PKK FILES
How the PKK terror has
destroyed its civilian targets
PROLOGUE
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This booklet provides a detailed account of some of the terrorist attacks
perpetrated in Turkey by the PKK (Kurdish acronym for the "Kurdistan Workers
Party"), one of the most brutal terror organizations in the world, both in
terms of the number of the victims of its terror acts and of the way these
acts
have been committed by its terrorists.
As a result of the indiscriminate terrorist attacks of the PKK, over 30,000
Turkish citizens have lost their lives since 1984. Among these were thousands
of innocent civilians, in many cases including women, children, the elderly
and
even infants. Death took many of them at night. Terror robbed them of their
lives. Some died only months after they were born. They had never seen their
murderers before. They did not know for what they were punished or why their
death would matter.
Indeed, a predominant majority of PKK's attacks, some of which are presented
in
the following pages, have been against civilian targets, including government
officials, teachers and villagers.
PKK terrorists have killed teachers and set fire to schools for they know that
their subversive and perverted ideology could only be harboured among the
uneducated.
The terrorists have massacred villagers, because they aim to subjugate the
local population in southeastern part of Turkey into supporting PKK's evil
deeds. This terrorist organization has operated through intimidation, coercion
and indiscriminate violence.
They have burned down work vehicles, destroyed health centers, set forests on
fire, and targeted all sources of economic and social development as they know
well that their survival depends upon hampering the development of the region.
It is ironic and revealing that an overwhelming majority of the PKK's civilian
victims, counted by thousands, have been Turkish citizens of Kurdish origin on
whose behalf the PKK purports to act.
The purpose of this study is to expose to the public the PKK in its true
colors
at the expense of refreshing the agony and grief of those who have lost their
loved ones in PKK's massacres. The "stories" of these incidents have been
edited by using newspaper excerpts only.
CONTENTS:
DATE PLACE AND RESULT
23/06/1987 MARDİN/ Ömerli - Massacre of 30 civilians in the Pınarcık village
by the PKK terrorists
23 JUNE 1987, SATURDAY
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A group of PKK terrorists raided Ömerli/Pınarcık village of Mardin on the
night
of 20 June 1987, killing a total of 30 civilians, it was reported in the
Turkish press.
3 groups of PKK terrorists attacked the village from two directions. The PKK
groups consisted of about 40 terrorists who, using a megaphone, called on the
village guards to surrender and ordered the villagers to gather in the village
square. The resulting clash between the village guards and the terrorists
lasted until the guards ran out of ammunition. The terrorists then
indiscriminately opened fire on the villagers, massacring 30 people, including
6 women and 17 children. The headman of the village and 7 other villagers were
wounded.
10/07/1987 MARDİN/ Massacre of 25 people in the villages of Peçenek and
Yuvalı
10 JULY 1987, FRIDAY
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PKK terrorists massacred 25 people, 11 of them children, in two villages of
southeast Turkey on 8 July 1987. It was reported that separate groups of 20-25
terrorists hit the villages of Peçenek, near İdil town, and Yuvalı, near
Midyat
town, both in Mardin province.
During the PKK assault, 4 of the 30 houses of the village were destroyed. 4
villagers were missing. They were believed to have remained under the wreckage
of the demolished houses.
All of the 9 dead villagers killed by the terrorists in Yuvalı belonged to the
same family and were aged between 3 and 70.
In a related incident, 3 people died and several others were injured when a
minibus carrying villagers to the funeral of the victims of the massacre hit a
landmine placed by the terrorists. Emel Aktuğ, a journalist who witnessed the
explosion reported: "Suddenly the minibus in front of our car was engulfed in
a
cloud of dust. We then heard a very loud explosion. The car was smashed to
pieces. Its engine flew 15 meters into a field. One man, identified as
35-year-old Halil Dinç, was killed on the spot. About 15 villagers were
injured. The driver of the car lost both legs and an arm. He was rushed to the
Mardin Hospital in serious condition. We later learned that he died in the
hospital."
Security officials told that the terrorists had left the landmines behind
while
leaving the village.
Prime Minister Turgut Özal visited Peçenek on Thursday to convey his
condolences to the villagers. The son of a village guard who was killed by the
terrorists in Peçenek asked the Prime Minister to supply him with a gun and
described the massacre as follows: "They assembled us all in the village
square
and started shooting at us. I threw myself to the ground and crawled away.
They
killed many children and women. We had no guns to fight back."
20/08/1987 SİİRT/ PKK attack on the village of Kılıçkaya
20 AUGUST 1987, THURSDAY
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It was reported in the Turkish press today that the PKK terrorists massacred
24
villagers including 14 women and children in Kılıçkaya village in Siirt
province on 18 August 1987. The terrorists attacked Kılıçkaya shortly before
midnight with automatic weapons, rockets and hand grenades.
Most of the dead, from three-month-old infants to 75-year-old elderly, came
from three families. Some of these people were killed by gunfire and grenade
and rocket blasts, while others burned to death when the attackers set wrecked
houses alight before leaving the village. Two village guards were also killed
in the massacre.
The names of those who lost their lives in this massacre are as follows:
Şakir Sever Ferhat Beştaş
Behiye Sever Hacı Beştaş
Ali Sever Zeynep Beştaş
Şükrü Narin Naciye Beştaş
Ömer Baykara Hazine Beştaş
Nurcan Baykara Sabriye Beştaş
Halil Baykara Kadri Beştaş
Sabri Narin Şehriban Beştaş
Bahar Narin Hamide Beştaş
Halise Narin Habip Demir
Hediye Narin Muhret Demir
Süleyman Dündar Kemal Demir
12/10/1987 SİİRT/ Killing of 13 people in the hamlet of Çobandere
12 OCTOBER 1987, MONDAY
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PKK terrorists killed 13 people and wounded 9 in a raid on a hamlet in
southeastern Turkey on the night of 11 October 1987, reported the Turkish
press.
About 100 terrorists sprayed bullets at random and set fire to houses in the
attack on Çobandere in Siirt province about 10 kilometers from the Iraqi
border. 6 women and 2 babies were among the dead.
A survivor, 19-year-old Ali Sallı, told the journalists that the PKK militants
shouted "come and join us" before starting shooting from all angles and that
he
feigned death after suffering minor hand injuries.
Three of the terrorists were reported killed. Ali Sallı said that he had heard
one terrorist ordering others to take away the dead militants. Military
authorities said that the terrorists always tried to take their dead with them
to avoid identification.
The following are the names of the civilians killed in the massacre:
Leyla Varol
Latif Varol
Ayşe Varol
Mehmet Kartal
Leyli Kartal
Abdurrahman Şallı
Hatun Şanlı
Hazer Şanlı
Agit Şanlı
Azime Şanlı
Murtaza Şanlı
A 15-day-old (nameless) baby
A one-month-old (nameless) baby
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09/05/1988 SIRNAK/ 11 people killed in the PKK attack on the village of
Dereler
9 MAY 1988, MONDAY
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The Turkish press reported today that the village of Dereler in Şırnak was
raided for the tenth time within the past year by a group of PKK militants who
executed 11 citizens. 4 of the executed villagers were women. Dereler village,
which had a number of village guards among its inhabitants, had been
blacklisted by the PKK. During previous attacks on the village the PKK was
responsible for killing 10 civilians, 4 security officials, abducting 12
villagers and destroying a great number of work machines of the Village
Services Administration.
The last PKK terrorist attack on Dereler took place in the evening of 7 May
1988. The PKK militants gathered the entire village population and forced them
to listen to PKK propaganda before reading out the names of 11 citizens and
separating them from the crowd. These seven men and four women were lined up
against the wall of a house. One of the PKK terrorists who was apparently the
head of the group said, "We have condemned you to death for betraying our
people and our cause. The sentence will be immediately carried out." A firing
squad from among the PKK terrorists opened automatic gunfire on the selected
11
villagers, killing them all before the eyes of the rest of the inhabitants.
The
PKK murderers then left the village, forcing four villagers to go with them.
One of the executed villagers, Osman Babat, was a previous PKK sympathizer. He
had been sentenced to one year in prison for assisting the PKK and had been
released three months before the raid on the village. The names of the 11
citizens who were murdered in this massacre are as follows:
Salih İnci
Ali İnci
Mustafa İnci
Gevri İnci
Esmer Kabul
Meryem Kabul
Halime Kaplan
Zübeyde Babat
Salih Babat
Osman Babat
Güllü Onat
10/05/1988 MARDİN/Nusaybin - Massacre of 15 people in the hamlet of Bahminin
10 MAY 1988, TUESDAY
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The Turkish press reported that, following the massacre in Dereler village,
the
PKK murdered on 8 May 1988 15 citizens, 8 of them children, in the countryside
of Nusaybin in the province of Mardin. Among them were the four villagers
abucted from Dereler the previous evening, Salih Babat, Şirin Babat, Fettah
İçil and Ömer Onat, who were brutally murdered by the PKK. Salih Babat was
decapitated. The bodies of Şirin Babat, Fettah İçil and Ömer Onat were riddled
with bullets. This brought the total number of civilian citizens murdered by
the PKK in the last 48 hours to 26.
The 11 citizens indiscriminately killed in the village of Taşköy, Bahminin
hamlet of Nusaybin, belonged to the same family and included girls, women and
men. A large group of PKK militants surrounded Bahminin from two directions
around 22:30. While a part of the PKK terrorists held the area under siege,
another group carrying automatic weapons and bombs entered Bahminin. As they
had done in Dereler village, the terrorists gathered the villagers out in the
open, read out the names of 11 people who were separated from the rest of the
villagers. One of the terrorists said that these 11 persons, eight of whom
were
children, had been condemned to death. They were executed by automatic weapons
gunfire. Their names are as follows:
Hatice Çelik (35)
Abdülkerim Çelik (47)
Ayşe Çelik (2 months old)
Fadime Çelik (5)
Ziver Çelik (15)
Abdurrahim Çelik (12)
Müslüme Çelik (7)
Narine Çelik (3)
Niyazi Çelik (9)
Fikriye Çelik (2)
Feride Bozkurt (40)
After the execution, the PKK terrorists burnt down the house of the Çelik
family. Two other members of the same family, İlhami Çelik (10) and Şahiye
Çelik (6) were wounded in the attack and taken to the Mardin State Hospital.
It was also reported in the press that the PKK gangleaders in the area
responsible for these murders were Nizamettin Taş (code name Botan), Şahin
Baliç (code name Metin), and Ahmet Kesip (code name Çimşit).
12/08/1988 ADIYAMAN/VAN/HAKKARİ/ Killing of a total of 13 people in southeast
Anatolia
12 AUGUST 1988, SATURDAY
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The terrorists belonging to the PKK created havoc in rural areas of southeast
Anatolia on the night of 10 August 1988, killing a total of 13 people (3 of
them soldiers), wounding 1, kidnapping 49 villagers and burning a school
building, a a workers' camp and 5 work vehicles, reported the Turkish press.
According to a news agency, the terrorists and the security forces clashed at
Kayatepe village some 20 kilometers from Adıyaman. The agency said one
lieutenant officer, two privates and a village guard were murdered by the
terrorists in the clash, which lasted several hours.
In an attack on the Çağlayan village of Mardin on the same day, the terrorists
killed 3 villagers.
In another attack, the terrorists poured gasoline on and set fire on the
workers' temporary housing and on work vehicles at the Electrical Studies
Directorate (EIEI) construction site near Hakkari. The terrorists opened fire
on the workers, killing one worker and wounding another.
Another group of PKK terrorists burned down a school and kidnapped 39
villagers
in the Gürpınar township of Van.
26/11/1989 HAKKARİ / Yüksekova - Massacre of 22 civilians in a PKK attack on
the village of İkiyaka
26 NOVEMBER 1989, SUNDAY
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It was reported in the Turkish press that the PKK terrorist raided the house
of
Sadi Aykut in the village of İkiyaka, Hakkari on the night of 25 November
1989,
massacring 22 villagers from the same family, including 13 children and 6
women.
According to the press reports, the terrorists came to the village before the
dawn and raided two houses where a village guard and his relatives resided.
The
villagers who had been sleeping in their beds were woken up and were forced to
walk down to the center of the village. The children who were unable to walk
in
the snow-covered path were carried by their mothers. The children of Sadi
Aykut, the village guard, were constantly crying with eyes searching for their
father. After the defenceless crowd gathered at the center of the village, the
terrorists opened fire on them. 21 people were killed on the spot. Later with
the death of one of the 2 wounded people, the death toll rose to 22.
The PKK terrorists then set fire to the evacuated houses, using the gasoline
they had brought with them for that purpose. The terrorists were reported to
have escaped toward an unknown direction after the attack.
The villagers of İkiyaka, who rushed out of their houses to the sound of the
gunfires that broke the silence of the night, came across the 21 dead bodies
lying on the snow. Some of the women had been killed while holding their
children tight against their chests. The villagers counted the dead bodies: 13
were children and 6 were women. The bodies of two men belonged to Sadi Aykut
and an elderly.
Some of the villagers left the village for Yüksekova town to inform the
relevant authorities of the PKK attack. The villagers who travelled down the
bumpy and snowy tracks on the back of mules were able to arrive in Yüksekova
only around 13:00 yesterday.
It was believed that the purpose of the PKK attack was to punish Sadi Aykut,
the village guard who repelled, with his friends, the previous PKK attack on
the village two months ago.
23/03/1990 ELAZIĞ/ Killing of 9 civilians in the town of Maden
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23 MARCH 1990, FRIDAY
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ERNK terrorists kidnapped and killed 9 people, including 6 engineers in the
town of Maden, Elazığ.
According to Turkish press reports, the PKK assault took place around 17:30 on
21 March 1990. The terrorists blocked the Guleman-Elazığ highway with the two
trucks which they forcefully stopped and started checking the identity of the
people whose vehicles got caught in the roadblock. The convoy of 5 vehicles
carrying engineers and workers from Mardin's Guleman Şark Chrome Plant owned
by
Etibank to the ferrochrome plant near the town of Kovancılar stopped before
the
roadblock. According to the witnesses, as the convoy came to a halt, 8 armed
terrorists forced the engineers and workers to get off the vehicles and
started
checking their ID's. Ordering "those wearing ties to part from the rest of the
group," the terrorists segregated managers from the workers and took 10 people
to a nearby hill called Ruttepe some 700 meters away from the vehicles and
razed them with gunfire. Of these engineers, only one, Doğan Demiray, was able
to run away and escape the fate of the others. The following are the names of
the 9 people massacred by the terrorists:
Hüseyin Yeğenoğlu (42)
Asım Erdal (30)
Bülent Fidan (25)
Aydın İnceoğlu (41)
Mehmet Fethi Bakar (34)
Orhan Yeter (34)
Zeki Özçelik (35)
Metin Çakır (47)
Selim Şahin (36)
The rest of the terrorists burned down the vehicles and made PKK propaganda to
the workers before letting them go.
11/04/1990 VAN/ Murder of 5 villagers by the terrorists in the village of
Övecik
11 APRIL 1990, WEDNESDAY
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The Turkish press reported that the village of Övecik in Van was raided the
other day in the evening hours by some 15 PKK terrorists who killed 5
villagers
around 19:30.
The terrorists first threw three hand grenades at the house of Tahir Tuman,
wounding him from his hand. The terrorists then moved towards the house of the
village guard İrfan Komi. One of the terrorists dropped two hand grenades into
the house from the chimney. With the explosion of the bombs in the middle of
the dinner table, five members of the same family who had been breaking their
fasting were instantly killed and 12 others were wounded. Two of the murdered
villagers were children.
Suphi Komi, brother of İrfan Komi, later told the reporters, "One of the blown
up bodies belonged to my son Mehmet. The image of his dead body comes to my
mind and breaks my heart. We had just broken our fasting. (The attack took
place during Ramadan.) When the dogs started to bark, I went out to see what
was happening. I had taken a few steps when I was kicked with the butt of a
rifle and fell down. When I attempted to get on my feet, they started kicking
and cursing me, asking "Are you all guards? We shall torture and kill you one
by one!" Then I saw one terrorist climbing to the roof and throwing two solid
pieces into the house through the chimney. The next thing I remember was a
fierce explosion. Our fasting dinner had become a bloodbath."
Following the massacre, the terrorists forced the villagers to gather out in
the open and told them that they had declared a war against the village guards
and that they would torture to death all the guards who refused to put down
their weapons. Later, they took five villagers hostage, one of whom was a
village guard, and left the village.
The name of the five citizens who were murdered in this massacre are as
follows:
Kasım Komi (70)
Osman Komi (24)
Osman Komi (22)
Mehmet Komi (10)
Güler Moho (10)
The 12 wounded villagers were hospitalized at the Van State Hospital.
12/06/1990 SİİRT/Eruh - Massacre of 26 civilians in the village of Çevrimli
12 JUNE 1990, TUESDAY
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Terrorists launched their most deadly attack in the past two years on 10 June
1990, killing 26 civilians, mostly women and children, at the Çevrimli village
of Eruh township of Siirt.
The attack on Çevrimli, only 50 kilometers north of the Iraqi and Syrian
borders was the PKK's most gruesome terror act since 25 villagers were killed
in the nearby Mardin province in May 1988.
The terrorists sprayed the villagers with automatic weapons, hurled hand
grenades and burned the houses before leaving the village. At least 20
civilians were reported dead, mostly women and children. Among the villagers
who were seriously wounded and hospitalized were two-year-old Sait Kayran and
three-year-old Selahattin Kayran. Sait Kayran was seriously wounded from the
abdomen and was immediately taken to the hospital for surgery. His condition
was reported to be critical.
Reports of the massacre were scant, but the sources were quoted as saying that
the terrorists were believed to have set fire to 4 houses and charring some
bodies inside before fleeing.
One of the hospitalized villagers, Hatice Kayran, said that the clash between
the village guards and the terrorists started at around 21:00 and lasted until
very late hours of the night when the village guards went out of ammunition
and
stopped fire. Hatice Kayran said the terrorists ordered the villagers to line
up and opened fire with automatic weapons and hurled grenades at them.
The Minister of Internal Affairs, Mr. Aksu, flew to Çevrimli village onboard a
helicopter for on-sight inspections.
The following are the names of those who were killed in this massacre:
Hatice Yılmaz Hayrettin Öner
Fatma Yılmaz Vasfiye Öner
Halime Yılmaz Hediye Öner
Mehmet Yılmaz Tayyibe Öner
Ahmet Yılmaz Cevair Öner
Rahime Kayran Kumru Öner
Mehmet Bektaş Ramazan Öner
Makbule Kayran Hasan Özbay
Fatma Kayran Hanife Özdemir
Mehmet Kayran Fatma Beştaş
Hüseyin Kayran Ali Beştaş
Meryem Kayran Takviye Öner
Asiye Kayran Öner Beştaş
16/04/1991 KAHRAMANMARAS/ Elbistan - Killing of 7 passengers near the village
of Kantarma
16 APRIL 1991, TUESDAY
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3 armed PKK terrorists stopped a minibus carrying civilians, killed 7
passengers and heavily wounded 5 others near Elbistan town of Kahramanmaraş,
according to Turkish press reports. The Governor of Kahramanmaraş, Mr. Mustafa
Demir, stated that the minibus bearing the licence plate of 46 AZ 912 was
coming from the village of Karahasanuşağı of Elbistan and was heading for
Kantarma village when it was stopped by the PKK militants near Kantarma.
The terrorists forced the driver of the minibus, Hüseyin Güven, and the
passengers to get off the vehicle and lie face down on the ground before
opening fire on them with automatic rifles. 7 people were killed and 5 were
seriously injured. The terrorists also set the minibus on fire.
The names of the victims killed by the terrorists are as follows:
Hüseyin Güven (driver)
Mahmut Güven (driver's brother)
Mehmet Aktaş
Duran Güngören
Ahmet Oymacı
Mustafa Çetin
The identity of one of the victims was not yet established. Those who were
injured were taken taken to the Elbistan State Hospital. All were in critical
condition.
26/12/1991 ISTANBUL / 12 civilians killed and 20 injured in an arson attack in
Bakırköy
26 DECEMBER 1991, THURSDAY
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The PKK terror this time hit Istanbul. 12 civilians were killed and 20 injured
as a result of an arson attack on a department store named Çetinkaya in
Bakırköy, İstanbul, it was reported in the Turkish press.
The arson attack took place around 13:10 yesterday. A group of PKK
demonstrators, headed by 4 masked militants first attacked a branch of
Emlakbank and a shop next to the department store, setting both places on
fire.
The next attack was on the department store, starting fire at the entrance of
the store which led to panic among some 150 customers and 45 personnel at the
5-storey building. People rushed to the roof, the elevators and the fire exit.
That the fire exit was locked left the people inside the store helpless. The
intervention of the fire brigades proved insufficient while the extinguished
fire turned into smoke, suffocating the people in the building. The fire was
taken under control about an hour later.
The fire exit of the store was opened by the fire brigades and rescue teams
who
entered the building and took those who had passed out owing to the dense
smoke
to hospitals.
The majority of the people who lost their lives in the department store was
reported to be the customers who were on "new year shopping." Among the
victims
were 6 children and 6 women, one of whom was pregnant.
Hüseyin Hürmeydan, one of the survivors of the arson attack later told
reporters "I was going to show them (his daughters and his mother-in-law) a
pair of trousers which I had tried on when everywhere was filled with smoke.
We
lost each other. I jumped out of the building and was saved. I was hoping to
find them outside." Hüseyin Hürmeydan could find neither his daughters nor his
mother-in-law. They had lost their lives in the department store.
12/06/1992 BİTLİS / 14 civilians killed in the attack on a transportation
vehicle near the village of Kokarsu
12 JUNE 1992, FRIDAY
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It was reported in the Turkish press that a group of PKK terrorists stopped a
minibus running between Tatvan province and Kokarsu village near Bitlis and
killed all of the 14 passengers and the driver of the vehicle. Two of the
passengers were children travelling with their grandfather.
The minibus was stopped around 19:30 between Kokarsu and Karıkan hamlet by a
group of PKK terrorists who made the passengers and the driver of the minibus
get off the vehicle and opened fire on them with machine guns. Among the 15
people killed was Hikmetullah Diksin, Welfare Party's Bitlis committee member.
The following are the names of the people killed in this massacre:
İbrahim Işık (driver)
Hikmetullah Diksin
Mehmet Şişman
Mahmut Şişman
Ahmet Şişman
Adil Şişman
Mahmut Özer
Aziz Taşoğlu
Yaşar Alaymurt
Abdullah Özbaş
Mahmut Ali Öcal
Mahmut Şişli and his two grandsons named
Kemal Şişli (10) and
Mahmut Şişli (11)
The identity of one of the victims was not yet established. The Governor of
Bitlis went to the village to make inquiries about the PKK attack
21/10/1992 BİNGÖL / 19 civilians killed in an attack on a minibus in the
hamlet
of Aksakallı near Solhan - Hazartah village
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21 OCTOBER 1992, WEDNESDAY
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The Turkish press reported today that PKK terrorists attacked a bus carrying
passengers to a nearby village in Solhan, Bingöl. The bus was on its way to
the
village of Harzemşah when it stopped before a PKK barrier near the hamlet of
Aksakal around 17:50 on 20 October 1992. The terrorists forcefully took the
passengers and the driver out of the bus and opened fire on them with machine
guns. 19 got killed on the spot. Their names are as follows:
Hüseyin Alan Selim İlhan
Sait Alan Eşref İde
Keji Kaya Timur Öztaş
Mahmut Kaya Abdullah İlkyaz
Ali Kaya Mehmet Tuz
Hasan Işık Ömer Ölmez
Rabia Karabey Esen Ali Demir
Abdurrahman Gültekin Hamit Akar
Mahmut Alp Cevdet Yılmaz
Ziya Özcan
Of the 6 wounded passengers, 3 died subsequently, increasing the death toll to
22. The security forces started an operation to capture the terrorists.
