|
Kurdish politician, rights activist
arrested in Turkey
6.4.2007 |
|
|
|
April
6, 2007
ANKARA, Turkey - A senior member of Turkey's
main Kurdish party and a rights activist were
arrested on Thursday on charges of belonging to a
rebel group fighting the government, Anatolia news
agency reported.
Salih Karaaslan, the provincial chairman in Ankara
of the Democratic Society Party (DTP), and Ismet
Aras from the Human Rights Association, were
remanded in custody over two protests in February
and March, at which participants backed separatist
Kurdish rebels, Anatolia said.
The court in Ankara ordered the arrest of two other
suspects, who were not identified.
DTP members have increasingly become the target of
judicial action, mainly on charges of backing the
Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK), which has waged a
bloody two-decade rebellion in the predominantly
Kurdish southeast and is listed as a terrorist group
by Ankara.
Separately, a court in Diyarbakir, the main Kurdish
city in the southeast, ordered the release of the
city's DTP chairman at the first hearing of his
trial on charges of sedition.
Hilmi Aydogdu
was arrested on February 23 on charges of
"inciting hatred" in comments about the ethnically
volatile, oil-rich city of Kirkuk in neighbouring
northern Iraq, which the Iraqi Kurds claim.
The court agreed to his request to remain free
during the trial and set the next hearing for July
26.
About 300 supporters greeted Aydogdu with ovations
as he emerged from the courthouse.
He was arrested after media quoted him as saying
that Turkey's Kurds would "consider a Turkish attack
on Kirkuk as an attack on Diyarbakir."
Ankara has issued harsh warnings over the future of
Kirkuk, which the Iraqi Kurds want to incorporate
into their autonomous region, even though the city
is also home to Arabs and Turkish-backed Turkmens.
Aydogdu's remarks provoked harsh reactions here at a
time when Iraqi Kurds are accused of supporting the
PKK, whose militants have long taken refuge in the
Kurdish autonomous region in northern Iraq.
Ankara fears that Iraqi Kurds may break away from
Baghdad and embolden the PKK insurgency in Turkey.
More than 30,000 Turkish soldiers and PKK guerrillas
have been killed since 1984 when the PKK took up
arms for self-rule in the country's mainly Kurdish
southeast of Turkey.
AFP
** The use of the term "Kurdistan" is vigorously
rejected due to its alleged political implications
by the Republic of Turkey, which does not recognize
the existence of a "Turkish Kurdistan" Southeast
Turkey.
Others estimate as many as 40 million Kurds live in
Big Kurdistan (Iraq, Turkey, Syria, Iran, Armenia),
which covers an area as big as France, about half of
all Kurds which estimate to 20 million live in
Turkey.
Turkey is home to some 20 million ethnic Kurds, some
of whom openly sympathise with the Kurdish PKK for a
Kurdish homeland in the country's mainly Kurdish
southeast of Turkey.
Before August 2002, the Turkish government placed
severe restrictions on the use of Kurdish language,
prohibiting the language in education and broadcast
media.
The Kurdish alphabet is still not recognized
in Turkey, and use of the Kurdish letters X, W, Q
which do not exist in the Turkish
alphabet has led to judicial persecution in 2000 and
2003
The Kurdish flag flown officially in Iraqi Kurdistan
but unofficially flown by Kurds in Armenia. The flag
is banned in Iran, Syria, and Turkey where flying it
is a criminal offence"
Southeastern Turkey:
North Kurdistan ( Kurdistan-Turkey)
wikipedia
Top |
Kurd Net
does not take credit for and is not responsible for the content of news
information on this page
|
® 