ANKARA - Turkish Foreign Minister and Deputy Prime Minister Abdullah Gul said on Monday that Leyla Zana issue was not brought onto agenda during his meeting with Turkish-German Interparliamentary Friendship Group Chairperson Claudia Roth.
When reporters recalled that Roth would like to visit Zana, Gul said that the issue was not taken up during the meeting and added that Roth did not demand anything from him about the issue.
Roth told reporters after their meeting with Gul that they wanted to visit Zana in the prison in the afternoon and they would try to get permission for this.
On April 24, 2004, Ankara State Security Court (DGM) no: 1 ratified former decision of the court against Leyla Zana, Hatip Dicle, Orhan Dogan and Selim Sadak, the former deputies of the DEP which was banned by the Constitutional Court, in their retrial process ordering them to serve the remainder of their 15-year prison sentences.
During the first trial, Ankara DGM 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''.
All four defendants were stripped of their parliamentary immunity, arrested and convicted in 1994 of having links to the terrorist organization of PKK. The four, who have already served 10 years in prison, will be eligible for release in 2005.
(GC-AÖ) 10.05.2004