Turkey Issues 82 Arrest Warrants Over Deadly Protests

Faizan Hashmi Published September 26, 2020 | 12:40 AM

Ankara, Sept 25 (UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 26th Sep, 2020 ) :Turkish prosecutors on Friday issued arrest warrants for 82 people, including a mayor and several former lawmakers from the pro-Kurdish HDP party, who are accused of involvement in 2014 protests that left 37 dead.

The Ankara chief public prosecutor's office said 20 people had already been detained in connection with the unrest, which spread to Turkey after Islamic State jihadists fought to capture the mainly Kurdish northern Syrian border town of Kobane.

The detained included six former lawmakers from the pro-Kurdish Peoples' Democratic Party (HDP), as well as current and former party executives.

Ankara suspects the HDP of being a political front for the outlawed Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK), which has waged an insurgency against the state since 1984.

The party denies this and accuses the government of persecution.

The government says the HDP urged people to join the 2014 protests, which saw Kurds take to the streets in anger over Turkey's decision not to intervene and stop IS militants from attacking Kobane.

The HDP blames Turkish police for provoking the violence, which spread from southeastern border regions near Syria to Ankara.

"This operation is not just an assault on the HDP, but on democratic politics and the determination to fight against fascism," one of the co-leaders of the HDP, Mithat Sancar, told reporters on Friday, referring to the arrest warrants.

The HDP is Turkey's second-largest opposition group in the parliament.

Former HDP leaders, Figen Yuksekdag and Selahattin Demirtas, were named in the latest investigation, but both have been in jail since 2016 pending multiple trials.

The party's mayor of the eastern city of Kars, Ayhan Bilgen, was detained on Friday, Anadolu said. Bilgen won the city in 2019 local elections.

Of the 65 HDP mayors returned in those elections, 47 have now been replaced by unelected officials, with some detained on terror charges, the party said last month.