster Management Directorate (AFAD). These reports have identified areas of cities at risk and in need of detailed ground studies and advised that municipalities should evacuate defective buildings.
“The Turkish authorities should permit criminal investigations capable of resulting in the prosecution of all responsible public officials alongside private actors for their role in earthquake deaths,” Williamson said. “Beyond that the government should undertake a wider inquiry into municipalities and any other relevant public authorities for their failure to take measures to mitigate the deadly risk of earthquakes, despite the available recommendations from Turkey’s Disaster Management Directorate, AFAD.”
Turkey has a history of failing to ensure that both private and public sector actors responsible for defective construction projects that have collapsed in earthquakes have been held accountable for their failures. Regarding the 1999 earthquake in the Marmara region of western Turkey, in which more than 17,000 people died, media reported on the very limited and slow proceedings against both private and very few public officials charged with misconduct. Most cases resulted in penalties being converted to fines or trials being dropped when they exceeded the statute of limitations.
Professional bodies such as the Turkish Union of Engineers and Architects’ Chambers have also condemned the impunity resulting from flawed and timed-out trials of those responsible for substandard building practices that proved lethal when the Marmara earthquake struck.