MERSİN - Abdullah Muhammed Çiçek, born in Colemêrg (Hakkari), has lived without an identity card for 46 years. Çiçek will be deported because he was not given an identity card.

 

Abdullah Muhammed Çiçek, who was born in 1969 in Kelêtan village of Colemêrg, lost his mother Meryem Çiçek and father Muhammed Çiçek in a bombardment during the clashes between Iraqi forces and peshmerga in 1975. Çiçek, who was left without a mother and father at an early age, was never registered in the civil registry and therefore did not have a birth certificate until 2006.

 

In 2006, Çiçek was granted a "refugee identity card" and his application for citizenship was rejected. The grounds for rejection were that the identity card documents were burnt during the clashes in Çelê'de (Çukurca) district of Colemêrg in 1984. 

 

Çiçek was given a deportation order by Mersin Governorate Provincial Directorate of Migration Management. Çiçek's lawsuit for the cancellation of this decision was rejected by Mersin 1st Administrative Court on 29 November 2024. The appeal for the cancellation of the decision was also rejected by the Adana Regional Administrative Court 3rd Administrative Case Department on 19 September 2025. So Cicek will be deported. 

 

'LEFT WITHOUT A HOMELAND'

 

Reacting to the verdict against him, Abdullah Muhammed Çiçek said: "My father was a trader, he married my mother while working at the Iraqi border. When I was 5 years old, my mum and dad died in the bombardment. My uncles did not take care of me, and I grew up staying in different houses until I was 15. Then I worked as a shepherd and in construction. In Ankara, they told me 'you cannot be without an identity card', I applied for one. But when my relatives did not support me, the state took me under examination and gave me a refugee identity card. For 20 years, I have been signing a petition every week. The lawsuits I filed were rejected. Now I am wanted to be deported. I am not Iraqi, I am a citizen of Turkey. I want my citizenship to be granted and my voice to be heard."

 

MA / Abdulkadir Ayten