A Turkish court argued in a detailed verdict released on Monday there was no definitive evidence that the 1993 arson attack which killed nine members of a Kurdish family in the Altınova (Vartinis) hamlet in Turkey’s eastern province of Muş (Mûş) was committed with political, racial, or religious intent, thus not constituting a crime against humanity.
On 3 October 1993, nine people from the same family, seven of whom were children, were killed when their house was set on fire following allegations that they had “aided and abetted an illegal terrorist organisation”.
The only surviving family member, Aysel Öğüt, repeated criminal complaints throughout the years, stating that the house was set on fire by the soldiers, complaints which eventually brought about an investigation process in 2006 lasting eight years. A lawsuit was finally filed in 2013, twenty years after the incident, which became known as the ‘Vartinis massacre’.
The case was dismissed on the grounds of statute of limitations in December. The Court also lifted the red notice and arrest warrant previously issued against Bülent Karaoğlu, a former gendarmerie captain and the only defendant in the case, who did not attend the hearings.
According to the detailed verdict, the court acknowledged that the fire resulted from the defendant’s orders. However, due to the lack of defence from the defendant following the Supreme Court’s decision to overturn, the panel of judges did not assess the defendant’s role and responsibility in the incident.
In response to the victims and their lawyers’ requests for the defendant to be tried under the genocide and crimes against humanity provisions of the 5237 numbered Turkish Penal Code , effective in 2005, the court maintained that no one could be punished for an act not considered a crime by the law in effect at the time of its commission.
It further stated there was no definitive evidence beyond doubt that the massacre was committed with the special intent required by law, such as political, philosophical, racial, or religious motives.
The decision has been appealed by the victims’ families. The appeal to the Supreme Court highlighted the refusal of legal and non-legal reasons for an effective trial on this tragic and severe case. It emphasised that the killing of nine people by burning should be considered a crime against humanity under national or international legislation, arguing that statute limitations should not apply to such crimes.
Vartinis massacre
The incident occurred during the 1990s, when the Kurdish conflict was at its height, and the government’s practice of burning Kurdish-majority villages as part of its “anti-PKK operations” – referring to the Kurdistan Workers’ Party – was commonplace.
Before the Vartinis massacre, a soldier was killed in the region and Turkish forces blamed the villagers for it. The houses in the village were set on fire that night. Most of the villagers could escape. But the Öğüt family could not.
It was also reported that on the day of the massacre that the soldiers came to the village and threatened the villagers by saying: “ We will burn your village tonight.”
As their house was set on fire, the couple Nasır and Eşref Öğüt died together with their seven children, the oldest of whom was 12 and the youngest was only three years old.
