Küçüközyiğit last spoke with his daughter Nursena on the phone on December 29 at around 3:30 p.m. His coworkers were the last people to have seen him. About 4 p.m. he left his office to visit a friend in Ankara’s Gölbaşı district, by a Mazda 323 with license plate 34 FNF 28. His cell phone stopped receiving signals at 4:23 pm.
Nursena Küçüközyiğit says her father was unemployed for a long time after being expelled from public service and was held in detention for six months for his alleged links with Gülen Movement. After he was released, he set up a business to offer legal advice to other purged public sector workers, which, Nursena believes might have been the reason her father to be abducted.
Similarities with Other Abduction Incidents
Kucukozyigit was a civil servant like many other victims of the recent abduction cases. Almost all abductions occurred at public places while the abductee was about to leave from an acquainted location. After months of their disappearances, victims resurfaced under police detention and were arrested immediately. Also almost in all cases, police officers and public prosecutors have been hesitant to open a case in spite of the clear and concrete evidence of a crime.
Growing Number of Cases of Abductions with Black Transporters
In many of the disappearances, a black transport vehicle is used, according to the eyewitnesses and CCTV footages. A group of masked men, believed to be the members of the Turkish intelligence agency, are grabbing the victims and pulling them into a black transporter van and disappear swiftly.
Almost all of the victims of these enforced disappearances resurfaced months after they went missing in bruises and traumatized. Some have spoken out in court, recounting the systematic and severe torture they were subjected to during their secret interrogation by the National Intelligence Organization (MİT), The victims also have reported that they were kept until their wounds got healed to be handed over to the police.
According to the testimonies of former MİT directors Erhan Pekçetin and Aydın Günel, who was captured by Syrian Kurdish militants in 2017 while they were in a covert operation in northern Syria, all abducted people that have affiliations with the Hizmet movement were tortured and interrogated in a building in the capital city of Turkey, Ankara(1)
Nursena thinks her father is yet another victim of the enforced disappearances and she is worried that he might be subject to torture. She says has reached CCTV footages displaying that Galip Kucukozyigit was followed by three suspicious men on the day he disappeared but she was not able to convince a prosecutor to open an investigation.
According to Kucukozyigit’s daughter Nursena, Turkish police are not willing to search for evidence against her father’s kidnapping. The only answer she could get from the police is: “We are unable to provide any information.” Families of other victims were also faced with the same attitude by the police, who were reluctant to investigate and collect evidence. The United Nations Working Group on Enforced and Involuntary Disappearances in its reports emphasized that the Turkish authorities were not pursuing the necessary investigative tracks. Detailed information about and a full list of enforced disappearances of Turkish nationals can be found in AST’s report, Erdogan’s Long Arms: Abductions In Turkey And Abroad2.
Forced disappearances and abductions are an assault on human rights as established by the Convention on the Forced Disappearance of Persons. According to Advocates for Silenced Turkey (AST)’s report3, there have been 135 abductions and forced disappearances to date; this report consists of an alarming number of ac- counts of abductions and torture provided by abductees. AST calls on international human rights organizations to urge Turkish authorities to abide by domestic and international laws of human rights and cease their illegal and inhumane practices of abductions, forced disappearance, and renditions immediately.
