The third hearing of a trial in which supporters of the PKK terrorist organization are accused of the grisly murders of four men in 2014 opened with the testimony of Yusuf Er, the sole survivor of the mob attack in the southeastern city of Diyarbakır.

Yasin Börü, Ahmet Dakak, Riyat Güneş and Hasan Gökgöz were murdered by a mob of PKK supporters in Diyarbakır during the Sept. 6-7, 2014, riots. Börü, 16, was the youngest of the group, and became a symbol of resistance against the terrorist organization after his death. He and others were charity workers distributing food to poor families when they were attacked by a mob who threw their bodies off the upper floors of a building.

Er, who was 18 at the time of the attack, told the court how the mob killed his friends and how he survived. Five young men, including Er and Börü, were distributing meat during Qurban Bayram (Feast of Sacrifice) in Diyarbakır as part of an Islamic charity. As they were visiting a neighborhood, they encountered a crowd gathered for riots. Er claimed a man among the crowd shouted "they are from DAESH!" and pointed toward them. "They then attacked us. They fired, they threw stones. We ran away and hid in a [apartment] building," he said.

Er was injured when the mob found him and others, and fired on them. He locked himself in a bathroom while the mob was busy murdering his friends. "They had knives and sharp objects in their hands. They dragged me out of the bathroom and wanted to throw me off the window. I was half-conscious. Then, they stabbed me and the pain made me conscious again. I pushed them away and ran away," he told the court.