Broken Promises

A year has passed since Prime Minister Demirel’s coalition government, committed to human rights reforms, took office in Turkey — a period long enough to produce significant change. But the promised reforms have not come about; on the contrary, killings, torture and other human rights abuses in Turkey have become significantly worse. In the first eleven months of 1992, security forces shot and killed seventy-four people in house raids, and the evidence suggests that the killings were deliberate executions. Security forces also shot and killed more than one hundred peaceful demonstrators. Moreover, many people disappeared while in custody of police or gendarmes. In the southeast, the Turkish government has utterly failed to investigate the assassinations of 165 people by assailants using death squad tactics. Among those killed were journalists, teachers, doctors, human rights activists and political leaders; many suspect government complicity in the killings.