Turkey
People and police gather outside a building housing offices of the HDP in Izmir where one woman was killed on June 17, 2021. Photo: Anadolu Agency
ERBIL, Kurdistan Region — One woman was killed in an attack on an office of the Peoples’ Democratic Party (HDP) in Turkey’s Izmir on Thursday, the party announced in a statement, accusing Turkey’s ruling party of the attack.
The alleged perpetrator, identified by the governor’s office as a former health worker with the initials OG, opened fire on the second floor of the building housing the HDP office and killed one person.
“Our friend, Deniz Poyraz, was murdered in the attack on our Izmir district building,” HDP tweeted.
The suspect has been arrested and an investigation is underway, according to the governor’s office.
HDP blamed the Justice and Development Party (AKP), the ruling party of President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, and its ally the Nationalist Movement Party (MHP).
“The instigator and abettor of this brutal attack is the AKP-MHP government and the Ministry of Interior which constantly targets our party and our members,” HDP tweeted.
“It is the government that targets our party and our provincial organizations; it is the Ministry of Interior that directs the provocateurs,” HDP said in a statement on its website.
HDP is a vocal opponent of the AKP-MHP alliance, which accuses the pro-Kurdish party of ties with the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK). Today, hundreds of HDP members and supporters are under investigation or in jail, including Selahattin Demirtas, the HDP’s former leader along with his co-chair Figen Yuksekdag. Most are accused by Turkish authorities of having ties to the PKK, considered a terrorist organization in Turkey.
Updated at 1:30 pm
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