A Turkish court on Saturday sentenced to life imprisonment three members of the family of an eight-year-old girl whose murder in the province of Diyarbakir (south-east) had shocked the country, noted an AFP journalist .
The body of Narin Guran, missing for 19 days, was found in September in a bag in a river about a kilometer from the village where she lived with her family.
A family murder
After a tense day of hearing, the Diyarbakir court sentenced Narin’s mother, older brother and uncle to life in prison for “deliberate collaborative murder”, according to the verdict obtained by the journalist present in court. The judge sentenced another suspect, Nevzat Bahtiyar, who confessed to the murder, to four years and six months in prison.
As part of the investigation opened by the Diyarbakir public prosecutor’s office, 21 people were placed in police custody. Narin’s two parents and older brother were among those arrested.
A national emotion
“The sad news of Narin, who was brutally murdered, has deeply hurt us all,” responded Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan on X, committing to follow “personally the judicial process to ensure that those who took Narin from us receive the severest punishment they deserve.”
His disappearance on August 21 caused a stir in Türkiye, with several well-known personalities joining a campaign on social networks called “Find Narin”. Calls for rallies to protest Narin’s murder had been launched by feminist organizations in several cities in Türkiye.