Relatives of victims who died in a devastating hotel fire in the ski resort of Kartalkaya in northwestern Turkey earlier this year broke down in tears during a parliamentary session on Wednesday, demanding justice and accountability for the tragedy that killed 78 people, the Anka news agency reported.
The fire, which erupted in the early morning hours of January 21 at the Grand Kartal Hotel, a 12-story ski resort in Kartalkaya popular with vacationers during Turkey’s midterm school holiday, claimed the lives of 78 people and injured 51 others. Among the victims were 36 minors.
The emotional hearing marked the 13th session of a parliamentary commission set up to investigate the January fire, which swept through the hotel, which had been promoted as “family-friendly” and “safe for children.” For the first time the commission heard directly from grieving families, a step many criticized as long overdue.
Relatives recounted the horrific events of the fire and alleged negligence, mismanagement and a cover-up of crucial evidence.
“How do 36 children die in a hotel marketed as safe?” asked Hilmi Altın, who lost his wife and daughter in the blaze. “Who gave this place a license? Who failed to inspect it? This was not a mistake, it was a crime,” he told lawmakers, his voice trembling. “The owners, the ones who ignored the risks, the ones who looked away, they all must be held to account.”
The tragedy sent shockwaves across the country, with videos circulating on social media of people desperately screaming for help or jumping from windows and the hotel becoming a symbol of what critics say is the country’s dangerous mix of poor oversight, lax building standards and political negligence.
The high death toll at the hotel was attributed to the lack of fire warning systems and fire safety measures and sparked a blame game between the tourism ministry and the Bolu Municipality, run by the main opposition Republican People’s Party (CHP), since Kartalkaya is located in Bolu province.
The hearing was filled with heart-wrenching moments as relatives of the victims, representing 28 families, packed the meeting room. Lawmakers greeted them with condolences, and photos of the deceased were displayed on large screens under the phrase “We have no one else to lose.”
Altın said the people who ran the hotel and those responsible for approving and inspecting it must be prosecuted. “We want sentences without any kind of reduction. We want the hotel’s grounds to be turned into a memorial so no one forgets this horror.”
President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan declared a national day of mourning after the fire.
A criminal investigation into the fire launched by the Bolu Chief Public Prosecutor’s Office is ongoing, with more than 20 people, including local officials, hotel owners, executives and staff, taken into custody and some put in pretrial detention.
“We dream of a country where morally bankrupt people are never again allowed to hold positions of responsibility,” Altın added. “We expect this commission to be a model of justice.”
Grand Kartal Otel yangınında kızını ve torununu kaybeden anne Sema Şahin, yangını araştırmak için kurulan TBMM komisyonunda konuştu:
"Kızımın yüzünü gördüm. Prensesim, koklayarak öptüğüm kızım yanmıştı. 'Dişlerini açın bana' dedim çünkü bizde genetik bir diş yapısı vardı.… pic.twitter.com/2Bbw9m8JF5
— ANKA Haber Ajansı (@ankahabera) April 30, 2025
Other families echoed his calls for justice and criticized the slow pace of the legal investigation into the fire.
Dr. Zeynep Kotan, who lost her 18-year-old son Ömür, said the victims’ families had to piece together information on their own. “The judicial process is crawling. Some hotel employees still haven’t been questioned. How is an indictment being prepared while statements are missing?”
Eray Bağcı, whose 16-year-old son Eren also died, said hotel staff fled instead of helping guests. “They panicked when they saw smoke. They saved themselves while abandoning our children,” he said. “There are reports of evidence being tampered with or not preserved properly. All I have left is a bracelet from my son. Some parents couldn’t even recover a single item. We are here for justice.”
According to a recent report from a court appointed expert, the hotel staff did not activate the fire alarm during the deadly blaze, seeking to avoid a stampede that might have delayed the evacuation of select guests on the upper floors.
Nihan Ece Mercan, who lost her brother Alp, said everyone with even the smallest responsibility must be held to account.
“This is not just about a ‘coffin hotel.’ It’s about flawed licensing, unregulated tour operators. Let my brother’s name mark a new beginning.”
The session’s most emotional moment came when Duygu Can Sarıtaş, who lost her husband Yılmaz, daughter Nehir and son Doruk, played an audio recording her son sent moments before the fire, expressing his love for his mother. Fighting back tears, she told lawmakers, “I expect the same courage from this commission that my 13-year-old son showed.”
She described the chaos, lack of communication and emotional abuse she suffered as she was waiting in front of the hotel that day for a piece of news from her family members. “Someone came to me and said, ‘Don’t cry, the governor is upset.’ Even my grief was seen as inappropriate,” she said. “I shouldn’t have had to pay the price of motherhood like this. The pain I carry isn’t just mine, it’s this country’s moral burden.”
The room was overcome with emotion as Sarıtaş concluded. Lawmakers and attendees, including commission chairperson Selami Altınok, a lawmaker from the ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP), were visibly moved. Several parliamentarians and family members wept.
The families ended the session by urging parliament to ensure that such a tragedy never happens again and to transform the hotel’s ruins into a public memorial. “We will not stop until justice is served, without reductions [in sentences], without excuses,” Altın said.
Meanwhile, the court-appointed experts identified multiple parties as primarily responsible for the disaster including the hotel’s owners and board members, the Ministry of Culture and Tourism, Bolu’s Provincial Special Administration, the Bolu Fire Department and the Ministry of Labor and Social Security.
Each party was found to have ignored or failed to correct known safety deficiencies, according to the report.