HDP holds AKP responsible for police violence against its deputies

ANKARA

A woman walks past Turkish police blocking a street in central Diyarbakır on September 14, 2015. AFP Photo

The Peoples’ Democratic Party (HDP) has condemned police forces for attacks wounding its lawmakers, while suggesting the police forces acted as police of the Justice and Development Party (AKP).

“Turkey has today been dragged into a great spiral of violence in the care of the AKP, which couldn’t get the results it desired in the elections. With concerns over remaining in power and being brought to account in case of not coming to power, the AKP has virtually thrown Turkey into the fire,” the HDP said in a written statement released Sept. 14.

The statement signed by deputy parliamentary group chairs of the party, İdris Baluken and Pervin Buldan, argued that the AKP has increased “state violence and rights’ violations,” while maintaining the party would not get its desired votes in the upcoming Nov. 1 elections either.

“The daringness of the AKP police has moved to a further level yesterday [Sept. 13] and our deputies have been directly targeted,” the HDP said.

“Police attacked Diyarbakır people who wanted to enter the district in order to prevent possible casualties following the declaration of a curfew in Sur. Our Diyarbakır deputy, Çağlar Demirel, who was among the crowd, was subject to police attack too. Upon this targeted attack, which police launched knowingly, our deputy has been wounded in her leg and hospitalized,” it said, adding that the HDP’s Antalya deputy was also subject to a “targeted attack” by the police during a demonstration in Istanbul on the same day when Demirel wounded. Oluç was injured by “three gas rockets fired at his back,” the party said.

“We strongly condemn these repressions and attacks by the police and gendarmerie,” Baluken and Buldan said, urging the launch of required legal procedure. They also called on Parliament Speaker İsmet Yılmaz for urgently raising his voice against attacks targeting members of parliament, saying his resume of silence would mean approval of “unlawfulness.”

Witnesses told Reuters on Sept. 14 that gunfire rang out intermittently overnight in Sur district of Diyarbakır, the largest city in Turkey’s mainly Kurdish southeast, where a curfew remained in force as police clashed with militants.

While only the historic Sur district was under curfew, police imposed tight security elsewhere in the city, firing tear gas at small groups of youths protesting during the night, local witnesses said.