Court To Announce Its Verdict Next Week On Former D.E.P. Deputies

ANKARA - The 9th chamber of the Supreme Court of Appeals heard today the case of four former deputies of the outlawed Democracy Party.
Former DEP deputies Leyla Zana, Hatip Dicle, Orhan Dogan and Selim Sadak, did not attend the hearing. Their lawyers requested the court to annul a previous verdict of the Ankara State Security Court no: 1.
Supreme Court of Appeals Judge Hasan Gerceker said that decision of the court would be made public on July 14, before adjourning the hearing.
Former DEP deputies were re-tried after the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) ruled in 2001 that the first trial held in 1994 was not fair since a military judge was among the court members.
At the end of the re-trial process, Ankara DGM upheld 15-year-imprisonment sentences against Zana, Dogan, Dicle and Sadak in 1994, on charges of ''staging separatist activities both in Turkey and abroad in line with orders and directives of leaders of the terrorist organization PKK''.
However, the Supreme Court of Appeals , taking into consideration the time they had served in prison, decided on June 9 to release the former DEP deputies. In fact former DEP deputies have served 10 years of their 15-year sentence behind bars.
(UK-ULG) 08.07.2004