The hearing for the case imprisoned former Peoples’ Democratic Party (HDP) Co-chair Selahattin Demirtas is on remand for continued on its second day. Demirtas attended the hearing held in the Sincan Prison Campus Ankara Heavy Penal Court Hall No.19 via the video conferencing system SEGBIS from the Edirne Type F Prison.

“THEY WERE DISTURBED BY PEACE”

Highlights from Demirtas’ defense are as follows:

“In 2010-2011 many of our party members had been arrested by the AKP-Cemaat (Community) partnership. The same Cemaat prosecutors accused us of ‘membership to a terrorist organization’ for our actions to support them. And today, 9 years later, I myself am on trial.

There were no visits to Ocalan at all. We would stress this in Newroz and anywhere else we found a chance to. As I said, who was disturbed? Who was the prosecutor who prepared the summaries? He was a Gulenist. In whose name was he acting? Maybe he himself didn’t fully know what he was serving at the time. But the people who gave these directions, ordering others to arrest people for speaking Ocalan’s name, beat people up in the streets, write up summaries if they are MPs, target them and get them fired if they are journalists - they were the ones trying to prevent meetings with Ocalan. Why? Because the Oslo process and the Imrali process that followed were not under control of these powers. It was a process that citizens of the Republic of Turkey, Kurds, Turks and the opposition together, implemented with trust in each other. Why would a prosecutor be disturbed by this? Why would a prosecutor be disturbed by politicians discussing the possibility of peace in their country?

“THE STATE MET WITH BOTH OCALAN AND THE PKK”

When I said ‘We will be in the streets that day to say we will never accept the torture imposed upon the leader of a people for 7 months’, there in fact hadn’t been any meeting with Ocalan in Imrali for 7 months. Before that, there had been a year and a half of uninterrupted official meetings, the Oslo talks. At the time we weren’t involved in the meetings, we were following from the outside, but the fact is that high ranking officials of this state met with high ranking PKK officials in Oslo and with Ocalan in Imrali for one and a half years.

Will the prosecutor on duty today take action against those who kiss the hand of the man who punched Kilicdaroglu, or those who took photos and videos of him, for ‘praising a crime or a criminal’?

“OCALAN HAS DONE A RESPECTABLE JOB”

You have me on trial here for saying ‘Mr. Ocalan’ and ‘leader of the Kurdish people’, for saying there should be meetings with him, but the same state transported a committee from my party to the Imrali Island on Coast Guard boats under the Interior Ministry. We went to meet with high ranking PKK administrators in Qandil at least 30 times. All of them happened within the knowledge, consent and support of the government.

Whoever works to stop the bloodshed, whoever carries one drop of water to put out the fire, they are doing a respectable job. Ocalan has done a respectable job for his contribution to peace. I hope he will get a chance to do more.

“MAZLUM DOGAN RESISTED TORTURE”

They say I praised terrorism. Mazlum Dogan is a man who protested the torture and tyranny in the Diyarbakir Prison during the September 12 process by setting himself on fire, and became a symbol like so many victims of torture in the aftermath of September 12. If it was me, if I was a prosecutor with a conscience and morals who has respect for the law, I would launch an investigation against the prosecutor who launched that investigation for praising torture and military coups.

“THIS IS FASCISM”

This summary accuses me of what I didn’t do more than what I did. In political discourse this is called fascism. It is fascism to force a citizen to do something that they aren’t obliged to do or say legally or legitimately. The summary is one that was prepared under such a mindset.”