The court case of the 1993 military operation in the Kurdish-majority district of Lice (Licê) in Diyarbakır (Amed) province, in which at least 14 civilians were killed and numerous houses and other buildings in the district were badly burnt, was dropped 30 years later on the grounds that there was no longer any surviving defendants, journalist Ruken Hatun Turhallı reported on Tuesday.
The military operation, known today as the Lice Massacre, was carried out in response to the shooting and killing of a Turkish brigadier general in Lice on 22 October 1993.
The case was filed just before the expiration of the statute of limitations, 20 years after the incident. In 2018, the court dismissed the case against one of the two defendants, who had led the operation, due to his death. The remaining defendant was acquitted on the grounds that there was insufficient evidence linking him to the crimes and passed away in August 2022 while the appeal process was open at the Court of Cassation.
The court made the decision to dismiss the case in May, however, the ruling was not communicated to the involved parties until recently, VOA Turkey reported.
Victims of the Lice massacre are outraged over the 20-year delayed opening of the case and the fact that only two individuals were accused despite the involvement of thousands of soldiers in the two-day operation.
The only person who has been sentenced in connection with the incident is Mehmet Emin Özkan, who was tried separately for the murder of the brigadier general and sentenced to life imprisonment. However, the witnesses who testified against Özkan later retracted their statements, saying that they had been given under torture. Özkan’s request for a retrial was accepted, but he remains in jail.
After 27 years of imprisonment, Özkan is seriously ill, and calls by the Peoples’ Democratic Party (HDP) and rights organisations for his release for poor health remain unanswered.
US-based international organisation Human Rights Watch says the Lice incident stands as one of the most severe human rights abuses committed by the Turkish Armed Forces during the Turkish-Kurdish conflict in 1993.
