Turkey removes four more Kurdish mayors over alleged PKK ties, 24 suspended so far
ISTANBUL,— Four more mayors from Turkey’s main pro-Kurdish party were dismissed on Saturday as part of a widening government crackdown on the pro-Kurdish Peoples’ Democratic Party (HDP) on suspicion of links with outlawed Kurdish rebels and were replaced by government-appointed trustees, the official Anadolu news agency reported.
The mayor of Suruc in the Sanliurfa province and three mayors from Mazidagi, Savur and Derik districts in the Mardin province in Turkish Kurdistan (Bakur) were suspended, Anadolu said.
President Tayyip Erdogan and his government repeatedly accused the Kurdish HDP of being linked to the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) militant group, and thousands of its members have been prosecuted for the same reason, including its leaders. The HDP denies such links.
The former co-leaders of the HDP have both been jailed since 2016 on terrorism charges, with several other prominent members accused of supporting terrorism over what the government says are links to the PKK.
In recent months, the government has cracked down on the HDP — the only party in parliament that criticised Turkey’s offensive against Kurdish militants in Syrian Kurdistan in northern Syria on October 9, 2019, branding it an “invasion.”
With the latest dismissals, the number of HDP mayors suspended by the government has reached 24.
Turkey removed four mayors last Wednesday as part of a widening government crackdown on the pro-Kurdish Peoples’ Democratic Party (HDP).
The PKK took up arms in 1984 against the Turkish state, which still denies the constitutional existence of Kurds, to push for greater autonomy in Turkish Kurdistan for the Kurdish minority who make up around 22.5 million of the country’s 79-million population. More than 40,000 Turkish soldiers and Kurdish rebels, have been killed in the conflict.
A large Kurdish community in Turkey and worldwide openly sympathise with PKK rebels and Abdullah Ocalan, who founded the PKK group in 1974 and currently serving a life sentence in Turkey, has a high symbolic value for most Kurds in Turkey and worldwide according to observers.
Copyright © 2019, respective author or news agency, Ekurd.net | AFP
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