A 100-aged Kurdish woman residing in one of the Turkish provinces – Tunceli (Dersim) has been looking for her family members for 72 years. Dogru, 100, lost her family in the Dersim mass killings in 1938. She said Kurdish citizens escaped from the Turkish soldiers, finding shelter in forests and caves, but small children revealed their places crying of hunger and fatigue. Thus, many mothers threw their children in the river alive.

All the men were killed, she noted, adding that fate of hundreds of girls is yet unclear. They are still missing. The woman stresses Kurds never thought once they would also be the victims of similar massacres perpetrated against Armenians. “During 1915 mass killings of Armenians we kept silent. We lived with Armenians in the villages. Old people did not understand why our Armenian friends were killed. In 25 years, our turn came,” Dogru emphasized.

The Turkish authorities vigorously suppressed uprising in Dersim province, destroying thousands of villages. According to different calculations, about 100,000 people were killed in Dersim.  

Thousands of Armenians, those who survived through the 1915 Genocide and managed to hide in Dersim villages suffered the second Genocide in 1938.