Earlier this week marked the 600th day since Berkin Elvan was hit by a tear gas canister during the Gezi Park Protests that lead to his death following a 269 day coma. It was pertinent that many took to Twitter to remember Berkin given that the up and coming security reform package current in parliament will drastically impact all future protests in Turkey. However Berkin was not out protesting. He was on his way to buy a loaf of bread from the local corner shop. Or at least this is a widely held narrative among a segment of society.
I witnessed an exchange on Twitter where one user asked if the other was “naive or simply stupid”, implying that Berkin had absolutely nothing to do with buying bread. That was President Erdoğan’s view in his speech at the International Ombudsman Symposium when he said Berkin was a tool for a terrorist organisation.
The neighbourhood of Istanbul where Berkin lived, Okemydanı, is known to be an area where outlawed groups such as the DHKP-C and YDG-H operate. Police are not welcome in the close-knit neighbourhood, which in some parts has resisted gentrification so far. Just as every resident in the pious Faith district is not a Jabhat al-Nusra or ISIS member or sympathiser, nor is every resident in Okemydanı an extreme left wing or Kurdish terrorist.
The Public Prosecutor’s Office in Istanbul has been conducting the official inquiry into the death of Berkin. Progress has been slow: the public prosecutor in charge of the case, Faruk Bildirici, was moved to Antalya last summer and his replacement was not appointed for three months, leaving all cases under Bildirici to gather dust. In December 2014 the Elvan family, exacerbated with the slowness of the inquiry, launched a Twitter campaign asking where Berkin’s file was (#BerkinElvanDosyasıNerede) and calling on the Ministry of Justice to act. Although footage of police at the scene of the crime was uncovered and a list of police officers on duty submitted, it seems the Riot Police Department is dragging its feet on providing further information necessary for the Elvan family to launch a lawsuit.
Regardless of the testimonies collected for inquiry, it is hard to imagine under what circumstances that the two opposing narratives on Berkin may coalesce. Is there a place for official, independent and impartial inquiries when so many of the actors heavily politicise the event under scrutiny?
Unsatisfactory and protracted inquiries are nothing new in any country. Turkey is no exception: from the Uludere/Roboski Massacre of 2011 to the Reyhanlı bombing in 2013, and the ever elusive cases such as the inquiry that lead to the Ergenekon and Balyoz (Sledgehammer) trials. It is important that both the government and the state ensure that these inquiries foster a sense of trust and justice.
Otherwise, in spite of what truths such inquiries uncover, competing narratives will remain dominant and become accepted fact for the public psyche.