2 July 1993 at the Hotel Madimak in Sivas, Turkey, people had gathered for the Pir Sultan Abdal {poet executed c. 1560} festival. A mob set fire to the hotel killing 35 people, mostly Alevi (a local Islamic tradition) intellectuals and creatives, plus two of the perpetrators.
There is some confusion about the exact number killed: this memorial and some sources (e.g. Wikipedia) say 35 (plus 2 perpetrators) but a number of websites give a list of 36 names (and we assume these do not include any perpetrators). The memorial has photographs of 33 and we think photos just do not exist of the other 3 names (Ahmet Alan, Ahmet Öztürk, Kenan Yılmaz). One of the names with no image ,Ahmet Öztürk, is very similar to another name, Ahmet Özyurt, and we wonder if this might explain the confusion over 35 or 36 names.
Of the 36 deaths:2 hotel employees; 1 journalist; 1 guest; 1 child; all the others were creatives (artist, poet, etc.). There were 17 female and 19 male.
