Prosecutor imposes ban on lawyers’ visits to 19 people detained in Diyarbakır operation

The public prosecutor’s office in Diyarbakır has obtained a 24-hour ban against lawyers who won’t be allowed to see the politicians and trade unionists who were arrested on Monday during police operations.

To justify the ban on lawyers, the prosecutor said that personal contact between “suspects in custody and lawyers as well as the right to examine the contents of the files or to make copies of the documents” could jeopardize the purpose of the investigation. This, in reality, means that it is still unclear what the victims are accused of.

The number of those arrested has now increased from fourteen to eighteen. In addition to Amed, there were other arrests in Mardin as well as in Izmir and Antalya.

The persons in police custody are the HDP politicians Mehmet Asana, Şeyhmus Yavuz, Nasır Yelter, Hüseyin Baran and Şakir Demir, HDP Sur Council member Ömer Filitoğlu, the DBP officers Yasemin Akengin, Mehmet Ali Alkan, Mehmet Süslü and Abdullah Dengiz, the PSK politician Bayram Bozyel, Erkan Keskin from ESP, union members Gülhan Tekin (SES), Arzu Koç (Eğitim Sen), Baki Öndeş (TÜM BEL-SEN), Arin Zümrüt from the Chamber of Engineers and Architects (TMMOB), Şehrat Uyanık from the Solidarity Association TUAYDER, activist Vesiye Yiğit from the Council of Peace Mothers and Nazife Yiğit.

They are all being held at Diyarbakır Police Headquarters.

Unions protest arrests

The branch of the Platform for Labor and Democracy, to which a number of trade unions belong, condemned the arrests on Monday. In an evening rally in front of the headquarters of the Health and Social Workers’ Union (SES), unionists called for an end to the “anti-democratic practice” against circles critical of the government and the release of those arrested.

Nasır Demirkıran, current spokesman for the KESK trade union federation, said arbitrary arrests and police operations had become routine under the AKP’s totalitarian regime. “Leading members and officials of trade unions and professional chambers, NGOs and political parties are attacked, threatened and arrested because they oppose the government. This government is unable to tolerate dissenting voices and react with fascist methods oppressing society.”