DİYARBAKIR - 5 years have passed since Rohat Aktaş was killed during the curfews in Cizde. Aktaş refused to leave Cizre during the curfews, saying 'Being a journalist would not have any meaning if I don't witness and write about what's happening here'. Describing what she lived through during that period, his mother Meliha Aktaş said that the cruelty and persecution must end.
It has been 5 years since more than 100 people including Azadiya Welat Newspaper Editor-in-Chief Rohat Aktaş were burned to death in a basement during the curfews in Cizre. Following the developments in Cizre during the curfew declared on December 14, 2015, Aktaş was told to get out of the area but he refused to leave and said: "What kind of a journalist would I be if I don't write about what's going on in here."
AN INVESTIGATION WAS LAUNCHED AGAINST AKTAŞ
Aktaş who was injured because his house was bombed during the clashes in the first month, was prevented from going to the hospital with the other injured. While no investigation was launched against the massacre, investigations were started against Aktaş and his newspaper who wrote about Aktaş's death.
PHONECALL UNDER BOMBARDMENT
Meliha Aktaş who was in a sit in staged by civillians between Cizre and Nusaybin at the time when her son was injured, told about what she'd been through and her phone call with her son under bombardment. Speaking about her last call with her son, Aktaş said: "I was hearing the sound of the clashes and the bombs when he called me. It sounded like it was raining bombs. My son told me he was in a basement and he climbed up the stairs because he had no reception. He said he had to go back inside. We said goodbye but he told me to take good care of myself three times. I haven't heard from him again after that phonecall. We didn't foresee this would happen. We thought he was injured and he would be taken to the hospital and he was going to be trated. But things did not go like we thought. When I headed to Cizre, I took some towels and pajamas with me in case he needs them at the hospital. We never saw this massacre coming.."
'THEY TURNED TO ASH'
Stating that she saw on TV that 27 citizens were killed in one of the basements and their names were disclosed, Mother Aktaş said: "Our children were slaughtered there. Bodies kept coming from different cities and neighborhoods while we were staging that sit in. And we were going to the morgue to identify them. I said bodies, but they all turned to ash..They were all charred. You couldn't tell they were human beings once. We couldn't believe what we were seeing with our own eyes. How can a person turn into something like that? Who does something like that to a person? I saw my own son in at the morgue in Silopi and I couldn't recognize my own son."
Stating that the body was able to be identified with a DNA test, Aktaş noted that they were able to bury their son on February 26, 2016.
Underlining that the cause of death of his son was recorded as 'unknown cause' in the autopsy report, Aktaş said: "There is a way to do everything. There is a moral code. They said his cause of death was unknown. The doctors can write whatever they want in those reports. We know what happened to them. The world knows what happened to them. Those black smoke rising over Cizre was from the bodies of Rohat and Mehmet. How is it unknown? They were burned to death and it was obvious."
TEARS DO NOT HAVE A COLOUR
Mother Aktaş, who called on to the Kurdish people, concluded her words as follows: "Let our people be one, they should never be fooled by anyone. The facts are there for all the world to see. Maybe they remained silent because it did not serve their purpose but everyone knows what happened. How long will this cruelty continue? The earth have been watered by the tears of mothers in this country. How long will this continue? Tears do not have a colour. Pain is pain for all of us. End this cruelty now!"