Human Rights Defenders have never been and will not be silent!
26 February 2024
For Atty. Metin Can and Dr. Hasan Kaya
Attorney Metin Can was the Chairperson of İHD’s local Elazığ Branch and Dr. Hasan Kaya was a member of İHD. Both human rights defenders were abducted on 21 February 1993 at a time when people were being silenced through enforced disappearances in custody. Their bodies, subjected to torture, were found under the Dinar Bridge on the Elâzığ-Dersim road on 27 February 1993.
Metin Can and Hasan Kaya were targeted by dark forces linked to the state for defending human rights values that must be defended for everyone under all circumstances.
Human rights are stated to be universal and holistic all over the world. Rights defenders work to protect and promote human rights – such as freedom of expression, freedom of belief, the right to life and the prohibition of torture – for all, including their own. States have an obligation to guarantee the exercise of these rights.
Atty. Metin Can and Dr. Hasan Kaya were targeted by dark forces precisely because they were advocating for rights in the light of these principles. From the moment they were abducted, applications made by İHD to every relevant institution proved to be fruitless. Although eyewitnesses testified that the kidnappers were linked to JİTEM (Gendarmerie Intelligence and Anti-Terror Unit), the very existence of JİTEM was denied for many years. Mahmut Yıldırım, code-named Yeşil, who was known to have committed murders on behalf of JİTEM, disappeared into the dark recesses of the state and could not be held to account for any of the murders he committed. Like the perpetrators of many other murders committed by JİTEM, the perpetrators of the murders of Metin Can and Hasan Kaya went unpunished as a result of the state’s policies of impunity. After their disappearance and murder, enforced disappearances continued. At the same time, the struggle of human rights defenders against disappearances, unsolved political murders, torture, and human rights violations in general has continued and continues unabated.
İHD and the relatives of the disappeared continue their uninterrupted struggle to find those responsible for the murders of Atty. Metin Can and Dr. Hasan Kaya, who were murdered 31 years ago, as well as those responsible for thousands of other murders with “known perpetrators.” While our struggle continues on the one hand to ensure that the perpetrators of each of our disappeared are found and put on trial, it continues, on the other hand, against the state’s policy of impunity to reveal the truth and to ensure justice.
We commemorate with love and gratitude our friends Metin Can, a lawyer, and Hasan Kaya, a physician, on the 31st anniversary of their assassination and we bow to their memories with respect.
We have not forgotten them; we will always remember them.
HUMAN RIGHTS ASSOCIATION