Turkey’s Erdogan Vows to Keep ‘Defending Truth’ as Saturday Mothers Mark 30 Years of Protest

ISTANBUL — Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan declared on Monday that Ankara will keep defending “truth, justice, peace, and stability” in the face of provocations, though he did not specify which incidents he was referring to [230835]. His statement comes as domestic groups continue to pressure the state over unresolved cases from past decades.

The Saturday Mothers, also known as the Saturday People, held their weekly vigil in Istanbul this weekend, marking nearly 30 years of continuous protest since 1995 [230749]. The group demands accountability for individuals who disappeared during political unrest in the 1980s and 1990s. “We will keep asking: Where are our missing?” the group said in a statement. “Until our missing are found, until the truth is revealed, and until those responsible are held to account” [230749].

The demonstration comes amid ongoing legal battles in other disappearance cases. In a separate case, the father of Rojin Kabaiş publicly rejected the official narrative that his daughter was suicidal, vowing that his family will not allow a cover-up [228341]. The family’s lawyer, Abdurrahman Karabulut, has formally requested that Turkish authorities detain two individuals and collect their DNA samples in connection with her disappearance [229482]. The petition, filed with the Van Chief Public Prosecutor’s Office, targets a person identified as M.Ç. and another as M.N.K., who allegedly had contact with M.Ç. after the incident [229482].

The Saturday Mothers argue that as long as the state denies responsibility, the full truth cannot emerge. Their demands remain unchanged: accountability, information, and the return of their loved ones—or at least the facts of what happened to them [230749].