by halil » Wed Jan 28, 2009 3:47 pm
Deniz ,
some TC's already opened some cases at ECHR about their missing members from 1964 . This last event will trigger everything and most things will be cleared up .Many people are happy in north about last movements . They says time is came ................
The applicants, Mustafa Arif’s children, Semral Emin, Asim Erk, Huseyin Erk and Kutlay Erk, submitted the law suit to the ECHR on 21st November, claiming that the Republic of Cyprus has violated Article 5 of the European Convention on Human Rights and asking for an investigation and award of compensation. The violations referred to the following articles of the European Convention on Human Rights:
1- Violation of Article 2: the related state is responsible for the missing father of the applicants. Mustafa Arif was taken from the hospital by the authorities and then went missing. He went missing when he was completely in the responsibility of the state and his bones were found after 45 years. Forensic examination of the remains revealed that he had been the victim of murder. The duty of the government was to start an inquiry about the incident right away. It has not been done. Article 2 is violated in practice.
2- Violation of Article 3: the grief and pain of the applicants caused by the missing of their father constitutes the violation of Article 3.
3- Violation of Article 8: the applicants suffered from a family life without their father and lived in deprivation.
4- Violation of Article 13: there are no effective domestic law procedures for the applicants to apply regarding the articles above. The domestic law procedures are not effective in the South. Domestic judiciary courts rejected the similar law cases. In that case the applicants do not have to apply to the domestic jurisdiction processes because; according to the established ECHR regulations the applicants do not have to make use of all the remedies.
5- Violation of Article 14: the father of the applicants was killed because he was a Turkish Cyprus, a Muslim. The article against discrimination was violated.
Mustafa Arif was taken away from Nicosia General Hospital where he had been undergoing treatment after suffering a heart attack in December 1963. He had started his job as a guard in the General Prison in 1952 and became ill during the inter-communal conflicts. He was taken to the hospital by his friends at the general prison. There was no news about him for 44 years. His remains were found following excavations by the CMP. His remains were laid to rest in Famagusta cemetery after a funeral on May 31st.
From the Sevgül below writings we understand how many cases will come to future investigations ..... In here writings people are giving the names as well .... who were the behind those crimes .
The opening of the mass grave in Trachonas (Kizilbash) is the result of
Spiros Hadjinicolaou not remaining silent about his missing father from
Yialloussa? Or Sevilay Berk speaking and telling her story and pressing
the authorities in the north, as well as the UN and the Council of
Europe for getting back the bones of her parents who went missing from
the village Pervolia back in 1964? It is the result of the cry of Maria
Georgiadou for justice, our visit to Kythrea (Degirmenlik) and Beykoy
in search for information about her missing mother, father, sister and
brother? It is the work of Kutlay Erk, who spoke up and demanded to
know what happened to his father, taken from the Nicosia General
Hospital in December 1963 and who never returned to his family ?
missing from a hospital bed? Or Petros from Palekythro (Balikesir) who
told the story of a massacre in 1974 by three Turkish Cypriots,
shooting and killing women and children? Petros was also shot but
remained alive to tell the story of what happened. It is the result of
hours of painful, tearful, horrible unspoken stories about Maratha,
Sandallaris and Aloa (Murataga, Sandallar, Atlilar). Brave people like
Huseyin Rustem Akansoy and Mustafa Shadanoglu spoke in pain,
remembering details that would make you sick? Details like the rapes,
details like the cutting off the heads of small kids?
It
is about a place called Assia (Pashakoy) and our long interview with
Yiannos Michaelides and Christoforos Skarparis? About the rapes of
young girls in Assia? About bus-loads of Greek Cypriot men
`disappearing` - going `missing` between Assia and Nicosia? It is about
standing up and raising your voice and demanding to know. If they did
not speak up and demand to know, if they did not tell their stories and
if these stories were not published on both sides of the dividing line,
there would be no discussion, no pressure built up on those holding the
keys to the mass graves? If they had remained silent and went along
with the tide to `just forget about it`, we would not be able to help
the process for trying to get to the heart of things. When they had
started speaking, the Missing Persons Committee had not been having any
meetings for the past two years? Later the UN Secretary General sent a
letter and asked the Missing Persons Committee to start to meet.
Turkish Prime Minister Erdogan had already promised to the European
Human Rights Court that he would do his best to solve the `missing
persons` issue in Cyprus. So with the pressure of Europe, we came to
this point. It shows us that we can affect change in this country if we
take the risk to stand up and speak up and tell our story. Without
being attached to this or that political force, these were human
stories that made a mark on people?s hearts and that?s why some
politicians got really upset with the whole series lasting almost six
months. Together, we were forming public opinion about the `missing`
issue, without their `control`!
etc.....etc........
In
December, together with Amnesty International Turkey and Amnesty
International Greece and with the organization of the New Cyprus
Association, we did a seminar about `truth and reconciliation` at the
Goethe Institute in Nicosia, on the `Green Line` dividing Cyprus. I
invited the relatives of the missing whom I had interviewed. It was the
first time that relatives of Turkish Cypriot and Greek Cypriot missing
persons were in the same room, sitting together? I introduced them to
each other and some of them, like Sevilay and Maria embraced each
other, seeing that the pain is the same ? whether you?re Turkish
Cypriot or Greek Cypriot or any other ethnicity, if one of your loved
ones is `missing` you feel the same pain. It was touching for me
because I wanted them very much to meet and perhaps work together for
the solution of this issue? I did a slide show, showing photos and
telling stories of six months of interviews published in ALITHIA and
YENIDUZEN? Everyone in the room was shocked ? many people cried, both
men and women. This was the starting point of our journey into the
missing links of our history ? we had to bring the pieces together in
order to be able to see the whole picture. We will continue doing this
in different parts of Cyprus this year, hopefully in trying to
establish `what is the truth?`
This
week INFORCE came to the northern part of Cyprus to Trachonas to begin
investigation of a mass grave where Greek Cypriots are thought to be
buried.
This is just the beginning of a very
difficult and perhaps frustrating process where we must join our
efforts as citizens of Cyprus and Europe. We can?t leave things in the
hands of just a bunch of politicians. As journalists from both sides of
the dividing line, instead of using such occasions to create more
hatred and vengeance feelings, we must use it as a step for
understanding what happened, the reasons behind what happened, who were
the responsible persons giving the orders and who were the ones
executing these orders to rape, to mutilate, to kill, to bury? We must
push for the `acknowledgment` and `apologizing` for what has happened
in the past ? this acknowledgment and apologizing must come from those
responsible for these murders or those who sat silently and watched,
not trying to stop these. Those who had the information, but did not
act. Because silence also kills, you know?
As
journalists from both sides of the dividing line of this country, we
must use the beginning of the opening of the graves to help our
communities to come together to understand how they have been used
against each other and how those `at the top`, who had big roles to
play in such massacres are still in power and running things in this
country. We must help our communities to develop together their own
model of learning `the truth` and `reconciling` with it. Many
communities in the world have had similar painful experiences of trying
to find out what was `the truth` and developing their own models of
dealing with the murders, the rapes, the mass graves, the murderers?
Our communities need a basic feeling of `justice` and this, we can
start thinking, discussing and developing together ? our own Cypriot
model of dealing with our own atrocities and its results?
