Metin Yüksel commemorated on 44th anniversary of his martyrdom

Metin Yüksel was a Muslim political and social activist from Turkey. One of the main leaders of Turkey's political Islamic movement during the 1970s, he also led the Akıncılar Organization, an Islamic political organization.

Yüksel was born on July 17, 1958, in the eastern Anatolian city of Bitlis. Little is known about his early life outside of his family's religious devotion, a characteristic that Yüksel would carry with him throughout his short life. His father, Sadreddin Yüksel, was a well-known religious scholar, famous among Turkey's religious.

Growing up during the turbulent 1960s and 1970s, a period of near-anarchy and daily bloodshed amongst Turkey's political factions, Yüksel began his activism at an early age. Inspired by the ideas of his father and others, Yüksel quickly became active in the burgeoning political Islamic movements that emerged in the early 1950s, following the onset of the multi-party period in 1945.

Asides from his political work, Yüksel also founded and led Akıncılar, a social welfare organization most prominent in eastern Turkey, but existed throughout the country.

Although Turkish Muslims of the day were careful to steer clear of the political violence between nationalist and Marxist factions in Turkey, many of them died nevertheless.

On February 23, 1979, while leaving Friday prayers, Yüksel was shot dead outside Istanbul's Fatih Mosque by ultra-nationalist gunmen. He was 20 years old.

Following his assassination, Yüksel became a martyr among Turkey's Islamic factions. His assassination led Muslims to declare February as Şehit ("Martyr") month.

Every year on the anniversary of his death, his followers visit the spot where he was martyred, in the yard of Fatih Mosque. It is common for them to hoist banners remembering him and paint red the spot where he fell. (ILKHA)