ÇAKICI v. TURKEY JUDGMENT 11 44. In relation to the oral evidence, the Commission was aware of the difficulties attached to assessing evidence obtained orally through interpreters. It therefore paid careful attention to the meaning and significance which should be attributed to the statements made by witnesses appearing before its delegates. In a case where there were contradictory and conflicting factual accounts of events, the Commission particularly regretted the absence of a thorough domestic judicial examination. It was aware of its own limitations as a firstinstance tribunal of fact. In addition to the problem of language adverted to above, there was also an inevitable lack of detailed and direct familiarity with the conditions pertaining in the region. Moreover, the Commission had no power to compel witnesses to appear and testify. In the present case, while seventeen witnesses had been summoned to appear, only eleven gave evidence. The lack of documentary materials is adverted to above. The Commission was therefore faced with the difficult task of determining events in the absence of potentially significant testimony and evidence. The Commission’s findings may be summarised as follows. 1. The operation in Çitlibahçe village on 8 November 1993 45. Çitlibhaçe was in a district where terrorist activity was intense in 1993. On or about 23 October 1993, members of the PKK kidnapped five teachers, an imam and the imam’s brother, Abdullah Cebeci, from the village of Dadaş and marched them across country, passing near the village of Bağlan. Mustafa Engin was required to shelter one of the teachers, who was of Kurdish origin, overnight before allowing him to leave. The PKK shot and killed the remaining four teachers and the imam, while Abdullah Cebeci, though wounded, was able to reach safety. He gave the gendarmes at Lice gendarmerie headquarters descriptions of the persons whom he had seen, including the villagers who had brought food and stood guard. Bağlan was a village under the jurisdiction of Lice gendarmes. The kidnap victims had also passed close to the village of Çitlibahçe, less than a kilometre from Bağlan, but which was under the jurisdiction of the Hazro gendarmes. 46. The gendarmes from Hazro and Lice conducted a coordinated operation on 8 November 1993. This operation concerned the collecting of evidence and information relating to the kidnapping and murder and the apprehension of persons suspected of involvement. Ertan Altınoluk was in command of the gendarmes from Hazro. The operation order drawn up by him on 7 November 1993 indicated that the purpose of the operation was the capture of PKK terrorists and their collaborators and the destruction of shelters, and it named Çitlibahçe as the place of the operation. The Commission rejected the testimony of Ertan Altınoluk that they were not looking for Ahmet Çakıcı when they went to Çitlibahçe. The delegates assessed his evidence as evasive and unhelpful, and demonstrating a lack of sincerity. The Commission had regard to the evidence from two other