As the anniversary of the February 6 earthquakes nears, social media users have called on Turkish authorities to investigate the whereabouts of people who went missing after the disaster.
Magnitude 7.8 and 7.5 earthquakes affected 11 provinces in the country’s south and southeast on February 6, killing more than 50,000 people and leaving millions homeless. While the exact number is not known, hundreds of people – including children – are missing.
Tuesday is the first anniversary of the disaster, and those people who are still missing will be declared dead. This means that all search efforts will be halted. Victims of the earthquake are demanding that the authorities continue their search efforts and find their loved ones, especially missing children.
A hashtag campaign # KayıpDepremzedeÇocuklar (missing children of the earthquake) has been circulating for the past several days.
One social media user said many families will appeal in court for their relatives not to be declared dead. “We will do everything in our power so the search for our loved ones continues. However, there are missing people who no longer have any living relatives remaining. Who will continue the search for those people?” she asked.
Social media user Dünya Akın added that many people went missing after being rescued and taken to a hospital.
Journalist Timur Soykan criticized President Recep Tayyip Erdogan for not making a statement on the matter and shared the photographs of children who are still missing.
On January 24, a parliamentary motion submitted by the IYI (Good) Party aimed at investigating the whereabouts of children was rejected by the Justice and Development Party (AKP) and its ally, the Nationalist Movement Party (MHP).
The İYİ Party during the General Assembly demanded an investigation into how unidentified bodies were buried in the aftermath of the disaster, a complete DNA analysis and a probe into claims of child kidnapping.
In a statement earlier this month, Minister of Family and Social Affairs Mahinur Özdemir had said that “there are no missing children in the aftermath of the earthquakes.” She said the ministry would be pressing charges against anyone who claimed there were children who had been rescued after the earthquakes but had gone missing while they were in state custody.
Opposition deputies contradicted the minister, saying hundreds of families were still searching for missing relatives. In a speech at the assembly, Ömer Faruk Gergerlioğlu from the pro-Kurdish Peoples’ Equality and Democracy Party (DEM Party) said authorities had failed these families.
Families have been searching for their missing members since day one, scouring hospitals across the country and mass graves in the region in the hope that maybe a relative had been buried without proper identification.
Before unidentified bodies were buried in mass graves, authorities took photographs, collected DNA samples and took fingerprints. Each unidentified victim had a number on their grave. Individuals have to go through the photos and give a sample of their DNA to determine if their family member was buried in such a grave.
Some are concerned that children who survived the disaster may have been kidnapped before their families had a chance to unite with them. Families now are demanding a special parliamentary investigation commission to focus on the issue of missing people.
