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22.09.06
A Turkish court acquitted 405 Turkish soldiers of the charges of torture and
rape of a Kurd woman, citing lack of evidence.
The 34-year-old woman, identified only as S.E., claimed she was blindfolded
and repeatedly raped and tortured in the town of Mardin during her detention
in November, 1993 and in March and August, 1994, times of heavy fighting
between the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) and the army.
The controversial trial started in October 2003, in Mardin and then moved to
the northern town of Sungurlu on security grounds.
The ruling of the court will be appealed before the European Court of Human
Rights, the woman's attorney said.
S.E. now lives in Germany, which granted her political asylum.