ANKARA: A Turkish court on Tuesday ordered the co-leader of the pro-Kurdish Peoples’ Democratic Party (HDP) Selahattin Demirtas to serve five months in jail, in the latest legal blow to the politician.
Demirtas has been held in jail since November on charges of links to the outlawed Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) and making terror propaganda on their behalf.
If found guilty in that case, he risks up to 142 years in jail.
In a separate case, a court in the eastern city of Dogubayazit convicted Demirtas of denigrating the Turkish state and its institutions and sentenced him to five months in jail, state media said.
Demirtas is currently being held at a prison in Edirne, in northwest Turkey, far from the southeastern heartland of the Kurdish movement.
In a separate development, Turkish authorities on Tuesday stripped the other co-leader of the HDP, Figen Yuksekdag, who is also held in jail, of her parliamentary seat.
The move was based on a 2013 conviction for “terror propaganda” which was validated by the top court of appeals in 2016.
According to the Anadolu news agency, the validated conviction was read out by the deputy speaker in the plenary session, which is enough for an MP to lose their seat.
The move means that the number of HDP MPs in the Turkish Parliament has now fallen to 58, Anadolu said.
Demirtas and Yuksekdag are among a dozen HDP MPs being held in prison ahead of trial on charges of links with the PKK after being detained last year.
The EU has expressed anger over their detention, calling on Turkey to abide by its obligations under the rule of law.
The detentions came after Turkey defeated a failed July 15 coup aimed at bringing down President Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s government and blamed on US-based preacher Fethullah Gulen.
But critics complain the crackdown goes well beyond the alleged coup plotters and accuse the authorities of using a state of emergency to muzzle all opposition.
HDP MP Ahmet Yildirim said that the decision over Yuksekdag “violated the Turkish constitution,” asking why the move did not come immediately after the verdict was approved by the appeals court five months ago.
Turkey Kurdish party co-leader given 5-month jail sentence
Turkey Kurdish party co-leader given 5-month jail sentence
UN rights chief Shocked by ‘unbearable’ Darfur atrocities
- Mediation efforts have failed to produce a ceasefire, even after international outrage intensified last year with reports of mass killings, rape, and abductions during the RSF’s takeover of El-Fasher in Darfur
PORT SUDAN: Nearly three years of war have put the Sudanese people through “hell,” the UN’s rights chief said on Sunday, blasting the vast sums spent on advanced weaponry at the expense of humanitarian aid and the recruitment of child soldiers.
Since April 2023, Sudan has been gripped by a conflict between the army and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces that has left tens of thousands of people dead and around 11 million displaced.
Speaking in Port Sudan during his first wartime visit, UN Human Rights commissioner Volker Turk said the population had endured “horror and hell,” calling it “despicable” that funds that “should be used to alleviate the suffering of the population” are instead spent on advanced weapons, particularly drones.
More than 21 million people are facing acute food insecurity, and two-thirds of Sudan’s population is in urgent need of humanitarian aid, according to the UN.
In addition to the world’s largest hunger and displacement crisis, Sudan is also facing “the increasing militarization of society by all parties to the conflict, including through the arming of civilians and recruitment and use of children,” Turk added.
He said he had heard testimony of “unbearable” atrocities from survivors of attacks in Darfur, and warned of similar crimes unfolding in the Kordofan region — the current epicenter of the fighting.
Testimony of these atrocities must be heard by “the commanders of this conflict and those who are arming, funding and profiting from this war,” he said.
Mediation efforts have failed to produce a ceasefire, even after international outrage intensified last year with reports of mass killings, rape, and abductions during the RSF’s takeover of El-Fasher in Darfur.
“We must ensure that the perpetrators of these horrific violations face justice regardless of the affiliation,” Turk said on Sunday, adding that repeated attacks on civilian infrastructure could constitute “war crimes.”
He called on both sides to “cease intolerable attacks against civilian objects that are indispensable to the civilian population, including markets, health facilities, schools and shelters.”
Turk again warned on Sunday that crimes similar to those seen in El-Fasher could recur in volatile Kordofan, where the RSF has advanced, besieging and attacking several key cities.
Hundreds of thousands face starvation across the region, where more than 65,000 people have been displaced since October, according to the latest UN figures.
