Interior Ministry demands over 200,000 liras in compensation from 2007 suicide bomber’s family

Özge Eğrikar – ISTANBUL

Turkey’s Interior Ministry on Dec. 11 sued the family of a suicide bomber who detonated himself in central Ankara in 2007, killing nine people, after it paid compensation worth around 200,000 Turkish Liras to the family of a victim of the attack.  

Lawyer Ayşe Erdenur Baykal from the Directorate General of Trials, applying to an Istanbul court on behalf of the Interior Ministry, demanded that the siblings of bomber Güven Akkuş, a member of the outlawed Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK), to pay the ministry what it paid to the family of victim Selahattin Deniz in pecuniary and non-pecuniary damages. The total amount is 212,314.20 liras, including interest on the damages.

The Deniz family had demanded 135,000 liras in pecuniary and 250,000 liras in non-pecuniary damages from the Interior Ministry, after which the court ordered the ministry to pay 99,321 liras in pecuniary and 100,000 liras in non-pecuniary damages with interest.