DEM Party says Turkish politics in new phase after İmamoğlu’s arrest

ANKARA

Peoples’ Equality and Democracy Party (DEM Party) Co-Chairwoman Tülay Hatimoğulları has said Turkish politics entered a new phase after the arrest of Istanbul Mayor Ekrem İmamoğlu, urging the government to stop the crackdown on the opposition parties, media and civil society.

“We, as the peoples of Türkiye, are passing through a historic era. The Turkish politics has entered a new phase with the arrest of İmamoğlu and his friends,” Hatimoğulları said at her parliamentary group on March 25.

The government is using the judicial bodies to attack the opposition and detained scores of university students, she said, stressing that the DEM Party is condemning the arrest of İmamoğlu in the strongest terms.

Hatimoğulları slammed the government for trying to eliminate their most important political rival through justice, saying, “The prosecutors consider urban consensus a crime. We have said many times, and we’ll continue to underline: Urban Consensus is a model in which the people — regardless of whether they are Kurds, Turks, Armenians, Sunnis or Alevis — show the will to govern the neighborhood they live in together.”

Considering this a crime is a reflection of the lack of will to resolve the problems in Türkiye, she said.

Hatimoğulları, on a question after her address, stressed that the ongoing process for creating terror-free Türkiye is still going on as efforts to this end are very valuable while criticizing the government for not allowing the DEM team to visit the jailed leader of PKK, Abdullah Öcalan.

On Feb. 27, Öcalan issued a historic call for PKK to dissolve and disband itself. PKK accepted the call and said it would begin preparations for holding a convention in the coming months to move forward in line with Öcalan’s call.