Ballerina, another woman, murdered in Turkey

ISTANBUL

A 20-year-old university student and ballerina, Ceren Özdemir, was stabbed to death on her way back home from a ballet class on Dec. 3 in the Altınordu district of the Black Sea province of Ordu.

Özdemir was attended by paramedics after the murder, while the attacker fled the scene.

Özdemir was taken to Ordu University Training and Research Hospital but died after surgery.

Police launched an investigation into the murder and collected security camera footage from surrounding workplaces.

Police are trying to identify the attacker, according to local reports.

Ordu University Rector Ali Akdoğan made a statement to journalists after expressing his condolences to Özdemir’s family.

“She left her school and stopped on her way home. When she came home, she rang the bell and her sister threw the keys out of the window. When her sister noticed she was late [did not open the door], she went down only to see Ceren lying in blood,” Akdoğan told local reporters.

"When I went to the window to throw the keys out, I saw that there was a person in his 40s dressed in black in front of the building,” Özdemir’s sister reportedly told the police.

The police determined that a deliveryman, identified only by the initials M.D. and who brought take away food to the house of the two sisters, asked Özdemir out a while ago, and that he had started to disturb Özdemir when she rejected him.

M.D. was detained at midnight.

Following the interrogation, however, the deliveryman was released after police found he had no connection to the murder.

Meanwhile, another suspect have been identified bu the police officers and was detained in a house he was hiding.

The suspect, allegedly a drug addict, stabbed a police officer severely and was taken to the police headquarters for interrogation under extensive security measures.

The police officer, who was seriously injured as a result of the attack, was taken to hospital.

The murder became the latest in a string of similar femicides to spark nationwide outrage on Turkey’s social media.

According to figures provided by Kadın Cinayetlerini Durduracağız Platformu (We Will Stop Femicides Platform), which keeps a tally of femicides across the country, some 390 women were killed by men in Turkey in 2019.

In its latest tally, the platform recorded 39 women murdered in the month of November.

Feminist groups have long urged authorities to take serious action to prevent more women from dying. The rate of femicides are alarming in a country already plagued by murders of women at the hands of abusive ex-husbands, partners or male relatives.