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A village in Turkey’s Kurdish province of Hakkari (Colemerg) has recently been subjected to great pressure by the Turkish military, forcing villagers to abandon their homes, according to a report by Jin News.
Şikeftanî is a village of 50 households in the district of Şemdinli (Şemzînan), near the point where the borders of Turkey, Iran and Iraq converge. As a result of the harassment and blockade the village has been subjected to for the last 40 days, 35 families have already left the village.
The reason for the harassment and blockade is reported to be allegations that explosives found in the car of a police officer in March had come through Şikeftanî.
The villagers told reporters that soldiers were deployed around the village, stopping villagers from going further than 100 metres from their houses. They added that despite the fact that they had contacted the authorities to inform them of the situation, there has as yet been no attempt by any state official to intervene. The villagers are subjected to body searches and criminal record checks each time they leave the village to buy provisions, Jin News reported.
Only 15 families remain in the village which used to house 50 households, and of these, 14 families have been forced to sell their livestock, saying that those who refused to sell up were harassed by the soldiers.
It is also reported that in addition to the harassment by soldiers, the water supply to the village has been cut off for the last 10 days.
