Information and liaison bulletin - Institut kurde de Paris

• 8 • Information and liaison bulletin n° 272 • November 2007
Parliament serve a ten-year prison
sentence from 1994 to 2004 “for
links with the PKK”. One of them is
Mrs. Layla Zana who received the
Sakharov Prize for Human Rights
in 1995. The DTP succeeded in
sending 20 Members to the Turkish
Parliament (550 seats in all) in the
last elections last July — a first
ever for struggling in the very difficult
political and legal context of
Kurdish rights.
The spotlights were again focussed
on the party in the last few days
after an ambush on 21 October that
cost the lives of 12 Turkish soldiers.
The attack, attributed to PKK
fighters who had infiltrated into
Turkey from the Iraqi mountains,
increased the possibility of Turkish
intervention into Iraqi Kurdistan.
The AKP had succeeded in getting
the National Assembly to authorise,
by an overwhelming majority,
the conduct of military operation
beyond Turkey’s borders. “The
SKP stole Kurdish votes during the
last elections by saying that they were
in favour of peace. Now the voting is
over, all it can talk about is a acrossborder
operation”, stressed Nursel
Aydogan, a DTP leader. Pro-Kurdish
parties have never managed
to cross the 10% threshold needed
to have seats in Parliament. At the
last poll, the DTP chose to bye-pass
this obstacle by supporting independent
candidates who then
formed a parliamentary group
under its banner. Several demonstrations
were organised in Kurdis-
tan in protest at the proceedings
against the DTP. In Diyarbekir,
nearly 50,000 people protested on
25 November and the police dispersed
the crowds with tear gas
grenades and detained several
people. In Van, 2,000 people held a
rally on 17 November at the call of
the DTP and the Turkish police
arrested ten of them. The police
fired into the air and threw tear
gas grenades at the demonstrators,
who reposted by throwing stones.
A journalist, hit by a stone, suffered
head injuries.
IRAN: THE IRANIAN SUPREME COURT CONFIRMS
THE DEATH SENTENCE ON THE KURDISH JOURNALIST
ADNAN HASSANPUR AND SENDS
T
MARIVAN HIVA BOTIMAR FOR TRIAL
HE Iranian Supreme Court
has confirmed the death sen- The death sentence passed on the
tence passed on the Kurdish two journalists on 16 July, have
journalist Adnan Hassanpur, aroused indignation in Western
accused of “espionage” and capitals. The Iranian court had stat-
quashed the death sentence passed ed that the two men were not on
on a second reporter, Hiva Boti- trial for being journalists but for
mar, announced their lawyer, having taken up arms against the
Saleh Nikbakht on 9 November. As Islamic Republic. However, “none
well as the sentence for espionage, of the actions (of Adnan Hassanpur)
Mr. Hassanpur was found guilty of constituted a real commitment in
having “divulged information on mil- movements opposed to the Islamic
itary sites” and of having “entered Republic” according to their
into contact with an individual of the lawyer. According to the organisa-
US State Department”. These crimes tion for the defence of journalists,
made him a “mohareb (enemy of Reporters sans Frontières, Adnan
God)” in the eyes of the court, Hassanpur and Hiva Botimar
which is what earned him the worked on the magazine Aso
death sentence. His lawyer, Mr. (Horizons), banned in 2005. Adnan
Nikbakht, has contested this inter- Hassanpur dealt with the very senpretation
and promises to continue sitive question of Iranian Kurdis-
to struggle to save his client from
the gallows. He announced that, as
tan.
the death sentence on Hiva Boti- Furthermore, the Iranian Intellimar
has been quashed, he will be gence Ministry announced that its
retried by the Marivan court, in forces had arrested eleven mem-
Kurdistan Province.
bers of PEJAK, accused of “having