Funerals for Suruç martyrs in Kurdistan

2015-07-23 11:02:14

HAKKARİ/ELAZIĞ (DİHA) - Two victims of the Suruç bombing, Süleyman Aksu and Cebrail Günebakan, were buried in their native cities yesterday.

Cebrail Günebakan had become a symbol of resistance against police violence from a photograph showing police brutally trying to rip his mouth open while he was press conference. Cebrail was killed on Monday when a bomb exploded during another press conference--as he and hundreds of other youth activists were announcing their plans to travel to the city of Kobanê, Rojava to rebuild it. Yesterday, Cebrail was carried to his burial in the Karakoçan district of Elazığ province.

In Yüksekova, in the eastern province of Hakkari, a massive crowd greeted the funeral convoy of Süleyman Aksu, 26. Süleyman was an English teacher and the local representative for the educators' union Eğitim Sen. A crowd of hundreds of vehicles traveled 20 kilometers outside Yüksekova to greet Süleyman's coffin as it arrived and accompany it into town.

There was a brief panic when two unmarked vehicles were seen following the funeral ceremony, but the people ensured that the cars left the area. The urban defense organization YDG-H's youth members had also set up security points throughout the convoy's route and at the ceremony.

As the convoy passed the local building of the ruling AKP, the crowd exploded in chants of "murderer Daesh, collaborator AKP." A police special operations team armed with rifles forced the convoy to change its route at one point. The crowd included representatives from dozens of political parties and civil society organizations, as well as neighborhood residents and members of the local commune villages.

"Mr. Süleyman, we understood your final lesson well," read the signs carried by Süleyman's students as the crowd of tens of thousands escorted Süleyman's body to the mosque to be blessed, then for a final time to his family's house. The convoy finally arrived at the Orman martyrs' ceremony, where Süleyman's younger brother İhsan Aksu thanked the crowd.

As the crowd left the cemetery on the way to Süleyman's family's house to offer condolences, police attacked the youth maintaining security for the ceremony, starting a clash. Police and youth clashed in the Yüksekova bazaar, with youth responding with Molotov cocktails and stones to the police barrage of tear gas and plastic bullets.

(cm/nt)