Turkey’s Supreme Court strips HDP co-chair of party membership

ANKARA

Turkey’s Supreme Court has striped opposition Peoples’ Democratic Party (HDP) co-chair Figen Yüksekdağ of her party membership. 

Her membership to the party and information regarding her duty records were dropped from the Supreme Court’s registration records, according to a notification sent to the HDP from the Supreme Court Chief Public Prosecutor’s Office’s Parties Records Bureau, with the signature of the Supreme Court Deputy Chief Public Prosecutor. 

Following the court’s decision, the party released a statement, saying they will make the “necessary appeals against the decision in domestic and international law.”

“Electing, being elected and the right to engage in political activities are among the most basic political rights, which were regulated in the 67th article of the constitution. The framework of those rights was regulated with laws, particularly with Political Parties Law,” the statement said on March 9. 

Yüksekdağ, who has been in jail since Nov. 4, 2016 on terror charges, previously lost her parliamentary status for a prison sentence she received in a previous case.