The Ankara Chief Public Prosecutor’s Office has ordered the detention of 82 prominent pro-Kurdish politicians, with some of them detained as of Friday morning in police raids, Turkish Minute reported, citing the state-run Anadolu news agency (AA).
According to AA, the detention warrants were issued over the politicians’ alleged role in protests in Kurdish majority cities against what is seen by many as the Turkish government’s tacit approval of the Kobane siege in 2014, when Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) militants laid a prolonged siege to a Kurdish town in northern Syria.
Our former executives have been detained on the pretext of the 2014 Kobani protests. We proposed many motions for a parliamentary inquiry on this issue but they were all turned down by AKP&MHP. We will continue our struggle for justice. We will not be silenced! #HDPSusturulamaz pic.twitter.com/XW3olF3OwM
— HDP English (@HDPenglish) September 25, 2020
Among the detainees are Ayhan Bilgen, co-mayor of the eastern city of Kars; and Altan Tan, Sırrı Süreyya Önder, Emine Ayna, Nazmi Gör and Beyza Üstün, former MPs from the pro-Kurdish Peoples’ Democratic Party (HDP). According to the Turkish media, citing the prosecutor’s office, they will be held in detention for four days.
Ankara Chief Public Prosecutor Yüksel Kocaman recently sparked criticism for visiting Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan at the presidential palace with his bride immediately after their wedding. The visit has become a subject of discussion as an indication of the current state of judicial independence, or lack thereof.
“Such would be the honeymoon of a prosecutor from the AKP [the ruling party]: ‘Many HDP members were detained as part of a probe launched by Ankara Chief Public Prosecutor Yüksel Kocaman, who went to the palace to visit Erdoğan after a family wedding,” tweeted Can Dündar, a Turkish journalist in exile who survived a 2016 assassination attempt in Turkey.
Böyle olur #AKPliSavcı’nın balayı:
“Geçen gün düğünü yapıldıktan sonra Saray'a giderek Erdoğan'ı ziyaret eden Ankara Cumhuriyet Başsavcısı #YükselKocaman tarafından yürütülen operasyon kapsamında çok sayıda HDP'li gözaltına alındı.” https://t.co/DDBQyc2sgk— Can Dündar (@candundaradasi) September 25, 2020
[…] prominent members of the HDP were detained on September 25 over their alleged role in protests in southeastern Turkey that turned violent and led to at […]
[…] Chief Public Prosecutor Yüksel Kocaman, who ordered the detention of 82 prominent pro-Kurdish politicians last September, is also among those appointed to serve at the Supreme Court of Appeals. The […]
[…] Chief Public Prosecutor Yüksel Kocaman, who ordered the detention of 82 prominent pro-Kurdish politicians last September, is also among those appointed to serve at the Supreme Court of Appeals. The […]