Another wound

The ruling pronounced on May 21 2007 for the case of truck driver Ahmet Kaymaz and his 12 year old son Uğur Kaymaz, killed by the police special forces in front of their home in Kızıltepe, Mardin on November 21 2004 for engaging in “armed assault on security forces”, rubs salt into the deep wound in the public conscience. Four policemen had been found not guilty on charges of possible misuse of the right to use arms for security enforcement. The ruling states that the Kaymazes fired thirteen rounds at the police and the police fulfilled their duty by returning fire.
But the Human Rights Association team who went to Kızıltepe directly after the event had reported that “the examination of the autopsy report on Uğur Kaymaz shows that his right and left hands have 4, his back has 9 bullet wounds for a total of 13 bullets and that 9 of these are from bullets fired at close range (less than 50 cm)... Ahmet Kaymaz’s autopsy shows 2 bullet wounds on his thigh and left hand, 4 bullet wounds on his chest, 2 on his back for a total of 8 wounds and all 8 are from bullets fired at close range... The possibility is high that the bullets were not fired from different directions but from the same direction, the different entry points occuring from the positions the bodies took after the first bullets found their mark.”
It seems that, like many other wounds, the killing of little Uğur who left behind only a photo in his blue school uniform, with slippers on his feet and his father Ahmet will continue to seep blood slowly in our collective conscience.

Translated by Deniz Akkuş
May 25, 2007