Turkey Issues Detention Warrants For 82 Pro-Kurdish Activists Involved In 2014 Riots

The Turkish public prosecutor's office has issued detention warrants for 82 members of the pro-Kurdish opposition Peoples' Democratic Party (HDP) as part of an investigation into Kurdish riots in October 2014

ANKARA (UrduPoint News / Sputnik - 25th September, 2020) The Turkish public prosecutor's office has issued detention warrants for 82 members of the pro-Kurdish opposition Peoples' Democratic Party (HDP) as part of an investigation into Kurdish riots in October 2014.

According to the prosecutor's office, the operation to detain the activists is taking place in seven Turkish provinces, including Ankara. So far, 18 people have been detained, and among them are former lawmakers of the Turkish parliament from HDP Sirri Sureyya Onder and Altan Tan, as well as Mayor of Kars Ayhan Bilgen.

The prosecutors believe that back in 2014, the detainees were urging Kurds to take to the streets, build barricades, riot and attack the police, as a result of which many citizens, including police officers, were killed and injured, while many public buildings suffered material damage.

In October 2014, Turkey's Kurdish population organized street riots in a number of Turkish cities in protest of Ankara's reluctance to help Kurds in the Syrian border city of Kobani while it was under siege by the Islamic State terrorist organization (IS, banned in Russia). The Kobani siege lasted from September 2014 to January 2015, which forced some 400,000 Kurds to flee into Turkey.