Member of the German Parliament Gökay Akbulut (DIE LINKE) has again been threatened with death. At the end of January, the politician from Mannheim had received a picture on Instagram with cartridges and a pistol with the inscription "Death will find you," announced the state association of the Left Party on Tuesday. The message was sent under the alias and picture of contract killer Mahmut Yıldırım. Code-named Yeşil (Green), Yıldırım was involved in numerous murders in Northern Kurdistan and Turkey in the 1990s commissioned by JITEM, the informal intelligence service of the Turkish military police (gendarmerie). JITEM is known for the most severe torture, kidnappings and brutal executions and is responsible for at least four-fifths of the unsolved murders in Northern Kurdistan. A journalist is also currently being threatened by JITEM, according to the regional association of the Left Party.

Not the first threat from JITEM

Gökay Akbulut already received a death threat with the same signatory at the end of 2020. The 38-year-old politician made the threat public in December - together with the Austrian Green politician Berivan Aslan, the co-chair of the left-wing parliamentary group in Hamburg's parliament, Cansu Özdemir, the activist and social scientist Kerem Schamberger, the Kurdish journalist Nuri Akman and the Syriac theologian Sami Grigo Baydar, who also received death threats from Turkish fascists. A joint statement said: "Turkish fascists in Germany act like Turkish fascists in Turkey, with attacks and violence against any form of opposition. The influence of extreme right-wing and ultra-nationalist Turkish organizations has grown nationwide in recent years. We have been drawing attention to this for years, both in and out of the parliament. Yet despite the threat situation, the security authorities have failed to act. On the contrary, they often downplay attacks and threats as 'eruptive violence' that occurs 'situationally' from time to time."

Criminal complaint has been filed

Like last year, Akbulut, an Alevi Kurdish woman, has now filed a criminal complaint. At that time, the investigations had revealed nothing, except that the author was in Turkey. The migration policy spokeswoman of the Left Party has repeatedly called on the federal government to ban fascist associations operating in Germany, such as the "Grey Wolves" or the "Federation of Turkish Idealist Associations in Germany", and to cease cooperation with Turkish police and intelligence agencies. So far, Germany has not come around to a ban - in contrast to France. Close cooperation between German and Turkish police authorities also remains in place.

Threats from "NSU 2.0" as well

Gökay Akbulut was also a target from a completely different source last year. Like other members of the Left Party, she received threatening e-mails with the sender "NSU 2.0" in reference to the right-wing terrorist network "Nationasozialistischer Untergrund" (NSU), whose core trio murdered at least ten people for racist motives. TAZ author Hengameh Yaghoobifarah, cabaret artist Idil Baydar and lawyer Seda Başay Yıldız also received death threats from the "NSU 2.0".