On July 2, 1993, yet another massacre targeted defenseless members of a religious minority in Turkey. On that day, a group of Alevi intellectuals were publicly burned alive by pious Muslims at a hotel in the city of Sivas.
The perpetrators still remain unpunished. Moreover, many defense lawyers have had prosperous careers in Turkish politics. Alevis across Turkey and the Diaspora once again commemorated the victims on July 2, the 27th anniversary of the massacre. But the judiciary system and the government of Turkey refuse to secure justice for the victims and their families.
On July 1, for instance, a parliamentary motion that was presented by an opposition MP and that called for an investigation into the massacre was rejected during a meeting at Turkey’s Parliament by the votes of the ruling Justice and Development (AKP) Party, its ally, Nationalist Movement Party (MHP), and the opposition Good (IYI) Party.
The motion was presented by Zeynel Özen of the opposition Peoples’ Democratic Party (HDP) and called on the parliament to shed light on the Sivas massacre and bring the perpetrators to account. The motion also gave information as to what has happened to the perpetrators in 27 years since the massacre.
“The injustices after the Sivas Madımak massacre have enormously increased the pain [of the families of the victims] of the massacre,” it said.
Some of the murderers against whom lawsuits were opened have never been found. It was later found out that some of these murderers continued living in Sivas and although there were search warrants against them, they got married, served in the military, worked and got driving licenses.
Cafer Erçakmak, one of the perpetrators who was sought, lost his life in his home 100 meters away from the governor’s office in Sivas. Some of the murderers were allowed to leave Turkey easily despite search warrants against them.
Another murderer, Vahit Kaynar, was caught on the border of Poland as he had been sought with Interpol’s Red Notice but was later released because Turkey did not request his extraction within forty days. Those who were allowed to go abroad were not returned to Turkey because they were accused only of violating the law on assemblies and demonstrations but not of committing crimes against humanity. Then the lawsuit finally dropped due to statute of limitation.
Lastly, Ahmet Turan Kılıç, another defendant, was pardoned by president [Recep Tayyip] Erdogan due to his age and health problems.
The motion called on the parliament to “reveal the facts behind the Sivas massacre, where people in the Madımak Hotel were brutally murdered; expose those who have kept the murderers unpunished despite judicial decisions; investigate the documents that have been hidden in the state archives for years and share them with the public; reveal the real perpetrators behind curtains in order to reduce the sufferings of those who lost their loved ones in the massacre.”
Alevis are a religious community in Turkey whose faith and places of worship, cem houses, are not officially recognized by the government. While the government claims that Alevism “is a sect of Islam,” many Alevis state that their faith is not only outside of Islam but many of its teachings are at variance with Islam.
Many Alevi individuals and organizations in and outside of Turkey have been legally struggling to get recognition for Alevism as an authentic faith distinct from Islam and not a sect of Islam. And it is this distinction between Islam and Alevism that appears to make the Turkish state and many Muslims in Turkey target and persecute Alevis not only during the era of republican Turkey but also during the Ottoman Empire.
Alevi Massacre at Madımak, Sivas
July 2, 1993 was one of the darkest days in Turkey’s history in which a cultural festival in the province of Sivas was turned into a massacre by Muslims.
Aziz Nesin, a well-known Turkish author, political activist, satirist and philanthropist, was one of the participants of the event. Nesin was also a leftist and an atheist from a Muslim family and wrote more than 100 books, chiefly novels containing criticism of politics and society. And due to his political views, he was jailed several times and placed under surveillance by the Turkish National Security Service.
Nesin was also an open critic of Islam and in 1993, he committed the most “inexcusable” crime that a person could ever commit on earth: He got Salman Rushdie’s novel Satanic Verses translated into Turkish and started to get it published in a newspaper on May 26. This attempt of Nesin received outrage from Muslims across the country.
On July 1, a cultural event named after the Alevi poet Pir Sultan Abdal in which several well-known authors and artists –mostly Alevi intellectuals –participated started in the province of Sivas.
Ironically, Turkey was not ruled by an Islamist government back then. On June 23, the coalition government of the True Path Party (DYP), a non-Islamist, centre-right party, and the Social Democratic Populist Party (SHP), an Ataturkist, centre-left party — under the leadership of Tansu Ciller, the first female Prime Minister of Turkey– took power.
The authors and poets who participated in the event organized an autograph and talk session on July 2 in the morning. The local press, however, covered the events in a way that targeted particularly Nesin. The newspaper, Bizim Sivas, for instance, had the headline “They sell snails in a Muslim neighborhood,” a Turkish saying which means “In a Muslim land, they dare do things that are incompatible with Islam.”
During an interview on the same day, a journalist told Nesin that “Muslims are disturbed by his statements such as ‘I have no religion’ and by the translations of Rushdie’s book.” Nesin responded:
“I am never disturbed by Muslims. But Muslims should also get used to me and they should not be disturbed by me either. I don’t have to be a Muslim. But I respect Muslims and all religions. If someone worships stones in a decent and genuine way, I respect them. It is none of my business. It is their issue. I respect Muslims so much because I come from a very religious Muslim family… But if someone insults [Islam], I won’t tell them not to or if someone insults Christianity, I won’t tell them not to either. You should respond [to the criticisms]. Civilized persons offer an answer if they are exposed to an injustice. But not by attacking, killing or snarling. If they are civilized, they will do what civilization requires.”
When the interviewer told Nesin that Muslims were provoked by comments about Islam’s prophet Mohammed’s wives, Nesin said:
They can be provoked. Then they should provide an answer… But a human does not attack when provoked… Civilized people, enlightened people show their reaction through writing, speaking and expressing themselves. They just don’t attack. They don’t attempt to kill, hit or beat people…
Muslims, Christians, and other believers should be for debate. No result can come out of fights. They might kill Aziz Nesin; another Nesin will emerge. Another Ahmet, Mehmet will emerge. For humans have brains; they think. You should counter an opinion with your own opinion. You can refute and ruin an argument with a counter argument. But you do so with your ideas, not by killing.
But Nesin’s opponents had a different plan. After the Friday prayers, the crowds started to gather in the city centre and started to march, chanting slogans: “Sivas will be the grave of Aziz.”
Then the crowd headed for the Madımak Hotel where the Alevi intellectuals were staying during the event. They were chanting “Down with secularism,” “We want sharia” and “Allahu akbar.”
The hotel was besieged; there were thousands of Muslims around it. And they would not disperse. The massacre started with the burning of cars in front of the hotel. And the mob set fire to the hotel. As the chants of “Allahu akbar” were being chanted, the fire was spreading. Only a small group of soldiers and police officers were dispatched to the area and as the deaths of the people at the hotel were approaching, the security forces just stood idly by.
In a video footage the perpetrators are heard saying “Burn it down!,” “My Allah, this is your fire,” “This is the hell fire in which kafirs will burn!,” and “Turkey is Muslim.”
Luckily, Nesin, who was 78 back then, survived the fire. But the threats, angry protests and the fire lasted for hours. As time passed by and the besieged desperately waited to be saved; the state authorities did nothing to protect them. By the time the soldiers controlled the attack, 33 intellectuals, mostly Alevis, as well as two hotel staff had already lost their lives in the fire.
The statements made by state authorities were even more shocking than the massacre itself. Tansu Çiller, then Prime Minister, said: “Thank God, our citizens outside of the hotel have not been harmed.”
Süleyman Demirel, then President, said: “This is an isolated incident. There was heavy provocation. As a result of this provocation, people were effervesced. The security forces did their best… There were no conflicts between groups. There was loss of life due to a hotel’s being set on fire.”
Mehmet Gazioğlu, then interior minister, said: “People were effervesced and showed a reaction as a result of Aziz Nesin’s known provocation of the faith of the people.”
Just like in other massacres or deadly attacks committed against minorities in Turkey, the perpetrators of this massacre also got away with their crimes. In 2012, the case against those accused in connection with the massacre was dropped. The court agreed with defense lawyers that the statute of limitations meant the case had expired.
When the trial got started in 1993, one of the defense lawyers was Şevket Kazan, who later became the Justice Minister of the next government of Turkey and even visited the detainees in prison during his tenure as minister.
Many other lawyers of the defendants later joined the current ruling AKP Party and even became MPs or mayors in the country. Journalist Burak Bekdil reported:
“One Sivas massacre defense attorney became the justice minister when the ruling Justice and Development Party’s (AKP) earlier predecessor, Welfare Party (later banned by the Constitutional Court on charges of attempting to topple Turkey’s secular regime) came to power in 1996. One was appointed as a member of the Constitutional Court by the AKP. One became an AKP state minister. Two became Erdogan’s personal lawyers. Four became AKP members of parliament (MPs), with one AKP MP becoming a member of Parliament’s constitutional commission. Three became AKP mayors. Two became AKP’s provincial chairmen and two, deputy provincial chairmen. Two became directors at the AKP-controlled Istanbul municipality. And one was appointed by the AKP as a board member of the state-run news agency, Anatolia.”
The 2 July 1993 Sivas massacre was just another page of the history of Islamic jihad. In order to understand the root cause of the problem, the historical continuity of jihad and the ideology behind it should also be understood. Such massacres are not isolated incidents in the Muslim world; they have been common acts of Islamic supremacists for centuries.
It is true that massacres have happened in many other places across the world. But what makes Turkey a “unique” place is that the state protects the perpetrators and enables them to get away with their crimes. And in many cases, the state itself is the perpetrator.
Those who lost their lives at the hotel: Muhibe Akarsu – (35, guest) , Muhlis Akarsu – (45, artist) , Gülender Akça – (25, artist) , Metin Altıok – (52, poet, writer) , Ahmet Alan – (22, artist) , Mehmet Atay – (25, journalist) , Sehergül Ateş – (30, artist) , Behçet Aysan – (44, poet) , Erdal Ayrancı – (35, movie director) , Asım Bezirci – (66, researcher, writer) , Belkıs Çakır- (18, artist) , Serpil Canik –(19, artist) , Muammer Çiçek – (26, actor) , Nesimi Çimen – (67, poet, artist) , Carina Cuanna – (23, Dutch journalist) , Serkan Doğan – (19, artist) , Hasret Gültekin – (23, poet, artist), Murat Gündüz – (22, artist) , Gülsüm Karababa – (22, artist) , Uğur Kaynar – (37, poet) , Asaf Koçak – (35, caricaturist) , Koray Kaya – (12) , Menekşe Kaya – (17, artist) , Handan Metin – (20, artist) , Sait Metin –(23, artist) , Huriye Özkan – (22, artist) , Yeşim Özkan – (20, artist) , Ahmet Öztürk – (21, hotel employee) , Ahmet Özyurt – (21, artist) , Nurcan Şahin – (18, artist) , Özlem Şahin – (17, artist) , Asuman Sivri – (16, artist) , Yasemin Sivri – (19, artist) , Edibe Sulari – (40, artist) , İnci Türk – (22, artist) , Kenan Yılmaz – (21, hotel employee).
Uzay Bulut is a Turkish journalist and political analyst formerly based in Ankara.
Savvy Kafir says
The cruelty and savagery of Islam’s True Believers know no bounds.
Allowing Muslims to live among us in the civilized world is just unforgivably stupid. For centuries, that was obvious to non-Muslims throughout the West. It still is obvious to anyone who is paying attention, and who hasn’t drunk the Kool-Aid of political correctness.
elee says
Remember them. Actual footage of the event can still be accessed on the internet; it is horrific. If you’re celebrating a nation’s birthday today, view this and see what Muslims wish to inflict on us.
Politicallyincorrectistruth says
A day after the incident, 35 people were arrested. Then the number of detainees increased to 190. A total of 124 out of the 190 defendants were charged with “attempting to establish a religious state by changing the constitutional order” and were indicted on charges. The first hearing of the case, publicly known as the Sivas Massacre Trial, Ankara State Security Court No. 1, was held on 21 October 1993. On 26 December 1994 a verdict was reached in the case of the 124 defendants: 15 years in prison for 22 suspects, 10 years in prison for 3 defendants, 3 years and 9 months for 54 suspects, 2 years and 4 months for 6 suspects, and the acquittal of 37 of the defendants. Another 14 suspects were sentenced to 15 years in prison. The remaining 33 defendants were charged with 35 counts of murder. After lengthy court proceedings, the State Security Court sentenced the 33 defendants to death on 28 November 1997 for their roles in the massacre; 31 of these sentences were upheld in a 2001 appeal.[7] When Turkey overturned the death penalty just over a year later in 2002, the sentences were commuted. Each defendant received 35 life sentences, one for each murder victim and additional time for other crimes. These 31 convicts are currently the only ones still serving time for the crimes; the other defendants were paroled early or released after completing their sentences. In January 2020, Ahmet Turan Kılıc, who at first was sentenced to death for his involvement in the Sivas massacre, was granted a commutation of his sentence by Recep Tayyip Erdogan. As a result his sentence was removed.[8]
gravenimage says
Thanks for that information.
gravenimage says
Turkey: When Alevis Were Burned Alive
………….
I never heard about this atrocity–despite my being an avid follower of the news. Just horrifying. Thank you, Ms. Bulut.
I love Iblis says
Only communists are defending the rights of non-muslim people in Turkey. Especially Alevis, since they are the biggest non-sunni group. But you people still hate communism and equate it with islam.
deavman says
They do for their self-interests. Communists are bad for everyone except the leaders and their entourage. You say that we equate it with Islam, that would be wrong, it is right after Islam in cruelty, #’s of dead, loss of freedom and control of every aspect of one’s life. So you are right to challenge the assertion that it is equivalent to Islam, but it is damn close.
gravenimage says
Communists and pious Muslims see each other as rivals to their own totalitarianism.
LB says
I’ve not heard of this incident, but I’m not surprised by it either. This massacre by muslim Turks is just a drop in the ocean of non-muslim dead bodies throughout the history of Turkey from Ottomans til today. Yet another example why Turkey is THE most evil country that exists today and should be eradicated completely.
buluttt says
What about Alevi,Atheists,Agnostics,Socialists,Social democrats,Seculars,Secular Natonalist Turks?Should they also be eradicate?