Two young women activists interrupted the live broadcast of the political talk show “Caren Miosga” on German television on Sunday night, holding up banners featuring the names and faces of murdered Kurdish journalists Gulîstan Tara and Hêro Bahadîn.
The activists stood up at the beginning of the show and chanted “Jin, Jiyan, Azadî” (Woman, Life, Freedom). When moderator Caren Miosga asked about their aim, they replied, “We demand that German media breaks its silence.”
In a statement published after the protest, the activists, members of the ‘Women Defend Rojava’ (WDR) organisation, said their action was in remembrance of all Kurdish journalists killed by the Turkish state. They also criticised the German media for its “ignorance” and “silence” that followed these murders.
The statement further stressed the importance of defending press freedom, stating, “Where journalists are murdered, freedom of the press dies”, and calling on all journalists to “defend it”. The activists highlighted the attack against Gulîstan Tara and Hêro Bahadîn on 23 August as part of a “systematic murder policy against the opposition press”.
In recent years, numerous Kurdish journalists have been targeted by Turkish attacks. In October 2022, Kurdish journalist and women’s rights activist Nagihan Akarsel was shot dead outside her home in Silêmanî. More recently, in July 2024, Murad Mîrza Ibrahim was killed in an attack on a vehicle carrying journalists from Çira TV and Çira FM in Sinjar (Şengal). Another incident in northern Syria on 23 August 2023 saw a Turkish drone attack that killed Necmeddîn Feysel Hec Sînan, the driver of a Jin TV vehicle, while journalist Delîla Egîd was seriously injured.
