Kurdish couple from Turkey lose asylum claim in Germany

ERBIL, Kurdistan Region — A Kurdish couple is facing the possibility of having to return to Turkey where they face a six-year prison sentence after their request for asylum was rejected in Germany. 

Sinem Mut and her fiancé Anil Kaya left Turkey in March 2019 after being accused of being members of the Maoist Communist Party (MKP), which Turkey deems a terrorist organization. Mut and Kaya have reportedly denied joining the party. According to the couple, they came to Germany and applied for asylum after realizing they could no longer live a “dignified life” in Turkey.

A German court rejected their application, media reported on Monday, and said they will face deportation if they do not depart Germany by August 21.

“The questions asked in court, as well as what we read in the courts decision, made us live through what we experienced in Turkey again,” Kaya said on Twitter after receiving the verdict.

Academics for Peace, a non-profit association founded to support academic freedom and freedom of speech in Turkey, claimed that Mut and Kaya, who were both pursuing post-graduate studies, are “only two of the hundreds of academics who are targeted by Turkeys ongoing and fascist development in recent years.”

Turkish courts have been accused of applying criminal law and procedures arbitrarily against critics of the government.

Mut and Kaya plan to launch a petition campaign to garner national attention in order to convince German authorities to let them stay in the country.