DERSIM, North Kurdistan, — According to Firat News Agency the Mayor of Dersim Edibe Sahin and five other Peace and Democracy Party officials were sentenced to five years and 8 months in prison for alleged propaganda of PKK.
Sahin and five other BDP officials sent a petition to the Justice Ministry demanding release of a document titled “Road Map” which was written by Kurdish national leader Abdullah Ocalan but was never handed to his lawyers.
The Malatya 3 Criminal Court sentenced each defendant for 10 months in prison for alleged propaganda of the PKK.
All defendants rejected the claims by the prosecutor and said they will appeal to a higher court.
The Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) which is the only Kurdish political organisation in Turkey resisting the Turkish oppression of the Kurds was put into the European terror list in May 2002, while the PKK ended its arm conflict with Turkey in 1999.
Blacklisting of the PKK by the EU blocked the way toward peaceful settlement to the Kurdish issue. It created a justification for further oppression of Kurdish people and has spurred Turkey to commit more violence against the Kurds who are regarded as “terrorists”.
Almost 3000 Kurdish children aged from 7 and 8, are imprisoned in Turkey under the charge of “terrorism”. More than 1500 Kurdish politicians, who have been democratically elected, are put into jail and charged with “terrorism”. These are all the consequence of blacklisting of the Kurdish resistance movement.
The European Association of Lawyers for Democracy and Human Rights ELDH and the Association for Democracy and International Law MAF-DAD have demanded that the PKK should be taken off from Terror List.
The European Union court ruled against the way the PKK was blacklisted. The Court of First Instance (CFI), and the EU’s second-highest court, has also said the EU had not justified its decision at the time. The Luxembourg-based Court of First Instance said that a decision made by EU governments in 2002 was illegal under EU law and the EU nations are obliged to implement the EU court rulings. Europe’s human rights watchdog, has said the EU’s anti-terror rules violate democratic principles.