German newspaper Deutsche Welle falsely claim that “Last year, 300 women were murdered in Turkey, according to a women's rights organization. The number of unrecorded cases could be far higher as femicides are often filed as suicides.”

In the DW’s article, Turkey is accused to cover up femicides as suicides. The article says that “300 femicides were recorded in 2020, according to figures published by the organization called We Will Stop Femicides. The organization says another 171 women were found dead under suspicious circumstances in Turkey during that same time, some of those cases also included alleged suicides.”

There is a treaty to prevent and combat violence against women and domestic violence dates back to 2014, with the convention obliging the signatories to create a framework to do so. Turkey ratified the agreement five years ago, underpinning it legally by passing a law to prevent violence against women and protect the family.

Unlike the claim of DW, violence and discrimination against women are prevented by Turkey's judiciary and law enforcement agencies which implement the convention.It is a false claim that “Turkey is covering up femicides as suicides.” It is a fact that if a suspicious crime is committed, then evidence is collected by law enforcement and an effective investigation is carried out on the order of the public prosecutor in accordance with the Criminal Procedure Law.

If it is concluded that there is no suspicion in a crime as a result of the evaluation made by the public prosecutor, it can be decided that the incident is not prosecuted; however, that is possible to reopen the investigation in the event of new findings and evidence are found.

In Turkey, a public prosecutor evaluates which crime is covered by the Turkish Penal Code, and the public prosecutor decides on which case will be non-prosecution or which will be deepened of the investigation. There have been 267 deliberate killings within the scope of the Law on the Protection of the Family and the Prevention of Violence against Women.

Public prosecutors follow the cases

The unfortunate deaths that are evaluated as "suspicious death" or "suicide" by the public prosecutor are followed up and necessary updates are made in the statistics of the relevant year in case the incident is described as deliberate killing.

In the light of these pieces of information, the article from DW is purely false, deliberate and fraudulent.The related news is the public manifestation of the ignorant understanding and interpretation of those who are unaware of the law enforcement-judicial relationship and the functioning of the law in Turkey.