Turkish prosecutors are examining new testimony that names the alleged planner of the unsolved 2015 killings of two police officers, columnist Ayşe Yıldırım wrote for the Kısa Dalga news website.
The government cited the attack when it abandoned peace talks with the outlawed Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) in 2015, although Turkey is now pursuing a new effort to end the conflict.
Writing for Kısa Dalga, Yıldırım said the İzmir Chief Public Prosecutor’s Office has requested a copy of the file from Şanlıurfa after hearing testimony from an alleged member of what prosecutors described only as a “separatist terrorist organization.”
According to Yıldırım prosecutors believe the witness identified the person who ordered and planned the July 22, 2015, killings of police officers Feyyaz Yumuşak and Okan Uçar in the Ceylanpınar district of southeastern Şanlıurfa province.
The prosecutor’s office has not publicly identified either the alleged informant or the person named in the testimony. It is also unclear whether the request will lead to a broader investigation or new charges.
The officers were found shot dead in the apartment they shared two days after an Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) suicide bombing in the nearby town of Suruç killed 34 people, most of them Kurdish activists and students.
The government blamed the PKK for the killings and cited the attack as justification for ending the peace process launched in 2013 and resuming large-scale military operations against the group. The collapse of the process was followed by renewed clashes, curfews and widespread destruction in predominantly Kurdish southeastern Turkey.
The PKK claimed responsibility for the killings, describing them as retaliation for the Suruç bombing and accusing the officers of collaborating with ISIL.
Yıldırım said the investigation and subsequent trial were marked by numerous allegations of irregularities.
She wrote that several suspects spent years in prison despite a lack of evidence linking them to the killings, that mobile phone records that could have shown their whereabouts at the time of the attack were destroyed without copies being retained and that anonymous tips leading to their detention were never properly investigated.
Yıldırım also pointed to unresolved questions surrounding fingerprint evidence. None of the fingerprints recovered from the apartment belonged to the defendants, while several were later found to match a fellow police officer who had previously said he had never entered the apartment.
A forensic report submitted to the Supreme Court of Appeals in December 2025 identified one fingerprint recovered from the apartment as belonging to police officer Burak Kuru, a colleague of the slain officers. The report concluded that five of the 10 fingerprints collected at the scene belonged to Kuru.
Defense lawyers’ requests to question Kuru during the original trial were denied.
Seven defendants accused of links to the PKK were acquitted in 2018 due to insufficient evidence, but prosecutors appealed the verdict, and the case has been awaiting a ruling from the Supreme Court of Appeals for seven years.
The renewed attention to the case comes as Turkey pursues a new peace initiative with the PKK.
The current process began in October 2024 when far-right Nationalist Movement Party (MHP) leader Devlet Bahçeli unexpectedly called on jailed PKK leader Abdullah Öcalan to urge the group to lay down its arms.
Öcalan issued such a call in February 2025, after which the PKK declared a ceasefire, announced its dissolution, held a symbolic weapons-burning ceremony in northern Iraq and began withdrawing its fighters from Turkey.
Talks have since focused on legislation governing the PKK’s giving up of arms, the legal status of former PKK members and their possible reintegration into civilian and political life.
Yıldırım questioned whether the renewed attention to the Ceylanpınar case reflected a genuine effort to solve the killings or whether the incident could once again be used to justify political decisions.
“Here is a test of sincerity,” she added.
The PKK, designated as a terrorist organization by Turkey and its Western allies, has waged an armed campaign against the Turkish state since 1984. The conflict has claimed more than 40,000 lives.