ANKARA - Retrial of former deputies of the Democracy Party (DEP), which was banned by the Constitutional Court continued on Friday.
Hatip Dicle and Leyla Zana, the former deputies of the DEP from Diyarbakir province, Orhan Dogan and Selim Sadak, the former deputies of the DEP from Sirnak province, and their lawyers attended the third hearing at the Ankara State Security Court (DGM) no: 1.
During the hearing, the court continued listening to public witnesses.
Mehmet Temelli, the leader of a tribe in southeastern province of Mardin, claimed that Zana and Zubeyir Haydar, the former deputy of the DEP, were expending efforts to provide support to the terrorist organization PKK.
He defended, ''Zana and Haydar told villager that they were Kurdish people. They called on villagers not to act as village guard. They told villagers that Kurdistan would be founded soon. We rejected them. In 1992, ten people including Zana, Sadak, Haydar and PKK members came to our village again. They told us that if we did not join the PKK, we would be treated badly.''
The hearing is still continuing.
After the law envisaging amendments to some laws, which is known as the second European Union (EU) adjustment package in the public opinion, came into force on February 4, Yusuf Alatas, the lawyer of former deputies of the DEP, submitted a petition to the Ankara DGM no:1 about re-trial of his clients.
Previously, Ankara DGM no: 1 sentenced Dicle, Zana, Dogan and Sadak to 15 years in prison in accordance with Article 168-2 of the Turkish Penal Code and Article 3713 of the Anti-Terrorism Law on charges of ''staging separatist activities both in Turkey and abroad in line with orders and directives of leaders of the terrorist organization PKK''.
According to the law that adds an article to the Code of Civil Procedure (CMUK), if the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) rules that Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms is violated in any decision of a court, the suspect can request re-trial.
(UK-AÖ) 23.05.2003