Süleyman Taşköprü was born in Istanbul on 20 March 1970 and grew up in Şuhut. At the age of eleven, he moved to Hamburg-Altona, where his parents and siblings already lived. He graduated from secondary school in Hamburg. His sister Ayşen Taşköprü wrote in the magazine ‘Hinz & Kunzt’ on the 20th anniversary of his murder: ‘We had many friends, and although we later lived a little further out, we were always drawn back to Altona.’
Süleyman Taşköprü became the father of a daughter at the age of 28. When she was three years old, he took over his family’s grocery shop, the ‘Taşköprü Market’. Ayşen Taşköprü (ibid.): ‘He was full of plans. […] I remember April 2001: My brother was standing in the shop, full of enthusiasm, […]. But his plans and dreams were destroyed with him.’ Just two months later, on 27 June 2001, Süleyman Taşköprü was murdered by the NSU in that very shop in Hamburg-Altona.
Ali Taşköprü found his son bleeding on the floor of the grocery store on 27 June 2001. He reported in the NSU trial that he had gone to another shop in the same street to buy olives. When he came back, he saw something black behind the counter. He said: ‘My son, have you spilt something here?’ His son did not answer. He then put the olives to one side. His son was lying on the floor. He took his son’s face on his lap. His son wanted to say something, but couldn’t. ‘Later, the police came and took my son out of my arms and put him on the floor.’
Süleyman Taşköprü was the third victim of the NSU’s series of racist murders. His father testified that he had seen two white men on his way back to the shop who he thought were the perpetrators. The investigations in Hamburg were nevertheless weighed down by the police’s racist theories that put Süleyman Taşköprü, his social network, and his family under the microscope. When the nationwide investigation team into the series of murders briefly investigated right-wing extremism in 2006, the Hamburg investigators (LKA) spoke out against that possibility.
What’s more, as part of the Hamburg investigation, a man was flown in from Iran who claimed that he could make contact with the dead. His contribution to the investigation was the statement that the deceased Süleyman Taşköprü had told him about a perpetrator with ‘a dark complexion (Südländer), brown eyes, and black hair’. The victim, according to the ‘medium’s’ statement, had been in contact with a gang known to the police that consisted of up to eight people. For the Hamburg LKA, these clairvoyant pronouncements were confirmation of their investigative theories.
The Taşköprü family continues to fight for justice and clarity. Okan Taşköprü, Süleyman Taşköprü’s nephew, said at the ‘Unravelling the NSU Complex’ tribunal in 2022: ‘A healing process was not possible due to the ongoing investigations against our family.’ He called for a parliamentary committee of enquiry on his family’s behalf. Hamburg is the only federal state in which the NSU committed murders that has not yet set up such a committee of enquiry. Most recently, the Left Party parliamentary group in the Hamburg parliament submitted a corresponding motion. The family was present at the discussion in parliament and had to watch as the governing parties, SPD and Greens, once again prevented the establishment of such a committee.
