The case of Kemal Altun*

Year

1983

Date

30.08.1983

Theme

Migration

Broadcast series

Panorama

Duration

09:09

*CAUTION: The film contains content that should not be used uncontextualised in accordance with discrimination-sensitive education.

This reportage for “Panorama” consists of two individual reports that have been put together in reverse order of their production. The film begins without commentary: The film team is standing in front of an apartment door, Navina Sundaram seems agitated, shaken. They enter the living room of a family, Turkish is spoken, a translator is present. A woman is invited in, the translator reports. The woman listens, then breaks down in tears. The family and the film crew try to help her. The camera keeps rolling. This is followed by an interview with a lawyer who explains that his client Kemal Altun committed suicide in the Berlin courtroom by jumping out of the window. He places the political responsibility on those who exerted massive pressure to extradite him; he demands an immediate halt to extradition to Turkey. The second part of the film, shot a week earlier in the courtroom, provides background on the Altun case: The student, persecuted for contributing to a left-wing student newspaper and on charges of alleged involvement in an assassination attempt, had applied for asylum in the Federal Republic of Germany in 1981. At the same time, Turkey demanded his extradition and he was placed in custody pending deportation. The asylum application was granted, but the extradition was not halted - the Federal Ministry of the Interior sued the Federal Office for Asylum before the Berlin Administrative Court. Due to the explosive nature of the material, “Panorama” head Peter Gatter held a live conversation with Navina Sundaram in the studio. The broadcast tape, an important historical document of the Federal Republic, can no longer be found in the NDR archives.