Pembe Hayat’s activist and staff member Cayan was first assaulted verbally with homophobic slurs and then faced physical violence by their neighbours on the upstairs and the apartment across theirs around 23:30, last night. The perpetrators used Cayan not closing their curtains as a reasoning for their homophobic attack. They threatened Cayan by saying “if you don’t keep your curtains closed, we are gonna continue watching your house. You are a fag and you have no place in our community.” Following the verbal assaults and threats, a neighbour man grabbed a knife and tried to stab Cayan.

Following the incident, Cayan called for police presence while other neighbours intervened the incident and tried to keep the perpetrators away.

“You should be teaching your children not to be peeping Toms.”

 Police officers from Esat Police Station arrived to Cayan's’s apartment where the incident happened. When police arrived, the homophobic neighbours immediately shouted out “this one is a fag, we have children in our houses, we don’t want our kids to see this one.” Cayan told them to teach their childred not to peep on people’s houses rather than hate and violence. Police officers suggested Cayan that “our traditions and public moral are applied in our laws, you have to keep your curtains closed.” They ignored Cayan’s statements and treated them as a potential criminal. Following the incident, poliçe officers escorted perpetrators to poliçe station to take their official statements of complaint against Cayan. Cayan was also invited to the poliçe station to register their official statemtn of complaint; however, seeing the homophobic behaviour and attitutde of law enforcement forces, Cayan decided not to register their official statement of complaint against the perpetrators at the poliçe station but at the public prosecutor’s Office next day along with the presence of Pembe Hayat’s attorney.

“This was a systematic assault and harrassment ever since I moved here.”

 Pembe Hayat’s web editor and activist Cayan talked to PembeHayat.org:

“ This is not the first time. Same people caused me troubles earlier this year about me not keeping my curtains closed. They claim that I was behaving immorally inside my own house at the hours when I am at the Office working. This is part of a systematic assault and harrassment I have been facing ever since I moved in this flat. They threatened me that they would continue these attacks as long as I keep residing here.”

Pembe Hayat will be following up the legal case about this incident.