Violence against children, a neglected problem DW 09/29/2024

“Dainty”, “sensitive”, “tender”, “fragile”: this is how the name Narin can be translated into English. His case has been making headlines in Turkish media for weeks. This 8-year-old girl from the village of Tavsantepe, near Diyarbakir, in the southeast of the country, was reported missing several weeks ago; his body was found in a bag on September 8 at the edge of a nearby river.

The affair shook the entire country. Numerous reports and comments were also published on social networks. Justice Minister Yilmaz Tunc visited the Kurdish village and President Recep Tayyip Erdogan promised on X, formerly Twitter, that anyone found guilty of the crime would be brought to justice. Both said the perpetrator(s) would receive “the most severe punishment.”

One of the reasons for the national outrage is that the entire village of 550 residents refuses to say anything. Several members of Narin's family, including his parents, are suspected and detained. A total of 12 people have been arrested so far, including Narin's uncle, head of Tavsantepe village.

Forensic doctors say the girl was strangled. The public is of the opinion that someone from this village must know who murdered Narin, but no one says a word.

“Turkey is facing a complex case. The murderer is hosted by the victim's family and his relatives,” explains Halis Dokgoz, forensic doctor and director of the Child Protection Center at Mersin University.

The region where Narin lived is rather traditional and conservative, and the society is based on tribal structures. In these communities, children are often “objectified,” meaning their deaths are downplayed, Dokgoz explains. In such cases, the perpetrator is usually someone the child already knows,” he says.

Lack of prevention

Narin is not an isolated case. According to the Turkish Center for Children's Rights (FISA), at least 64 children have been murdered in the past two and a half years, often due to domestic violence. The center collects its data from publicly available sources.

Turkish authorities have not released official data on children killed or missing since 2016. The most recent statistics show that 104,531 children were reported missing across the country between 2008 and 2016, so it is difficult to know today. 'today not only how many cases there have been since then, but also how many of these children have been found dead or alive so far.

Experts criticize the lack of transparency and preventive policies in this area and call for the systematic collection and publication of information on missing children. “To provide a political solution to the problem, we need data,” says FISA’s Ezgi Koman.

She says the UN Committee on the Rights of the Child (CRC) has been calling on Turkish authorities for years to provide relevant information. “If they have data but keep it secret, that would mean they don't want to be held accountable. Or they want to keep people from knowing how bad the situation is. Or the kids don't count everything just not for them,'” Koman says.

DW confronted the Turkish Family Ministry and the Turkish Statistics Institute (TUIK) with these statements, but has so far received no relevant response.

The opposition also submitted a parliamentary inquiry to the government and received no response. The 15-day deadline to respond expired on Thursday September 19.

In particular, the opposition wanted to know how many children had been reported missing since 2016. According to statistics available to the opposition, there should be more than 10,000. Burhanettin Bulut, a politician from the Republican People's Party (CHP) , said the lack of transparency in this matter was a “disgrace” for the government.

“Children must know their rights”

If such data were available, forensic scientists, social workers, psychologists and police could develop strategies to potentially prevent such cases, Dokgoz says. “Right now, we don't know anything at all. We follow a case only after it becomes public. And when we do, we only focus on the question: 'Who is the murderer?' This is false,” says Dokgoz. He believes that the authorities lack motivation to find lasting solutions to prevent such cases.

Sahin Antakyalioglu, coordinator of the Child Advocates Network (CACAV), agrees. He believes there should be a publicly accessible alert system with all the data and “a basic solution-oriented policy” for child protection. This would include an easily accessible helpline that all children could call, whether they live in a city or a village, he says. And, Antakyalioglu says, there should also be “an education system that teaches children about their rights.”

It makes “no sense to give rights to a child if he or she is not aware of them,” Antakyalioglu says. “Are we telling kids where they can report it if someone touches them? We need to start teaching them these things before they even go to school.”

“Children should be able to tell when someone is forcing them to do something,” he says. Until Turkey succeeds in taking all these measures, he says, Turkish society will continue to be shocked by case like that of Narin, 8 years old.

This article was originally published in Turkish.