Kurdish victims of Paris shooting to be returned home for burial

Musician Mîr Perwer, also known as Mehmet Şirin Aydın, and activist Abdurrahman Kızıl will be returned home for burial in Muş (Mûş) and Kars (Qers) respectively, in ceremonies to be held on Thursday.

Two of the Kurdish victims of the Paris shooting will be returned home for burial on Thursday, Mezopotamya Agency reported.

The funeral of Kurdish musician Mîr Perwer (Mehmet Şirin Aydın) is to be held in the town of Yeşilova (Ewran) in the eastern province of Muş (Mûş), while activist Abdurrahman Kızıl will be buried in Kars (Qers).

The bodies of the victims are to be transported via air to Turkey, where they will be met with funeral processions. The Aydın family is planning a ceremony outside their home, where Democratic Community Congress (DTK) co-chair Berdan Öztürk is expected to speak. The remains will then be buried in the town cemetery.

Kızıl’s family will hold a ceremony in Qeregûnî village in Kars’s Kağızman district, where Democratic Regions Party (DBP) co-chair Saliha Aydeniz will speak. There will be a procession, but no mass action is planned as the governor of the province has issued a blanket ban until 10 January on marches, protests and other mass activities, on national security grounds.

Peoples’ Democratic Party (HDP) MPs will attend both funerals and the subsequent wakes.

Kızıl and Aydın were both killed in the 23 December shooting at a Kurdish cultural centre in the French capital, alongside prominent feminist and politician Emine Kara (Evîn Goyi). The 69-year-old French shooter has prior indictments and convictions for targeting immigrants, while Kurds in France believe he could possibly have been recruited by Turkish intelligence to target the Kurdish diaspora in particular, while serving time for a previous xenophobic crime.