No concrete evidence for İHH
LEFT Party took the issue of disaster-affected children being handed over to İHH to court. The prosecutor's office stated that action had been taken against officials from the Ministry of Family, while it decided not to proceed against İHH executives due to a lack of "concrete evidence."
The LEFT Party took the scandal of giving children without parents to the Humanitarian Relief Foundation (İHH) during the earthquake disaster to the judiciary. However, it was revealed that Ankara Chief Public Prosecutor's Office closed the file without taking action against İHH executives.
The LEFT Party's criminal complaint emphasised that the children were placed in a villa belonging to İHH in Beykoz and stated: “Approximately 20 children between the ages of 0-4 were taken to İHH's villa in Beykoz in a group with about 10 adults. The Ministry of Family and Social Services announced that the children were women and their children who lost their husbands in Syria. In his statement, the ministry official said that police teams and ministry personnel went to the villa together, it was determined that the residence belonged to İHH volunteer Aynur Akdeniz, the children and their mothers were together in Kırıkhan, the children did not have a father, they were Syrian refugees with their mothers, the personnel knew the address, it was explained that they went there from time to time and controls were provided.”
Emphasising that ‘the Ministry of Family and Social Services is the sole authority for the delivery of unaccompanied and orphaned children in the earthquake zone’, the LEFT Party's complaint also included the following: “The Ministry should take all measures regarding children in need of protection. Ministry officials and İHH executives who turned a blind eye to the detention of children from the earthquake zone by İHH member Aynur Akdeniz, who described herself as the “Orphan Patron” of children from another country, and did not take them under protection have committed the crimes of misconduct in office, deprivation of personal liberty, abduction and detention of a child, and failure to report a crime...”
In September 2023, the Ankara Chief Public Prosecutor's Office announced that “necessary proceedings have been initiated against Rıdvan Duran, Deputy Minister of the Ministry of Family and Social Services, and former Deputy Ministers İsmail Ergüneş and Fatma Öncü”. However, it was understood that the file was closed with the decision that there was no grounds for an investigation on the grounds that the complaint was “not based on concrete information, documents and evidence for IHH executives”.
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STRANGE DEFENCE: THE DUTY WAS DONE IN ACCORDANCE WITH THE LEGISLATION!
The lawsuits filed in relation to the collapsed buildings after the earthquakes continue to be heard. Developments in some of the cases are as follows:
The 6th hearing of the Nilüfer Apartment building case in Hatay, where 56 people died, was held at Hatay 5th Assize Court. The lawyer of the fugitive defendant Süleyman Çağan said, “My client performed his duty as an assistant control officer in the building supervision during the construction process of the collapsed building in accordance with the legislation.” The lawyers of Süleyman Sürmeli, one of the defendants, said, “We request the lifting of the red notice decision for the extradition of our client to Turkey in line with the collateral and bail.”
In the second hearing of the Yağmur Apartment Building case in Hatay, where 26 people died, the defendants claimed that they had built the building in accordance with the project and that the demolition could be caused by unlicensed construction.
The final hearing of the Trend Garden Residence case in Malatya, where 31 people died, was held. The court sentenced the contractor Bahattin Doğan and static project engineer Bülent Yeroğlu to 12 years and 5 months, and residence owners Engin Aslan and Sefa Gülfırat to 17 years and 5 months each. 10 defendants were acquitted.
Note: This text has been translated from the original Turkish version titled İHH için somut delil yokmuş, published in BirGün newspaper on May 10, 2025.
