Four women killed on the same day in Turkey amid Istanbul Convention withdrawal

Four women were killed on the same day on March 22, days after President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan withdrew Turkey from the Istanbul Convention, an international document protecting women's rights. All of the women are suspected to have been murdered by their romantic partners, once again displaying the Turkish judiciary's inefficacy in protecting women.

From L to R: The scene of Meral Sivrikaya's death, Nagihan Üste, Serpil Fikirli, Beyzanur Özel Fidan.

Duvar English

Four women were killed by men days after President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan withdrew Turkey from the Istanbul Convention, an international document that protects women's rights in signatory countries. 

The president's withdrawal of the country from the treaty prompted nationwide protests and international backlash, with domestic feminist organizations calling for the immediate reversal of the presidential decree. 

A man named Erkan Sivrikaya stabbed his 50-year-old wife Meral Sivrikaya to death in their daughter's home on March 22 in the southwestern province of Denizli, after he entered the residence through the balcony, where he landed on a rope he tethered to the roof.

A police officer named Fırat Köksal shot and killed his fiancee Nagihan Üste in his vehicle on the same day in Aegean İzmir, and proceeded to kill himself. 

A man named Cemil Fikirli stabbed his wife Serpil Fikirli to death in her father's house in southern Osmaniye on the same day, despite a restraining order the woman had issued against him. 

Meanwhile in western Kocaeli, 22-year-old Beyzanur Özel Fidan was reported to be found dead in her bedroom by her husband of three months, Ömer Fidan, whom she eloped with. 

Ömer Fidan was arrested on murder charges shortly after an autopsy on the young woman's body was completed.

On the same day, a group of women from the We Will Stop Femicides Platform staged a sit-in protest in Istanbul's Taksim Square to urge the government to reverse the withdrawal and to enforce Istanbul Convention. 

Istanbul Convention's enforcement by the Turkish judiciary has been an ongoing debate between women in Turkey and the government, as the Turkish judiciary has displayed its reluctance to prosecute violent crimes against women on numerous occasions. 

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Topics Istanbul Convention Femicides in Turkey Turkey Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan