Three public officials who had been on trial over the collapse of the Isias hotel in the Turkish city of Adiyaman, which collapsed and killed 72 people, including 35 Cypriots, were on Monday acquitted of all charges, while a further three were released on bail.
Former Adiyaman deputy mayor Osman Bulut, civil engineer Bilal Balci, and former Adiyaman town planning director Mehmet Salih Alkayis were all handed suspended 10-year prison sentences and then released on bail conditions.
Meanwhile, former Adiyaman town planning director, building auditor Abdurrahman Karaarslan, and technician Fazli Karakus were all acquitted of all charges and as such freed.
After the decision was announced, Cyprus Turkish bar association chairman Hasan Esendagli explained that the court’s reasoning for its decision has not yet been disclosed, but will be made public in due course.
He added that “our work in Adiyaman is finished”, before explaining that Monday’s decision will be appealed at higher courts in the cities of Gaziantep and Ankara.
The Cypriots are also appealing a 2024 ruling made by Adiyaman’s sixth high criminal court in which six other people, including the hotel’s owner and architect, were found guilty of causing death by conscious negligence leading to the building’s collapse.
They believe that all 12 should be found guilty of the more severe charge of causing death by possible intent.
The hotel collapsed during the first of two powerful earthquakes which hit the southeast of Turkey on February 6, 2023, with 24 of the 35 Cypriots who were killed having been children.
Initial reactions to Monday’s verdict was terse, with newspaper Yeniduzen describing it as “scandalous”, while Rusen Karakaya, whose daughter Selin was among the 24 Cypriot children who died in the hotel’s collapse was visibly furious when she exited the courthouse.
“Down with your justice! I will not remain in Adiyaman a minute longer!” she cried.
Monday’s hearing was expected to begin at Adiyaman’s first high criminal court at 10am local time, 9am Cyprus time, but was delayed as the Cypriot prosecution lawyers had been unable to reach Adiyaman on time due to adverse weather in southeastern Turkey.
Before the hearing did begin, Turkish Cypriot ‘prime minister’ Unal Ustel spoke outside the courthouse, flanked by opposition political party CTP leader Sila Usar Incirli.
“Both the government and the opposition parties, and all of our people, trust in the justice system of the Republic of Turkey, and will continue to trust in it. We have been in Adiyaman since the beginning of the process, we will be in Adiyaman until the process is completed, and we will fight for our children’s rights until the very end,” he said.
He added that he had travelled to Adiyaman “not as a prime minister, but as a father”.
“I am with the mothers and fathers here, and with our people whose hearts are bleeding. We have not forgotten our champion angels, we will not forget them. We have made a promise to them, and we are eagerly awaiting the judges’ decision,” he said.
The moniker “champion angels” was given to the 24 children who made up the Famagusta Turk Maarif Koleji (TMK) school volleyball team and who were staying at the Isias hotel.
Ahead of the day’s hearing, Karakaya told the north’s Tak news agency that she expected the six defendants to be found guilty of “causing death by probable intent”.
She said this conclusion has been “indicated by all the evidence”, and that she also expects “for all the necessary steps to be taken, and for consequences and the law to converge”, but that she fears the court may instead decide to convict the six defendants of the lesser charge of “causing death by conscious negligence”.
“This is our debt to our children. This is the most fundamental test of justice. As a mother, I say this: considering the established practice of lower courts basing their decisions on the prosecutor’s opinion, we are aware that it is legally foreseeable that the verdict could lean towards conscious negligence despite such clear and indisputable evidence,” she said.
However, she stressed that she and other family members of the deceased will not allow what she considers to be the truth to be covered up.
“I am a mother; a mother who has buried her child and been forced to learn to live by caressing a gravestone. My child died under a chain of negligence, under facts which were deliberately ignored. All the evidence in the file, the expert reports, the technical facts, they all scream one thing at us: this was not an accident, this was not negligence, this was a foreseeable death,” she said.
Meanwhile, Turkish Cypriot leader Tufan Erhurman offered his support for the families of the dead Cypriots, saying that his “heart and mind are in Adiyaman with the families”.
At the case’s previous hearing, Bulut had insisted that he had only signed off on reports which had already been prepared regarding the hotel during his term as deputy mayor.
“The projects had already been signed and prepared. I only signed the permit. It was not my responsibility to prepare any reports. The municipality’s operations and procedures are so complex that I cannot recall them,” he said.
He had earlier said that he had “no technical knowledge” and that he therefore could not be held liable for the hotel’s collapse.
“I was a history teacher. As far as I remember, I started working as Adiyaman’s deputy mayor in 1994. Before I started there, the rough construction of the Isias hotel had already been completed,” he said.
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