Pro-Kurdish party members suffered widespread violations, legal harassment in 2023: report

A report drafted by Turkey’s pro-Kurdish Peoples’ Equality and Democracy Party (DEM) has found widespread cases of legal harassment and rights violations suffered by the party’s members in the first 11 months of 2023, the Mezopotamya news agency reported on Monday.

The report, unveiled on Monday by the party’s Legal and Human Rights Commission co-spokespersons, Nuray Özdoğan and Öztürk Türkdoğan, detailed the attacks and human rights violations against party members since 2015.

The party saw the detention of 2,906 of its members and the arrest of 319 others between January and November 2023, according to statistics provided by Türkdoğan.

At least 22,818 party members have been detained in operations targeting the party since 2015, with 4,334 individuals, including the co-chairs, arrested.

“Between January 2015 and December 10, 2023, 104 provincial co-chairs, 201 district co-chairs and one municipal co-chair of our party have been arrested. … Our party saw the arrest of 24 members of parliament and 30 MYK [Central Executive Committee] members,” he added.

Türkdoğan said seven members of parliament and 14 MYK members from the party are still in custody, with 15 MPs stripped of their parliamentary status.

Pro-Kurdish party members or politicians in Turkey are frequently accused of having links to the outlawed Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK), which has been waging a bloody campaign in Turkey’s southeast since 1984 and is listed as a terrorist organization by Turkey and much of the international community.

Türkdoğan said that out of the 93 municipal mayors elected on March 30, 2014, all have been arrested, and trustees have been appointed to replace them in 95 instances.

Türkdoğan added that following the local elections of March 31, 2019, 43 co-mayors were arrested and trustees were appointed to 48 municipalities, with 17 municipal co-chairs still in custody.

According to the report, a total of 336 physical attacks on the party were documented between 2015 and 2023, resulting in the death of two party members and the injury of 76 individuals affiliated with the pro-Kurdish Peoples’ Democratic Party (HDP). Additionally, bomb attacks targeting the party claimed the lives of 142 people, while nearly a thousand were injured.

In October the pro-Kurdish Green Left Party (YSP) renamed itself HEDEP during a party congress in Ankara at which it also elected new co-chairs.

The party began to use the acronym HEDEP following the congress and notified the Supreme Court of Appeals of its name change, but the court refused to green light its name change request on the grounds that its acronym was similar to that of a party that was closed down in 2003.

The party adopted the abbreviation “DEM” last week.

“This government cannot democratize or break free from this policy of oppression without entering into a new settlement process for the Kurdish issue. This country must stop [appointing] trustees. The will of the people is of the utmost importance,” Türkdoğan said.

The Kurdish issue, a term prevalent in Turkey’s public discourse, refers to the demand for equal rights by the country’s Kurdish population and their struggle for recognition.

The settlement process, which refers to talks between the ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) government and the leadership of the PKK to resolve the Kurdish issue, began in 2012 and ended after two police officers were executed in southeastern Şanlıurfa province in June 2015.

Meanwhile, the Medyascope news website reported jailed Kurdish leader Selahattin Demirtaş as saying that if he was still in prison, the party’s stance during the local elections in March 2024 would be determined accordingly.

“Those who disregard the DEM Party’s expectations and demands will lose. … We want to see how we’re approached,” Demirtaş, who has been behind bars since November 2016 on politically motivated charges, was quoted as saying.

Demirtaş, a two-time presidential candidate and former co-chair of the pro-Kurdish HDP, broke his silence for the first time after he announced on social media in late May that he’s stepping back from political engagement “at this stage” in time.

The pro-Kurdish HDP, which faces a closure case on terrorism charges that is still pending at the Constitutional Court, ran in the May elections on the YSP ticket to circumvent the risks that could have emerged from its possible closure ahead of the elections.