ANKARA: The body of a 21-year-old woman student who went missing nearly three weeks ago has been found in eastern Turkiye, the government said on Tuesday, as the country grapples with a wave of femicides.
Hundreds of women have taken to the streets in major cities across Turkiye over the past 10 days to denounce the string of murders.
The protests began following a grisly October 4 attack in Istanbul in which two 19-year-olds were killed within half an hour of each other by a young man of the same age who then killed himself.
One of the women was decapitated.
The body of Rojin K. was found on the banks of Lake Van near Molla Kasim village some 80 kilometers (50 miles) from Turkiye’s eastern border with Iran, Interior Minister Ali Yerlikaya wrote on X.
Although Yerlinkaya did not give the cause of death nor confirm whether she had been murdered, it is rare for such a high-ranking official to comment publicly on a missing person case.
The young woman was studying at university in the nearby city of Van where she was last seen leaving her student digs on September 27.
Turkiye has struggled to contain a wave of femicides, with the country shocked by the murder of an eight-year-old girl in August and a 26-year-old policewoman last month.
Many of those protesting at the weekend chanted slogans against the ruling AKP and its leader, President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, who initially blamed alcohol and social media for the violence.
But last week, he promised to toughen the justice system and crack down harder on crime.
Part of the anger is about Turkiye withdrawing from the so-called Istanbul Convention, which was set up by the Council of Europe and required signatory countries to pass laws aimed at preventing and prosecuting violence against women.
Women’s organizations want Turkiye to return to the convention.
Turkiye withdrew from it in 2021 with Erdogan’s government claiming it encouraged homosexuality and threatened the traditional family structure.
In the three months to September 30, 117 women were “murdered” and another 110 died in “suspicious circumstances,” according to a statement released on Friday by women’s rights groups who based their figures on press reports.
Body of missing student found as Turkiye grapples with femicides
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Body of missing student found as Turkiye grapples with femicides
- Hundreds of women have taken to the streets in major cities across Turkiye over the past 10 days to denounce the string of murders
- The young woman was studying at university in the nearby city of Van where she was last seen leaving her student digs on September 27
Israeli military says its forces shot dead Palestinian rock-thrower in West Bank
- Palestinian Red Crescent said one person had been killed and one wounded in the incident
- Israeli settler attacks on Palestinians have risen sharply, while military has tightened movement restrictions and carried out sweeping raids in several citie
RAMALLAH: Israeli soldiers shot at three Palestinians who were throwing rocks at cars in the occupied West Bank on Sunday and killed one of them, the Israeli military said.
The Palestinian Red Crescent said one person had been killed and one wounded in the incident. There was no immediate comment from Palestinian officials. The Israeli military said that apart from the fatality, one other person was “neutralized” and one arrested.
A day earlier, Israeli soldiers killed a Palestinian teenager who was driving a car toward them as well as a bystander at a checkpoint in the West Bank city of Hebron.
The military initially said two “terrorists” were killed after soldiers opened fire at a car accelerating toward them, before later clarifying that only one was involved.
An Israeli security official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said a 17-year-old was driving the car and that a 55-year-old bystander was the second person killed.
Palestinian state news agency WAFA reported that 55-year-old Ziad Naim Abu Dawood, a municipal street cleaner, was killed while working. It said another Palestinian was killed but did not report the circumstances that led the soldiers to open fire.
The Palestinian health ministry identified the teen as 17-year-old Ahmed Khalil Al-Rajabi.
The military did not report any injuries to the soldiers.
Violence has surged this year in the Israeli-occupied West Bank. Israeli settler attacks on Palestinians have risen sharply, while the military has tightened movement restrictions and carried out sweeping raids in several cities.
Since January, 51 Palestinian minors, aged under 18, have been killed in the West Bank by Israeli forces, according to the Palestinian health ministry.
Palestinians have also carried out attacks on Israeli soldiers and civilians, some of them deadly.
