Sub-sub-series 15 - Gülten Aytekin

12 files

Materials pertaining to the case filed by Gülten Aytekin on 22 October 1993 against the Republic of Turkey with the European Commission of Human Rights (application number 22880/93, later given case number 102/1997/886/1098, referred to internally within the Kurdish Litigation Project as Case 57 and assigned to Kevin Boyle as lead) regarding the allegedly unlawful killing of her husband, Ali Rıza Aytekin, by a soldier on 24 April 1993 at a checkpoint outside a gendarmerie headquarters on the road between Diyarbakır and Sason in south-east Turkey. Her deceased husband had been a building contractor and a partner in the Aytekinler Construction and Trading and Industry Company Ltd, which had its office in Diyarbakır. He was 27 years old at the time of his death.
On 24 April 1993, Ali Rıza Aytekin, his brother, Feyzullah Aytekin (a building contractor), and his cousins, Salih Aytekin and Resul Aytekin (both building workers), were travelling in a private car to check the construction of two bridges in the Sason district of the province of Batman, south-east Turkey. Ali Rıza Aytekin’s company had been awarded a contract by the State authorities for the construction of the bridges. Ali Rıza Aytekin was at the wheel of the car. At about 1.30 p.m. just as the vehicle had passed the Yanıkkaya gendarmerie headquarters near Kozluk, a soldier on duty outside shouted to the vehicle to pull over and stop. Ali Rıza Aytekin, who was driving relatively slowly due to the presence of speed ramps, pulled over or began to pull over to the right-hand side of the road in response to the soldier’s order. Just as he stopped, the soldier, Private Tuncay Deniz, shot in the direction of the vehicle. The bullet went through the rear window of the vehicle, entered the back of Ali Rıza Aytekin’s head, came out through his forehead and exited the car through the windscreen. Ali Rıza Aytekin was killed instantly. According to the Turkish Government, Private Deniz warned the driver of the car to stop, first by blowing his whistle and then by firing a shot in the air. Despite these warnings and despite the fact that a “Stop – Gendarmerie” warning sign had been placed 65 metres before the checkpoint, the car failed to stop. When it had travelled more than 50 metres past the checkpoint, Deniz fired a shot towards the car. This shot, fired from behind, caused the driver’s death. The incident was immediately reported to the prosecuting authorities by the commanding officer of Kozluk gendarmerie headquarters. The Batman Criminal Court convicted Deniz of manslaughter on 2 October 1997.
On 22 August 1995, Feyzullah Aytekin, who was originally attached to the initial application but was unable to submit a power of attorney form at the time, submitted a separate application (29362/95) regarding the same incident. Documents submitted on behalf of this application were later approved to be considered with Gülten Aytekin's application with Boyle's approval, and application number 29362/95 was annulled on 9 May 1997.
On 23 September 1998, the European Court of Human Rights unanimously upheld the Government’s objections that domestic remedies had not been exhausted in the case and thus the case could not be considered by the court. The full judgment is available for viewing at https://hudoc.echr.coe.int/eng?i=001-58243.

The files in this sub-sub-series are equivalent to Tabs 1 through 10 in Kevin Boyle and Françoise Hampson’s filing system, plus documents originally placed in sleeves at the front of the file, and a small binder of documents originally submitted with Feyzullah Aytekin’s application that were merged into Gülten Aytekin's application as noted above.