DTP deputy lands 18-month jail term

Hurriyet Daily News with wires

Kurdish deputy Aysel Tuğluk, 43, was put on trial on charges of engaging in separatist propaganda after making a public statement at her party's congress in 2006 in which she rejected calls from Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan to brand the PKK, terrorists.

Tuğluk, who has rejected the charges, said she will appeal the conviction. If a higher court confirms the verdict, she will become the first lawmaker to be imprisoned on PKK-related charges since 1994, when Leyla Zana and three other Kurdish legislators were jailed for links to the PKK.

Former chairperson of DTP

Tuğluk is a former chairwoman of the pro-Kurdish Democratic Society Party, which has 21 deputies in Parliament. She is also a lawyer who once represented the PKK's imprisoned leader, Abdullah Öcalan. "Even if we were to declare them terrorists, the problem would not be solved. Those you brand terrorists are heroes to some," Tugluk told crowds at the party's congress in the southeastern city of Batman, AP reported.

"If we were to call Abdullah Öcalan a terrorist then we would not be able to face the people."

Yesterday, she maintained her innocence. "I see the verdict as an act against my party and against freedom of speech," the Anatolia news agency quoted her as saying. "If I knew that it would lead to a solution to the Kurdish question, I would be willing to serve 50 years in jail."

Tuğluk went on trial before she was elected to Parliament in July 2007. The case was briefly suspended because of a law that shields deputies from prosecution. But a high court later ruled that the case must resume on grounds that legal immunity does not include terrorism-related charges.

Her party also faces the possibility of being disbanded for its alleged ties to the PKK. The Constitutional Court is deliberating the case separately.