For the third time in a week, the Turkish police raided members of the pro-Kurdish opposition party HDP and arrested 19 people. Among them are the co-mayor of the eastern Turkish city of Kars, Sevin Alaca, and other party officials, the state news agency Anadolu reported today. In addition, the town hall in Kars had been searched.
The public prosecutor accuses the arrested of connections to the banned Kurdish Workers‘ Party (PKK). According to Anadolu, they are said to have supported the PKK in the region and carried out propaganda. The HDP did not initially comment on the arrests.
Several HDP politicians were arrested on Friday for protest actions in 2014. Among them was the co-mayor of Kars, Ayhan Bilgen. The HDP usually fills its mayor’s posts with one man and one woman. Yesterday, Turkish forces raided HDP members in Diyarbakir, southeast Turkey, and arrested 14 people.
Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan considers the legal HDP party to be the extended arm of the PKK, which is on the terrorist list in Europe and the USA. The HDP rejects this. Since the local elections in 2019, numerous mayors of the party have already been ousted. Usually the government in Ankara appoints receivers from within its own ranks.
