Ex-boyfriend of assaulted blogger arrested

ALANYA – Doğan News Agency

DHA photo

The former boyfriend of a Turkish woman who started a blog relating the violence she encountered from her boyfriend, has been arrested for assault and causing injury in the southern province of Antalya. 

A Turkish court in Antalya’s Alanya district ruled Sept. 2 for the arrest of a man, identified as Serdar D., who assaulted his former girlfriend many times after she asked for help via social media.

Kübra Yılmaz, a 22-year-old living in Alanya, wrote in her blog, www.kubray.com, that she had been assaulted and beaten by her ex-boyfriend for a long period of time. Yılmaz, who started the blog “as a last resort” to stop the ongoing violence, also wrote that the police did not process her complaints despite several applications.

Serdar D. was detained on Sept. 2 by gendarmerie forces near Yılmaz’s house, as gendarmerie forces, along with two officials from the Family and Social Policies District Directorate and a group of lawyers, who had visited Yılmaz at her house and was heading to the Alanya courthouse, detained the former boyfriend after Yılmaz spotted the minibus of the tour firm where he was working. 

Gendarmerie officers approached the minibus and found Serdar D. sitting on a nearby bench, where they detained him.

Yılmaz, who talked to members of the media after filing a complaint about Serdar D. on Sept. 2, said she had previously filed many complaints against Serdar D. though no action was taken. 

Yılmaz started her blog after breaking up with Serdar D., whom she met in 2014. Yılmaz posted pictures of herself with bruises on her face and body, as well as video footage showing a man beating up a woman in front of a house. Several people attempted to stop the man, but he continued his assaults.

Serdar D. repeatedly assaulted and made death threats against Yılmaz after they broke up, she wrote.

Although she went to the gendarmerie station to file a complaint, no one processed it, she wrote. “As a last resort, I turned to social media,” she said.

Yılmaz wrote in her blog, “Torture against a woman in Alanya,” that she fears being murdered by her ex every time she leaves her home.

“If I get murdered or assaulted today when I leave my house for the supermarket and if I go to the morgue without being able to reach home, know who killed me because the gendarmerie station I went to several times did not take me seriously or help me,” she wrote.

“I cannot even leave my house to file a complaint to the courthouse because he is constantly outside waiting for me,” wrote Yılmaz.