Uludere massacre
| Uludere airstrike | |
|---|---|
| Part of the Kurdish–Turkish conflict | |
| Type | Aerial attack |
| Location | Uludere, Şırnak Province, Turkey |
| Target | Kurdish smugglers |
| Date | December 28, 2011 9:37 PM (UTC+02:00) |
| Executed by | Turkish Air Force F-16 Fighting Falcon |
| Casualties | 34 killed |
The Uludere airstrike, also known as the Roboski massacre, or Sirnak massacre, took place on December 28, 2011, at 9:37 pm local time near the Turkish–Iraqi border. According to Turkish government sources, 34 smugglers were killed in the incident.
UA group of 40 Kurdish villagers of Turkish nationality, mostly teenagers, from the Ortasu (in Kurdish: Roboskî) and Gülyazı villages in Uludere district of Şırnak Province were moving in the night of December 28, 2011 from Iraqi territory towards Turkish border. The people were on a tour for smuggling cigarettes, diesel oil and the like into Turkey, packed on mules.
Turkish Armed Forces had received certain information about activities at the region supplied by United States intelligence services that was based on a U.S. drone ten days before the incident. The footage by the unmanned aerial vehicles flying over the terrain was evaluated as a group of militants of the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK). Pentagon officials were quoted as saying that American drones initially spotted the group, but after alerting the Turks and offering to conduct more detailed surveillance they were denied and “Turkish officers instead directed the Americans who were remotely piloting the drone to fly it somewhere else.” The security forces had been criticized in the media for their failure and losses. Two F-16 Fighting Falcons of the Turkish Air Force took off and bombed the area.
The next morning, relatives searched for the missing people, and found the bodies of the victims. 34 people belonging to the group were killed during and shortly after the airstrike. Two smugglers escaped to Iraq. Only one survivor, Servet Encü, returned to his village. 28 of the dead were from the Encü family. The bodies, some of them burnt beyond recognition or dismembered, were transported to their hometown on mules due to the rough terrain.
Servet Encü stated that generations of people in his village and neighboring settlements have been in the smuggling business because they are financially in need. He added that Iraqi traders bring diesel oil or tea by their vehicles to within 2–3 km (1.2–1.9 mi) of the border, and the villagers buy the goods and bring them home on trails, which takes about two and half hours. He said that the smuggling action was well known to the security forces at the border.
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Wikipedia