ERBIL, Kurdistan Region – A Turkish court sentenced pro-Kurdish People’s Democratic Party (HDP) deputy Abdullah Zeydan to 8 years, 1 month and 15 days on terror charges, according to HDP. This is the second time Zeydan has been convicted on the same offence. He was originally found guilty of aiding a terror organization in July 2016, but appealed the decision. His appeal was granted and his conviction was overturned on the grounds of lack of evidence. The prosecutor, however, renewed the charges against Zeydan. He was arrested on November 4, 2016, along with several other HDP deputies and was convicted by the same court for a second time on Thursday. The sentence he was handed on Thursday is identical to what he was given in 2016. HDP has condemned the court’s decision as politically biased. The charges relate to the funeral of a YPG fighter that Zeydan attended. Ankara maintains that the YPG, a Kurdish armed force in Syria, is an extension of the banned PKK. The YPG denies the charge. Prosecutors allege that PKK members were at the funeral. HDP insists Zeydan was in attendance to comfort the family members only. Ahmed Yildirim, head of HDP’s bloc in the parliament, described the court case as theatre and claimed the result was pre-determined, because “the order has been written from higher places,” referring to Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and his party. Yildirim asked why Turkey still has an appeal court if their decisions are not respected. According to HDP, the judge that heard the most recent case accused Zeydan’s lawyers of “bothering” the court. Zeydan has been staying in the same cell as HDP’s former co-chair Selahattin Demirtas in the high security Edirne prison. The two joined a prison hunger strike in March 2017. “In consequence of the Edirne Prison’s stance of no-dialogue, unlawful practices, inhuman practices against other prisoners, and the complete lack of good intention regarding the ending of hunger strikes that have been continuing for days, we, too, from Friday on, will begin a hunger strike,” read a statement they issued from Edirne prison at the time. In August 2017, Zeydan had health problems but he refused to go to hospital because he would have been forced to travel handcuffed. In May 2016, the Turkish parliament voted to lift immunity from a select group of MPs, including many HDP members facing terror charges for alleged ties to the PKK. Nine HDP MPs are currently in prison.
