File 39 - Hatice Gezer and Hatun Dirlik

20 items

Materials pertaining to the case filed by Hatice Gezer and Hatun Dirlik on 9 March 1995 against the Republic of Turkey with the European Commission of Human Rights (referred to internally within the Kurdish Litigation Project as Case 92 (‘the ‘Napalm Case’) and assigned to Kevin Boyle as lead) regarding the alleged incineration of 19 members of the PKK (Kurdistan Workers’ Party) by napalm dropped from aircraft by the Turkish military during an operation in the Nurhak mountains on 30 July 1993. Hatice Gezer’s daughter Elif and Hatun Dirlik’s son Sexo were identified by authorities as two of the victims. The initial attempt at applying to the Commission on behalf of Gezer on 1 January 1994 went unacknowledged/was rejected by the Commission due to the representatives’ inability to submit a full application; the application registered in 1995 was under Hatun Dirlik’s name. On 16 October 1995, the application was struck from the Commission’s list as it was filed one year beyond the Commission’s six-month time limit (‘the Commission considers that the application should have been introduced not later than January-February 1994.’).
Materials in the file include: the initial application under Gezer’s name filed 1 January 1994; the second, registered, application under Dirlik’s name and its appendices (including a Kurdish Human Rights Project investigative report on the use of napalm in southeast Turkey by the military); statements of the applicants; Kevin Boyle and Françoise Hampson’s working case notes on the Napalm Case; correspondence with the Kurdish Litigation Project members attempting to coordinate the application; correspondence between Boyle and the Commission; and the Commission’s decision striking the application from its list. NOTE: All correspondence created by the Commission is closed to access until 1 November 2073.

Correspondence created by the European Commission of Human Rights is closed to access until 1 November 2073.

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