HDP Amed holds congress: “They will never be able to defeat us”

The Peoples’ Democratic Party (HDP) provincial association in Amed (tr. Diyarbakir) held its third congress on Sunday and elected a new executive committee. The meeting was held under the slogan “Let’s break isolation with organized force – build a democratic and free life” and was attended by a large number of delegates. In addition to members of various small parties united under the umbrella of the HDP and parties of the Kurdistan Alliance, representatives of civil society organizations were also present.

First, there were intense political discussions at the meeting. HDP co-chair Pervin Buldan drew a picture of the developments in Kurdistan and Turkey in recent years, highlighting in particular the phase starting in 2014, when the so-called Decomposition Plan (tr. “Çöktürme Planı”), a military and political extermination concept against Kurdish society, was launched in Ankara and since then war, crises and conflicts have continued to intensify. This, she said, is the only strategy of the palace regime to guarantee its existence to a people who are waging a “historic struggle” for peace and thus a ray of hope for the entire country and the entire region. “As HDP, we have presented a way out of this rot that is being imposed on us with our Roadmap for Justice, Democracy and Peace,” Buldan said. “In order to start a new era, it is time to expand our democracy alliance – from Amed to Tekirdağ and from the Black Sea to the Mediterranean” said the politician.

Referring to the Kobanê case in which 108 executive members of the HDP stand trial, Buldan said, “They think they can succeed. Yet, they will never be able to defeat us, nor close our party as our people will be standing upright before them.”

After further speeches and the reading and discussion of the activity report of the provincial association, the board was elected. Zeyyat Ceylan remains in office, his new colleague in the gender-parity dual leadership is Gülistan Atasoy. Her predecessor Hülya Alökmen Uyanık has been in prison since the spring. In April, a court in Amed sentenced the politician to ten and a half years in prison for alleged membership of a “terrorist organization”. Uyanık’s participation in protests as co-chair of the regional office of the health trade union SES in 2012 and her work as a delegate in the civil society association Democratic Society Congress (DTK) were used as evidence in the trial.