The world is looking the other way as Turkey plans to build on its successful occupation of Afrîn to expand its power with a new round of ethnic cleansing, John Tully writes.
People's Democratic Party (HDP)
Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan's decision to call an early general election on June 24 — a year and a half before it was due — is a sign of weakness and desperation, according to opposition Peoples’ Democratic Party (HDP) MP Lezgin Botan.
The ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) and the Nationalist Movement Party (MHP) are losing popular support because of their anti-democratic and pro-war domestic and regional policies and because the economy is a mess. The official unemployment rate is nearly 11% and one in five young people are without work.
The left-wing Peoples’ Democratic Party (HDP) has condemned Turkey’s invasion of the Afrin region in northern Syria (known as Rojava in Kurdish) in collaboration with mostly jihadi Syrian militias.
The HDP, with strong roots in Turkey’s Kurdish minority, has itself faced worsening repression from the regime of President Recep Tayyip Erdogan.
The mood in Turkey is low, and not just among those who oppose President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and his Justice and Development Party (AKP). Even some of his supporters are disoriented by developments in the country.
In the aftermath of the failed coup of July 15 last year, Erdogan orchestrated the dismissal of tens of thousands of government employees. The figures from the ongoing Turkish purges are startling.
The Kurdish-led left-wing Peoples’ Democratic Party (HDP), which won 13.2% of the vote in 2015 national elections to become the third largest parliamentary group, has faced growing repression as the Turkish regime of Recep Tayyip Erdoğan has turned increasingly dictatorial. Last year, all of the HDP’s 59 MPs were hit with arrest warrants, amid mass arrests of voices critical of the government.
As Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan cracks down on opponents — including the left-wing, Kurdish-led Peoples’ Democratic Party (HDP), whose 59 MPs have all been issued with arrest warrants and whose leaders are in jail — HDP parliamentary group co-chair and Instanbul MP Filiz Kerestecioğlu declared that the HDP’s women MPs would join the International Women’s Strike on March 8.
The July 15 coup attempt was a nightmare. Kurds remember the terrible army coups in Turkey’s past. After the coups, Kurdish people were jailed, killed and tortured.
Kurds are against military coups. By nightfall on July 15, the pro-Kurdish Peoples’ Democratic Party (HDP) had immediately condemned the coup attempt.
Kurds thought that after the coup attempt, there may be a return to the peace process.
The reasons behind this were:
Despite facing one of the most oppressive atmospheres in its history, thousands of Turkish protesters took to the streets of Istanbul on November 20 against a crackdown on Turkey’s main pro-Kurdish party, its lawmakers and mayors in the country’s south-east, as well as on opposition media outlets following the July coup.
“We will resist and resist until we win!” chants Sebahat Tuncel before her mouth is forcibly shut by half a dozen police officers who drag her along the floor and detain her in early November.
The following statement was released on November 11 by Farooq Tariq, spokesperson for the Awami Workers Party in Pakistan.
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On the night of November 3, the Turkish police detained Selahattin Demirtaş and Figen Yüksekdağ – the co-chairs of the People’s Democratic Party (HDP) – alongside several other Members of Parliament who were democratically voted in with over 5 million votes in the last parliamentary election.
The political situation in Turkey continues to deteriorate in the wake of the attempted coup d’état in July, allegedly organised by the Gülen Movement, a former ally of the ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP). It has in fact led to a slow incremental counter-coup where President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan and his cronies have progressively jailed, marginalised and silenced opponents of all hues — but especially the Kurdish movement.
Peoples' Democratic Party (HDP) Kars deputy and party spokesperson Ayhan Bilgen said 441 HDP members have been detained since the arrest and imprisonment of 10 HDP MPs on November 4.
Speaking to the press in Ankara on November 10, Bilgen said there had been a systematic crackdown on HDP members and those protesting the imprisonment of the left-wing pro-autonomy HDP's MPs, including co-chairs Selahattin Demirtaş and Figen Yüksekdağ.
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