The Group of Socialists, Democrats and Greens within the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe, is appalled by the imprisonment of three opposition Members of the Parliament of Turkey, one from CHP (Enis Berberoğlu) and two from HDP (Leyla Güven and Musa Farisoğulları) which took place yesterday.
This sudden decision to strip Mr Berberoglu, Mrs Güven and Mr Farisogullari’s status of deputies and linked immunities clashes directly with the will of the Turkish people, and reflects political abuse, more state repression and attacks against the Parliamentary democracy.
Furthermore, we take note that the political decision of stripping MPs from their deputy status which has resulted in their loss of all constitutional immunities and their imprisonment, occurred despite the yet uncompleted deliberations of the Constitutional Court regarding the individual appeal of all three MPs about their sentencings.
Parliamentarians should be in parliament not in prison! Such acts contravene with the core principles of our Organisation, the Council of Europe, namely respect of democracy, human rights and rule of law, thus cannot be accepted.
We strongly ask the Turkish authorities to reconsider their decision and act for the immediate release of the three members of Parliament.
Strasbourg, 5 June 2020
