Four Turkish Officers Get Life Jail For Torturing Syrian Migrants To Death

Friday June 27, 2025

By Idorenyin UMOREN

A court in Turkey has given life sentences to four border guards convicted of torturing two Syrian migrants to death in March 2023, according to a verdict seen by AFP on Friday, June 27.

Seven other officers were also sentenced in May to up to seven and a half years in prison for “intentional injuries” and “destroying and hiding evidence” in the case, according to the verdict.

According to AFP, prosecutors said the officers, stationed along the Syrian border in Hatay province, had arrested a group of Syrians, including eight who had entered Turkey illegally.

Two of them, Abdurrezzak Kastal and Abdulsettar Elhaccar, were found to have been beaten with iron bars and forced to swallow petrol, leading to their deaths.

The others were returned to Syria and hospitalised.

Millions of Syrians have fled to Turkey since 2011 to escape the civil war, prompting Turkish authorities to build a border wall to reduce the exodus.

Nearly 2.7 million Syrians still live in Turkey, according to the authorities, who said in June that around 275,000 had returned since the ouster of President Bashar Al-Assad in December, AFP reported.