A senior opposition lawmaker has called for the reinvestigation of the death of a 23-year-old Uzbek maid in the home of Justice and Development Party (AKP) deputy Şirin Ünal, amid public criticism over the mishandling of unsolved suspicious death cases across Turkey.
Aylin Nazlıaka, deputy chair of the main opposition Republican People’s Party (CHP), said all suspicious death files that have created a sense of distrust in the public should be reopened, specifically citing the case of Nadira Kadirova, who was found dead in Ünal’s home in 2019, according to the Birgün daily.
Nazlıaka said the Kadirova case contained many contradictions but was nevertheless classified as a suicide and that a decision of non-prosecution had been issued anyway. “That file must now be reopened,” she said.
Kadirova was working as a maid in Ünal’s home when she was found dead on September 23, 2019, with a gunshot wound to the chest. The gun that killed her belonged to Ünal. Crime scene photographs showed signs of a struggle and pools of blood in four different places in Kadirova’s room.
A report from the Ankara Police Department’s forensics unit found no traces of gunshot residue on Kadirova’s hands, which were examined several hours after the incident. Despite these findings, the autopsy of Kadirova at the Council of Forensic Medicine was completed in a day and her remains were quickly returned to her home country for burial.
The Ankara Chief Public Prosecutor’s Office ruled her death a suicide and closed the case in March 2020.
İlyas Doğan, the lawyer for Kadirova’s family, filed a petition at the Constitutional Court in June 2020 demanding that Turkish authorities reopen the investigation into the circumstances of her death. The court in August 2023 ruled the allegations of violations of the right to life and the prohibition of ill-treatment inadmissible.
Nazlıaka’s call came amid public outrage following developments in the case of Gülistan Doku, a 21-year-old student at Munzur University who went missing in January 2020 in Tunceli province. The case took a turn with new evidence that led to the arrest of the former Tunceli governor, his son, his bodyguard and five others.
Responding to public pressure, Justice Minister Akın Gürlek announced that a special unit at the Justice Ministry is reviewing all files that ended in decisions of non-prosecution, including unsolved crimes.
