Pro-Kurdish Peoples’ Democratic Party (HDP) deputies Çağlar Demirel and Besime Konca, who were detained in Ankara late Monday as part of investigations into alleged links to the terrorist Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK), Konca was released.
HDP Diyarbakır deputy Demirel and Siirt deputy Konca had been taken to the Ankara Police Department after being detained in front of HDP headquarters in Ankara late Monday evening. The two deputies were released on probation.
HDP Ağrı deputy Dilan Taşdemir shared a video from her Twitter account showing the HDP deputies arguing with officers as police try to put them in a police vehicle.
Demirel and Konca were detained as part of investigations by the public prosecutor’s offices in Diyarbakır and Batman, respectively.
HDP spokesperson Ayhan Bilgen announced on Monday that at least 237 officials from his party had been detained in simultaneous raids since Monday morning.
The detainees include HDP provincial and district branch heads in provinces such as İstanbul, Ankara, İzmir, Adana, Mersin and Şanlıurfa.
Police raids on HDP offices and the houses of party officials came after an offshoot of the PKK on Sunday claimed responsibility for twin bombings that killed 44 people and wounded more than 160 outside Vodafone Arena in the Beşiktaş district of İstanbul on Saturday night.
In early November HDP Co-chairs Selahattin Demirtaş and Figen Yüksekdağ along with eight other deputies were arrested on the grounds that they refused to testify in court as part of a terrorism probe.