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20 November 2000
Nazire Dedeman
Founder President of Umut Foundation
Panel Scripts
Thank you everybody.
I was asked to spank about Umut Foundation, so that is how I would like to start.
The Proud Umut Leaders Foundation was established in 1993 as you all know after my son Umut was killed. We have tried to share our sorrow and experiences with society while striving to keep our childrens memories alive.
The aim of Umut foundation to give the skills and personality to our children - who are the guarantee of our future - to lead society in the manner set out by Ataturk, and raise our children so they support the improvement of our country and the welfare of mankind, to help people to accept the superiority of the law and contribute to its implementation, to find peaceful solutions for disputes with the principle of Ataturks motto of Peace at home, peace in the world and to teach them the skills to keep and improve a peaceful and compromising environment.
The emblem of the Umut Foundation is the seagull. As you know, the symbol of peace is the pigeon. Peace has a predominant role in the aim of our foundation, but not only the establishment of peace but also sustaining peace. For this reason, we chose the seagull. Our effort is to prepossess and spread these expectations with flying seagulls and inspire the hopes of our country and the world in our young people.
The Umut Foundation has contributed to peace and also helped prepossess and teach peaceful methods of compromise not only in Turkey but also in the Middle East. I would like to mention some of our activities.
- Activities of the Peace, Compromise, Science and Art Conference, held in Turkey, Bulgaria and Spain
- Regional, National and International Readjustment Tendency Conference in the Balkans
- Education program related to Law in the Balkans Project.
- International Conference on the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and Democracy in Todays schools
- Two Conferences on Civil Rights in Bulgaria
- One Balkans Conference, related to Law
- Regional Conference of Non Governmental Organizations
- Turkish Greek Student Seminars
- The Middle East Media Conference
I do not want to take your time by setting out the whole list. Many similar activities have been carried out.
Our aim with these activities is to show the psychological side of the negotiation, and draw attention to the importance of compromising centres in taking the burden of courts, promoting democracy, removing prejudice in intercultural relations, and promoting compromise.
The projects related to law was including the superiority of law and peaceful solutions for disputes; our main subject is violence.
The education of civil rights in Turkey is aimed to promote peoples consciousness to be responsible citizens.
The reason for the Umut Foundations establishment as I mentioned before was that my son was killed with a gun.
Tens of people die everyday in this country. Like Umut, they lose their lives through guns and violence. The use of arms is a means of violence and it is the extreme of violence. The use and possession of arms illustrates the tendency towards violence. Violence is not gift of God, it is learned and it comes out when it finds adequate conditions. Like violence, the use of guns is also a learned behaviour.
Therefore, the Umut Foundation faces all kinds of violence and brute force at all levels, and seeks to contribute to the preference of peaceful methods to solve problems.
When we face violence and brute force, we also need to change ourselves too. This is possible by adopting a peaceful spirit when solving problems.
Besides these activities, Umut Foundation has been organizing activities under the banner of Say No to Individual Arming since 1993-1994. With these activities, it has aimed to encourage research into the need for individual arming and to prevent the rise of violence and brutal force and to strengthen the existence of state of law.
We all know that unchecked arming has reached to a dangerous point in our country. Besides arms used in celebrations and entertainment activities, there are arms used in killing. Therefore, it is a reality that many people lose their lives and most are innocent people. Having heard and read the reports every day, we have became inured to them. The Government has also become inured to them, and as Ms. Gül said unfortunately no legal action is being taken against them.
For this reason, there are many things that we, the people who work for non governmental organizations, should do about this. Our insisting attitudes, leading public opinion and making it heard more in public will encourage law makers to take action.
After the campaign No jokes with arms, a call to sports fans, Umut Foundation carried out many activities with the Football Federation, the Association of Sports Writers and even with arbitrators. Apart than this, the visual media supported our call and subtitled our no jokes with arms slogan during football games. This attracts peoples attention and talked about not using guns after the games.
It also affected legislation. With the decree of the eighth Criminal Department of the Supreme Court, taken unanimously in 1996, those committing such a crime face 2 to 5 years imprisonment. I went to the eighth department of the Supreme Court in Ankara, to personally thank them, and they told me that this legislation already existed, but we had never implemented it. After the media campaign, we have at least tried to put it in practice.
Of course it was something, but at the end it did not work, because the users of weapons still evade capture. Who would capture them? Police officers in police stations would capture them, or people would inform each other or call the police. I had many discussions in police stations, because they were still using guns after the games and still do so. They asked me; who are we going to capture? They told me they would go to the scene after hearing gunfire, but when they arrived there the shots were over and people had already gone home. Of course, it is easy to find excuses. But it is their duty to do capture the perpetrators.
Since the government makes buying guns easier, in other words, by legitimating guns, it also legitimatizes violence.
Apart from these activities, we also organized competitions with prizes, on Say No to Individual Arming.
- Searching and examining the reasons of individual arming in Turkey in 1994
- Composition Competition on Violence and Arms among Young Individuals among high school students across Turkey in 1995; with this competition we aimed to find out how the young see the problems of violence and arms.
- With a cartoon competition entitled No Jokes with Individual Arming and Arms in 1997, we tried to show the artistic side of the subject.
- We organized a research conference on The Role of the Media in 1998, which attracted a very high level of participation from members of the media, especially the newspapers. Columnists discussed what to do now, and I will mention this later.
- News photograph competition into the reasons and results of individual arming and violence in 1999.
This year, on 28 September 2000, we had the activity entitled The Medias Contribution to Peace.
As you know, incidents resulting in death and injury increase with the sale of guns in Turkey and individuals are being egged on with this increase. I would like to give some statistical information.
According to the Justice Departments statistics in 1996, the incidence of murder in each 100,000 of population rose by 11%, while incidents of assault and battery increased by 88%. It also shows that 21% of suicides were committed with the use of guns.
- Of course, I am not sure. These are the statistics provided by Justice Department, and you may have more detailed information and statistics.
During the 5 year period between 1992-1996, public prosecutions against guns under law 6136 increased by 83% and has multiplied in each 100,000 of population. The number of accused rose 74%. The use of guns in incidents has also increased. As you know, guns cause five times more deaths than sharp materials.
The number of rifles and pistols sold in our country in the last 8 years between 1990 and 1997 according to official information increased by 358%. During this period the total amount of sales was 260,770 I think this is very low. According to this statistical report, in the last 10 years between 1987 and 1996 the number of pistols captured in the area controlled by police forces was 95,114.
The number of pistols captured increased by 612% between 1987 and 1996.
According evaluations carried out by the Ministry of Internal Affairs in 1997, the percentage convicted murderers serving prison sentences, out of a sample of 234, who used weapons was 59% in 1985-1986.
Here is the list showing the use of violence and arms in public prosecutions in the criminal courts.
While the number of murders was 4,810 in 1987, this number increased to 6,980 in 1997 and the number of accidental deaths increased from 13,843 to 19,942, while the number of incidences of assault and battery rose from 73,839 to 97,370.
When we include robbery, seizure by violence, hostage taking and suicides to these numbers, the result is more scary. But we dont have time to be scared.
Again when we look at the statistical report of Justice Department Judicial Records and Statistics General Directorate for the period between 1994-1995, we face an even worse situation. The number of cases filed for murder based on decree laws 448 and 445 of the Turkish Criminal Code was 129,447.
The number of cases under law 6136, which concerns the use of firearms and sharp materials, between 1994-1998 was 132,321.
When we look at Police Department Records, we see the seriousness of the situation, with 80% of above crimes recorded as being committed with unlicensed guns.
Our wish I will keep it short is to solve the problems through peaceful methods and encourage people to do the same. Although we want to have guns to defend ourselves, unfortunately we do see any incidents where guns are used for this purpose in our country. Guns are not used for defensive purposes; they always cause incidents or cause death following arguments.
If we succeed in encouraging people to solve the problems through peaceful methods, we will not need guns. Our government has a huge responsibility in this, too. Our national education program should also include mediation courses for schools.
I will stop here and will continue in the second part.
Thank you.
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