VAN, -- In Chatak district OF Van province, 30 kilometres from the village of Gorandesht in the uplands of Badılgali, there is a mass grave containing the bodies of 28 members of the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) who lost their life in a clash there in October, 1998.
According to locals who witnessed the clash, PKK members had taken hostage 14 village guards who were sent to the area to conduct an operation when Cobra helicopters bombarded the area, killing all 14 village guards along with 28 PKK members.
Following the clash, soldiers entered the area and took the bodies of the village guards. Then, they piled the bodies of the PKK members on top of each other and burned them.
After Abdullah Malgaz’s (code named Pling) head was cut off, his body was piled with the others and set on fire, according to eyewitnesses and MEYA-DER (Association of Mesopotamian Families of Victims of Forced Disappearances) Administrator, Isa Sarıbulak. Later, villagers in the area buried the burnt bodies themselves, turning the area into a cemetery.
Human Rights Association (İHD) Van Branch Secretary Sami Gorendag, who is conducting a probe into the events at this place, said that it is clear that the bodies were burned using a chemical agent and there were fewer skulls than bodies.
In order to deliver the bodies to their families, Gorendag asked the PKK to provide the names of those interred at the site, and he is calling for anyone else who has information about the people buried there to come forward.
An IHD committee confirmed that the Malgaz Family applied to the organization for assistance in retrieving the body of Abdullah Malgaz from the grave.
Abdullah Malgaz’s brother, Mustafa Malgaz was in a state of shock after an interview with the eyewitnesses. He said that severing his brother’s head after he died was a crime against humanity and that he is going to file a criminal complaint.
source : http://www.rojhelat.info/english/component/content/article/1460-guerrillas-burned-and-piled-up-in-mass-grave
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