HDP deputy asks Interior Minister what gov't has done to prevent hate crimes against Alevis
In a parliamentary question addressing Interior Minister Süleyman Soylu, HDP lawmaker Ali Kenanoğlu has asked what kind of legal proceedings the ministry has run against the assailants of 36 publicly known hate crime incidents that were committed against Alevis in the last eight years. Kenanoğlu's inquiry came after unidentified assailants on Oct. 20 painted threatening messages on an Istanbul apartment building housing Alevis.
Duvar English
A deputy of the Peoples' Democratic Party (HDP) has submitted a parliamentary question inquiring about what the government has done in the last eight years with regards to hate crimes committed against Turkey's Alevi community.
HDP MP Ali Kenanoğlu's parliamentary question addressing Interior Minister Süleyman Soylu came after the most recent hate crime in which unidentified assailants covered an Istanbul apartment building housing Alevi residents in red paint that read “Death to Alevis.”
Kenanoğlu said in his parliamentary question that there have been a total of 36 hate crime incidents targeting Alevis since 2012 and asked what kind of legal proceedings the government has so far run against the perpetrators of these crimes.
“What kind of procedures have been undertaken with regards to the 36 incidents that have found place in the news?” Kenanoğlu asked. The lawmaker also inquired about the incidents of which the assailants have been caught and asked what kind of judiciary processes have been launched against these nabbed assailants.
“Hate speeches and threats targeting Alevis continue in a routine way. Authorities have a tendency to see the marking of Alevi houses, which is one of the methods of this routine, as individual cases saying they are simply 'actions of drunk people or children.' The reason why this routine is not slowing down is because the public authority is not in anyway taking an action,” said Kenanoğlu.
“If the authorities do not put forward a powerful will [to stop these hate crimes] as soon as possible, Alevi community has the risk to go through similar tragedies they experienced in Sivas, Maraş and Çorum Alevi massacres, which they have not overcome in terms of pain and anger.”
Marking Alevi families’ houses in a Turkey is part of a bloody tradition of attacks on Alevi families, as family homes were marked with red crosses before the Maraş Massacre of 1978, the Çorum Massacre of 1980 and the Sivas Massacre of 1993.