A delegation from the Party of European Socialists (PES) speaks to media after being denied visit to the leader of the pro-Kurdish Peoples’ Democratic Party (HDP) party Selahattin Demirtas, imprisoned in Edirne, on November 21, 2016, in front of the Erdine Prison. (Photo by AFP)
Turkish authorities have not allowed a group of national European legislators and members of the European Parliament to visit the chairman of the left-wing and pro-Kurdish Peoples’ Democratic Party (HDP), who has been held in prison for nearly a month.
Dozen members of the Party of European Socialists (PES) together with national lawmakers from Sweden, France and Austria sought to visit Selahattin Demirtas at the maximum security prison in northwestern Turkish city of Edirne on Monday, but Turkish gendarmes blocked the approach road to the detention facility and did not let them move forward.
The European parliamentarians subsequently decided to convene an unplanned press conference in the street.
“He is not abandoned. He is not alone. Our political family is in solidarity with him,” PES President and former Bulgarian prime minister, Sergei Stanishev, said.
He added that there can be “no compromise” on political standards as Turkey tries to join the European Union.
The Turkish government’s has been pursuing its EU membership bid since the 1960s. The formal negotiations started in 2005. But the process has been mired in problems, and only 16 chapters of the 35-chapter accession procedure have been opened for Ankara so far.
Meanwhile, vice co-chairman of HDP responsible for foreign affairs, Hisyar Ozsoy, has denounced the Turkish officials’ procrastination to consent to visits to Demirtas.
“There is a serious policy of isolation… They have reduced relations with the outside world to the lowest level,” he said.
Earlier this month, 13 HDP legislators were arrested over alleged links to the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) militant group.
Party leaders Selahattin Demirtas and Figen Yuksekdag remain in custody along with eight others, waiting to stand trial on terrorism-related charges.
A shaky ceasefire between the PKK, which has been calling for an autonomous Kurdish region since 1984, and the Turkish government collapsed in July 2015. Attacks on Turkish security forces have soared ever since.
Over the past few months, Turkish ground and air forces have been carrying out operations against PKK positions in the country’s troubled southeastern border region as well as Iraq’s semi-autonomous Kurdistan region and northern Syria.