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Prominent Kurdish politician Leyla Zana
sentenced in Turkey for praising rebel PKK leader
10.4.2008
By staff
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April
10, 2008
DIYARBAKIR, Kurdish Southeastern region of
Turkey, — A Turkish court Thursday sentenced Kurdish
politician Leyla Zana, a former Nobel Peace Prize
nominee, to two years' imprisonment for praising
jailed Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) leader
Abdullah Ocalan.
The court in this central city of Turkey's
Kurdish-majority southeast sentenced Zana under a
law that penalises "propaganda of a terrorist
organisation." She was convicted by a court in
Kurdish city of Diyarbakir under anti-terrorism laws
for a speech she made last year at a Kurdish
festival.
Zana, 47, who has already spent a decade in jail for
collaborating with the PKK, said she would appeal.
The charges stem from a
speech she made in March 2007
at a Kurdish festival here,www.ekurd.net
counting Ocalan among
Kurdish national leaders along with Iraqi President
Jalal Talabani and Massoud Barzani, President of the
autonomous Kurdistan region in 'northern Iraq'.
"I am grateful to those three leaders... They all
have a place in the hearts and minds of the Kurds,"
the indictment quoted her as saying.
The PKK, which has waged a bloody campaign for
self-rule in southeast Turkey since 1984, is listed
as a terrorist group by Ankara and much of the
international community.
Ocalan, who was captured in Kenya in 1999, is
serving a life sentence on a prison island in
northwest Turkey.
Zana, 1995 laureate of the European Parliament's
Sakharov human rights award, and several other Kurds
were elected to parliament in 1991, but lost their
seats three years later after their party was
outlawed for links with the PKK.
Zana and three colleagues spent 10 years behind bars
for collaborating with the rebels. They were
released in June 2004. |
Turkey's outspoken Kurdish rights advocate Leyla
Zana, Former Kurdish MP in Turkey Zana spent a
decade behind bars in Turkey for speaking Kurdish in
the Turkish Parliament after taking her
parliamentary oath. She was the first Kurdish woman
to be elected to Turkey's parliament. On Thursday
sentenced to two years' imprisonment for praising
PKK and Iraq's Kurdistan leader
Leyla Zana on trial in Turkey (1994). |
The latest conviction came as European Commission
President Jose Manuel Barroso arrived in Ankara for
talks on reforms designed to advance Turkey's
troubled EU membership bid.
Zana and her colleagues were first sentenced to 15
years in jail in 1994 for membership of the outlawed
Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) which has been
fighting a 22-year bloody campaign for Kurdish
self-rule in the country's southeast.
The charges were brought two years after Zana,www.ekurd.net
the
first Kurdish woman to be elected to Turkey's
parliament, caused an uproar by first taking the
oath in Turkish and then repeating in Kurdish to the
protest of other legislators.
At the ceremony, she also wore a headband in yellow,
green, and red, the colors of the PKK.
The four were adopted as prisoners of conscience by
the European Union and the European Parliament
awarded Zana its prestigious Sakharov human rights
prize in 1995.
In March 2003, Zana and her co-defendants were
allowed a retrial after their original conviction
was condemned as unfair by the European Court of
Human Rights in 2001.
The retrial upheld the original sentences amid
accusations by rights activists and defence lawyers
that the proceedings were again flawed.
However, the appeals court overturned their
convictions and ordered a new trial in July 2004 a
month after the four activists were released from
jail.
Since 1984 the PKK
took up arms for self-rule in the country's mainly
Kurdish southeast of Turkey. A large Turkey's
Kurdish community openly sympathise with the Kurdish
PKK rebels.
The PKK demanded Turkey's recognition of the Kurds'
identity in its constitution and of their language
as a native language along with Turkish in the
country's Kurdish areas, the party also demanded
an end to ethnic discrimination in Turkish laws and
constitution against Kurds, ranting them full
political freedoms.
The PKK is considered a 'terrorist' organization by
Ankara, U.S., the PKK continues to be on the
blacklist list in EU despite court ruling which
overturned a decision
to place the Kurdish rebel
group PKK and its political wing on
the European Union's terror list.
Information for this report was provided by , AFP |
Reuters | Agencies
** More
about Kurdish Activist Leyla Zana
** Kurds are not recognized as an official minority
in Turkey and are denied rights granted to other
minority groups. Under EU pressure, Turkey recently
granted Kurds limited rights for broadcasts and
education in the Kurdish language, but critics say
the measures do not go far enough.
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 over 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 25 million ethnic Kurds, a
large Turkey's Kurdish community 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
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