More than 30 Kurdish politicians nabbed in Turkish raids
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Istanbul, Oct. 11, 2016 (dpa/NAN) More than 30 members of the opposition Kurdish Peoples’ Democratic Party (HDP) are under arrest in South-Eastern Turkey after a series of police raids, a spokesman for an affiliated group said Tuesday.
The charges against the politicians, many of them officials at the provincial or district level, remain unclear.
It is also not clear if this is linked to a series of rolling purges launched by Turkish officials since an attempted coup in July.
Of those arrested, 25 of the politicians were from Diyarbakir province, while seven came from Bitlis province.
Police also raided the homes of three senior party officials in Diyarbakir, but did not find the people being sought, said Merdan Berk, spokesman for the DBP, a regional party affiliated with HDP.
Those in custody have not been allowed to meet with lawyers.
In September, Turkey put numerous DBP-run governments under federal administration, removing local officials from office.
The DBP officials were removed for alleged links to the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK), an organisation considered a terrorist group by Turkey.
Turkey has been in conflict for most of the last few decades over the actions by the PKK. (dpa/NAN)
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Edited by Damilola Oyewole and Abdullahi Yusuf