Communicated on 30 April 2019
SECOND SECTION
Application no. 21330/19
Fatma Betül ZEYBEK and Others
against Turkey
lodged on 19 April 2019
STATEMENT OF FACTS
The application concerns the disappearance of Salim Zeybek, the applicants’ relative, following his alleged abduction by unknown persons on 21 February 2019 and the allegations of a lack of an effective investigation into his disappearance.
The applicants (see appended table) rely on Articles 2, 3, 5 of the Convention.
QUESTIONS TO THE PARTIES
1. Have the applicants exhausted all effective domestic remedies, as required by Article 35 § 1 of the Convention? In particular, is the individual application to the Constitutional Court an effective remedy within the meaning of Article 35 § 1 of the Convention in respect of the applicants’ complaints under Articles 2, 3 and 5 of the Convention?
2. Was the right to life of the applicants’ relative, ensured by Article 2 of the Convention, violated in the present case? In particular, was he abducted by agents of the State?
3. In accordance with the procedural and positive obligations under Article 2 of the Convention, have the authorities carried out an effective investigation and taken the necessary measures available to them to find the applicants’ relative in order to safeguard his life (see respectively Salman v. Turkey [GC], no. 21986/93, §104, ECHR 2000‑VII, and Osmanoğlu v. Turkey, no. 48804/99, §§ 71 and 84, 24 January 2008)?
In this connection,
3.1. What steps are being taken by the national authorities, in particular by the relevant prosecutors, in order to investigate the circumstances of the alleged abduction of the applicants? In particular, has the Ankara public prosecutor questioned the first, second and third applicants who were in the car when their relative had allegedly been kidnapped with a view to elucidating the details of the alleged incident?
3.2. Have the authorities identified the owner of the cars which have the plate numbers indicated in the applicants’ submissions of 25 February 2019 to the Ankara prosecutor’s office? If so, what actions have been taken to follow those leads?
3.3. Have the investigating authorities opened necessary enquiries into whether any incident on the Istanbul-Edirne highway on 21 February 2019 between 18.00 and 21.00 hours was reported, in particular a car chase or a car entering the opposite lane?
3.4. Have the records of surveillance cameras on the route from the location of the incident to where the first, second and third applicants were dropped off, including gas stations where the kidnappers allegedly stopped, been secured and analysed with a view to identify the person(s) involved in the alleged kidnapping of the applicants’ relative?
3.5. Have the investigating authorities taken necessary steps to identify the persons who allegedly kidnapped the applicants’ relative from the drawings made by the first applicant? Have they prepared facial sketches of those individuals and carried out a search in the relevant databases?
4. Has there been a violation of Article 5 of the Convention on account of the disappearance of the applicants’ relative? (see Çiçek v. Turkey, no. 25704/94, §164, 27 February 2001).
The Government are requested to submit a copy of the investigation file.
APPENDIX
No.
Applicant’s Name
Birth date
Nationality
Place of residence
1
Fatma Betül ZEYBEK
24/03/1984
Turkish
Ankara
2
Azime AYDIN
01/06/1967
Turkish
Ankara
3
Mustafa AYDIN
10/02/1958
Turkish
Ankara
4
Abdullah ZEYBEK
19/12/1955
Turkish
Ankara
5
Cafer Sedat ZEYBEK
07/06/2011
Turkish
Ankara
6
Esra ZEYBEK
13/03/1994
Turkish
Ankara
7
Hatice ZEYBEK
01/03/1959
Turkish
Ankara
8
Selma ZEYBEK
22/11/2013
Turkish
Ankara
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