ANKARA - The re-trial of former deputies of the banned Democracy Party (DEP) Leyla Zana, Hatip Dicle, Orhan Dogan and Selim Sadak continued on Friday.
Ankara State Security Court No. 1 listened to 19 witnesses in the second hearing the same day.
Officials said that Mehmet Tahir Babat, who gave testimony regarding speech of Selim Sadak in Senoba hamlet of Uludere in the second hearing, reiterated the testimony which he gave 10 years ago.
Upon questions of lawyers of convicts, Babat said that Sadak delivered speech in Kurdish and stated that he did not remember more detail about the issue.
Omer Babat said that Sadak and other people had come to Senoba by a taxi and stated that they later left the hamlet after turmoil took place due to Sadak's speech.
Other witnesses; Cemil Babat, Idris Babat, Osman Babat, Nurettin Babat and Ahmet Kenanoglu said that long time passed after the incident and did not reply to questions of lawyers.
Selim Sadak who spoke after testimonies said that he did not have any connection with people in Senoba and said that if there was an incident which would cause them being imprisoned for those years, it could not be possible for witnesses to forget it.
Sadak said that it was stated that he had said in his speech that ''he would not allow Turks to oppress Kurds'' and added that he did not deliver such a speech.
Leyla Zana said that testimonies and documents in the dossier showed that they became convicts due to their political thought.
Yusuf Alatas, one of the lawyers of the convicts claimed that there was not any components against convicts in testimonies and stated that re-trial could affect verdict on the decision about his convicts. He demanded convicts to be released.
The court rejected the demand of Alatas and delayed the hearing to May 23, 2003.
The four convicts, who were former DEP deputies were imprisoned to 15 years for getting involved in separatist activities in line with the instructions they got from leaders of the terrorist organization PKK.
(EÖ-AY) 26.04.2003