A violent attack by an ultranationalist youth group at a university in Ankara on Monday left several students injured and led to the detention of 29 of them, while none of the perpetrators were taken into custody, Turkish media reported.
The assailants were reportedly affiliated with the Hacettepe University branch of the Grey Wolves, a youth organization linked to the far-right Nationalist Movement Party (MHP), an ally of President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan. The group, with some carrying machetes, attacked students as they were reading a press statement protesting a “leadership handover and flag ceremony” organized by the Grey Wolves at a campus café. According to witnesses, some of the attackers came from outside, while footage showed several wearing ski masks to conceal their identities.
Due to the failure of university security to intervene effectively, several students were injured, one of them seriously. Rather than pursuing the perpetrators, police detained six of the protesting students at the scene.
At Bilkent City Hospital, the police attempted to forcibly remove a wounded student from medical care to take him to police headquarters to give a statement. Twenty-three others, including those waiting to be examined, were detained after resisting the police intervention. In total, 29 students were taken into custody. Twenty-four were released, while five were referred by prosecutors to the criminal magistrate of peace on Tuesday with a demand for arrest. The court, however, denied the request and instead released them under judicial supervision.
The injured student was eventually allowed to give his statement to the police on Tuesday morning in the presence of a lawyer after being released by the hospital.
The university branch of the Grey Wolves issued a statement on X, claiming responsibility for the attack and alleging that the students had “disrespected the Turkish flag.” The group declared, “The required answer is given,” and expressed readiness for martyrdom, language that rights advocates say incites violence and glorifies political aggression.
The Ankara Medical Chamber alleged that the police’s conduct inside the hospital violated the right not to be subjected to torture or ill-treatment under the provisions of the Turkish Constitution and the European Convention on Human Rights. It also said that attempting to detain an injured student who needed to remain under medical observation despite doctors’ warnings constituted a breach of international medical ethics.
