JINHA

ISTANBUL – Women from Roboski, the Kurdish village bombed by Turkish state jets in a massacre that killed 34 civilians, traveled to Istanbul to discuss their new book: "We Wrote in Roboski," edited by HülyaTarman.

The women began writing in a workshop hosted by Hülya Tarman. The young women, wearing all black, shared their stories of living through the airstrike that killed 34 villagers, many of them children. They spoke of the experience of their struggle for justice and the Turkish state's complete refusal to be accountable for the massacre.

"All of them had dreams," said SercanEncü, a woman from the village, of the massacre. "They weren't given permission to live their dreams. Until those responsible are found and tried, we will keep struggling."

"If this massacre had happened in the west [of Turkey] would the reactions be the same?" asked CahideEncü. "This massacre happened because we are Kurdish."

Hülya Tarman, the book's editor, also spoke at the event at the Kadıköy building of the group Green and Left Future. She noted that this was the first time these women had left the village to come this far.

Kıymet Encü, a second-year high school student who lost her older brother in the massacre, also spoke at the event.

"It wasn't just my brother who died in the massacre; it was my whole family. Now what will happen to us, and what will happen to the ones who committed this atrocity?" asked Kıymet."My little brother doesn't want to go to the state's schools. He says, 'the school of a state that killed my brother will kill me too.' As long as we remain silent, the state will keep killing us."

"Now after people die, we won't want to hear 'condolences to the country,'" said BerivanEncü, referring to a statement that has a particular sting for Kurdish people killed in the latest in a long string of massacres of Kurdish people by the Turkish state. "Now after people die, people need to escalate the struggle for freedom."

(ödk/mg/cm)