Turkey’s Supreme Court of Appeals has upheld a jail sentence of seven-and-a-half years handed down to former pro-Kurdish Peoples’ Democracy Party (HDP) deputy İdris Baluken on charges of being a member of a terrorist organization, the t24 news website reported on Tuesday.
The prison sentence was given to Baluken, who is behind bars since February 2017, by the Diyarbakır 8th High Criminal Court in January, which was upheld by a regional appeals court in Gaziantep province in May.
The Supreme Court of Appeals reviewed the Gaziantep Regional Appeals’ Court’s ruling due to an objection from Baluken’s lawyers and upheld the ruling.
The Diyarbakır court also handed down consecutive four years, seven months jail sentences on charges of making terror propaganda and violating the law on the right to assembly. These sentences have also been upheld by the top court.
Turkey has stepped up its crackdown on Kurdish politicians in the past several years. Trustees have been appointed to dozens of municipalities in the country’s predominantly Kurdish Southeast, while hundreds of local Kurdish politicians have been arrested on terror charges. There are currently hundreds of Kurdish politicians behind bars including the HDP’s former Co-chairs Figen Yüksekdağ and Selahattin Demirtaş.
In a similar development on Tuesday, a regional appeals court in Turkey upheld Demirtaş’s four year, eight month prison sentence for disseminating terrorist propaganda.
Since the prison sentence is shorter than five years, Demirtaş cannot appeal to the Supreme Court of Appeals, rendering the regional court’s decision final unless he applies to the Constitutional Court or the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR).
The ECtHR on Nov. 20 ruled that Demirtaş’s pre-trial detention from a different case had gone on longer than could be justified.
However a local court on Nov. 30 refused to release Demirtaş and decided to ask Turkey’s Justice Ministry whether the ECtHR ruling was final.
The post Top court upholds jail sentence given to former HDP deputy Baluken appeared first on Turkish Minute.
from Turkish Minute https://www.turkishminute.com/2018/12/05/top-court-upholds-jail-sentence-given-to-former-hdp-deputy-baluken/
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