Plain Speaker may be a local news website for the Upper Calder Valley, but sometimes things happen in other parts of the world that are barely reported and desperately need to be brought to public attention.

Human rights abuses in Istanbul is a case in point.

A Turkish person living in Turkey has sent Plain Speaker information about civilian Erdogan supporters’ murder of soldiers on the night of the attempted coup, and horrific photographs that you may not want to look at. These are at the end of this post. Plain Speaker is withholding the identity of the information source, for obvious reasons.

Western journalists have generally reported that Erdogan’s supporters came onto the streets to stop the coup in order to restore democracy. This is not what happened. Please tell President Erdogan that hard-won human rights must not be taken away.

Here is what the Turkish person has written to Plain Speaker:

“As you will know from reports in Western media, on the night of the attempted coup in Turkey President Erdogan facetimed on a tv channel and asked his voters to come onto the streets and confront the soldiers, which they did and some ended up cutting the throats of young soldiers who were only there under the command of their superiors. They killed them one by one and the soldiers in most places didn’t even open fire on them because they called themselves the soldiers of Mustafa Kemal Ataturk, the founder of Turkey.

Yes they bombed buildings but only empty ones… if they’d really wanted, they could have killed thousands.

I don’t even know where to begin or how to explain what’s been going on. I don’t even know if I’d get arrested for commenting on this. There is a good chance that I might.

There are three theories about what happened on 15th of July in Turkey: the first one is that Erdoğan did this himself, the second one is it was done by Erdoğan’s former best friend turned recent enemy, Fettullah Gülen, and the third and the least likely is that it was done by the reformers, followers of Mustafa Kemal Atatürk, the founder of Turkey.

The way I see it, it doesn’t matter who did this. What matters is that Erdoğan won anyway. He actually sent us text messages asking us to be on the streets, he asked his innocent unarmed citizens to go out on the streets on the same day as the coup.

İf these 19-20 year old soldiers meant to kill, they had the weapons to kills thousands, but they didn’t – because they didn’t know what they were doing. So they died instead, they died at the hands of people, people who would kill gladly for Erdoğan, who Erdoğan ordered to kill for him that night. These young innocent soldiers, soldiers who had no idea what was going on, were killed that night.

So I’m sharing some pictures of what happened that night. I have not been able to eat, sleep, breathe, since that night… I have been suffering for all those who lost their lives… I don’t know how to go on.

Many of the photos were taken on Bosphorus Bridge, where civilians killed soldiers. Just remember this: all these soldiers were heavily armed and they didn’t shoot any body on the bridge.”

A report from Amnesty International says that of 208 people that the Turkish authorities announced were killed on the night of the attempted coup on 15th July, 24 people were described by authorities as ‘coup plotters’, some of whom were reportedly lynched while unarmed and trying to surrender.

Here is the latest information from Amnesty International on Erdogan’s brutal backlash following the failed coup

Amnesty International has reported on abuse of detained soldiers and civilians, following the attempted coup in Turkey on 15th July.

Please tell President Erdogan that hard-won human rights must not be taken away.

PHOTOS – Warning – they are horrific. 

These photos were taken on that night, the ones which were taken in daylight are from Bosphorus bridge.

The one in the middle is when the soldiers were captured.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

“There are tears at the heart of things.”