Image copyright AP/Reuters Image caption Selahattin Demirtas (L) and Figen Yuksekdag have been detained as well as other MPs from their party

The joint leaders of Turkey's pro-Kurdish opposition party, People's Democracy (HDP), have been arrested along with at least nine other MPs.

Selahattin Demirtas and Figen Yuksekdag are accused of spreading propaganda for militants fighting the Turkish state.

Hours after Mr Demirtas was arrested in Diyarbakir, a car bomb killed eight people and injured more than 100.

Militants have been fighting for years to achieve independence for the Kurds, Turkey's biggest ethnic minority.

Turkey remains under a state of emergency that was imposed after a failed military coup in July.

The emergency allows President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and his cabinet to bypass parliament when drafting new laws and to restrict or suspend rights and freedoms.

Image copyright Reuters Image caption The blast in Diyarbakir destroyed the fronts of buildings

Image copyright AP

Image copyright Reuters

A major escalation: Analysis by Mark Lowen, BBC Turkey correspondent

Image copyright AFP

The government says those detained had failed to respond to a summons for questioning and issued an arrest warrant for two other HDP MPs currently abroad.

This is a major escalation of a clampdown that has seen Kurdish media closed down and the mayor of Diyarbakir arrested.

Hopes of an end to Turkey's decades-long Kurdish problem have evaporated since a ceasefire with the [Kurdistan Workers' Party] PKK broke down in 2015, leading to a wave of tit-for-tat attacks.

Mr Demirtas elicited international support with his liberal politics but critics say he has failed to distance the party sufficiently from the PKK. Friday's detentions are likely to provoke more tension among Kurds - and more violence too.

Why were the party leaders arrested?

The government says they were detained for failing to co-operate with a counter-terrorism investigation, which the two leaders vowed to boycott in June.

Defending the arrests, Justice Minister Bekir Bozdag said: "They did not respect the law."

The MPs are also accused of spreading propaganda for the PKK, the Kurdish group suspected of a wave of recent attacks including Friday's car bomb.

Deemed a terrorist organisation by the US, the EU and Turkey, the PKK has been fighting the state since the 1970s in a war which has claimed at least 40,000 lives.

Can MPs really be arrested just like this in Turkey?

Turkish politicians normally have immunity from prosecution but this was removed from the HDP and some other MPs in May.

Last month, the joint mayors of Diyarbakir, Turkey's largest Kurdish-majority city, were also arrested as part of a terrorism investigation.

Is the HDP linked to the PKK?

While commonly seen as the main pro-Kurdish party, HDP is an eclectic grouping which also appeals to leftists, liberals, environmentalists, gay rights activists and pious Muslims. That explains why it is Turkey's third-largest party.

It entered parliament for the first time last year, winning 59 seats.

During the election campaign, it carried a moderate message despite dozens of attacks against party supporters and offices, culminating in a deadly attack on its largest election rally in Diyarbakir two days before the vote.

The party strongly denies any links to the PKK.

Mr Demirtas and others accuse President Erdogan of seeking to push the party out of parliament and increase his own power.

One MP, who is currently abroad, told the BBC the government was acting like Nazis.

"This crackdown tonight is nothing to do with procedural law, criminal law, any law whatsoever or the constitution," Ertugrul Kurkcu said. "This is an unlawful hijacking of HDP parliamentarians."

Turkey's HDP party goes mainstream</s>The blast struck near the police station in Diyarbakir where some of the pro-Kurdish party leaders were being held in a terrorism probe.

A car bomb rocked southeastern Turkey's largest city on Friday, killing at least one person and injuring more than 40, security sources said, hours after police detained the leaders of the mostly Kurdish region's biggest political party.

The blast struck near the police station in Diyarbakir where some of the party leaders were being held in a terrorism probe. It tore off the facades of buildings and firefighters were searching debris for people trapped there. Justice Minister Bekir Bozdag said police and civilians were killed.

The detention of the leaders of the pro-Kurdish Peoples' Democratic Party (HDP), Parliament's second-biggest opposition grouping, and ten other of its lawmakers will heighten concern among Western allies about a deepening crackdown on dissent under President Tayyip Erdogan.

The move, which drew immediate condemnation from the European Union, comes as Turkey has detained or suspended more than 110,000 officials in the wake of a failed July coup, mulls the reintroduction of the death penalty, and days after journalists from a leading opposition newspaper were detained.

“Very bad news from Turkey. Again. Now HDP members of parliament are being detained,” the European Parliament's Turkey rapporteur, Kati Piri, said on Twitter of a country that is seeking membership of the EU.

EU foreign policy chief Federica Mogherini said on Twitter she was “extremely worried” by the arrests and had called a meeting of EU ambassadors in Ankara.

Southeastern Turkey has been rocked by political turmoil and violence for more than a year after the collapse of a ceasefire with the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) militant group, which has waged a three-decade insurgency for Kurdish autonomy.

The lira currency hit a new record low against the dollar after the arrests, trading at 3.1319 at 0640 GMT. Access to social media, including Twitter, Whatsapp, YouTube and Facebook, was blocked, an internet monitoring group said, and a reporting ban was imposed on coverage of the blast.

Mr. Erdogan and the ruling AK Party accuse the HDP of links to the PKK, which is deemed a terrorist organisation by the United States and the European Union. The HDP, which won more than 5 million votes at the last general election, denies direct links.

The government introduced a nationwide state of emergency after a failed military coup on July 15 which gave it broad powers to round up suspects linked to the putsch. More than 110,000 civil servants, soldiers, police, judges, journalists and other officials have been suspended or detained.

The authorities have also used the emergency powers to round up pro-Kurdish opposition politicians, including Diyarbakir's joint mayors, who were detained late last month, and has closed all major Kurdish media outlets.

In comments cited by state-run Anadolu Agency, Bozdag said Friday's detentions were within the law and rejected criticism of the move.

“The lawmakers who are detained ... disregarded the law,” he said. “They were sent an invitation but they don't come. What other solution is there? It is to bring them forcibly.”

The interior ministry said Friday's detention orders were for 13 members of parliament, but two were abroad and were therefore not immediately detained.

Police raided the Ankara house of Figen Yuksekdag, HDP co-chairwoman, and Selahattin Demirtas, the other party leader, in Diyarbakir, after they refused to give testimony for crimes linked to “terrorist propaganda".

“The HDP calls on the international community to react against the Erdogan regime's coup,” the party said on Twitter.

A court official said the prosecutor was seeking Demirtas' formal arrest and that both he and Yuksekdag were in court after police questioning.

“I will not hesitate to be held accountable in front of a fair and impartial judiciary. There is nothing I cannot answer for,” Demirtas said in a statement to the prosecutor, which was shared by HDP lawmaker Besime Konca.

“But I refuse to be an actor in this judicial theatre just because it was ordered by Erdogan, whose own political past is suspicious,” he said.

Police also raided and searched the party's head office in central Ankara. Police cars and armed vehicles had closed the entrances to the street of the HDP headquarters.

A group of protesters chanting slogans tried to reach the party offices, but were stopped by police before they could enter the street, a Reuters witness said.

Internet monitoring group Turkey Blocks said access to social media sites had been blocked. A U.S. internet company official, who declined to be identified, confirmed some sites were being “throttled", a method of slowing them to the point where they are unusable.

The HDP is the third-largest party in the 550-seat Turkish parliament, with 59 seats, and won more than 5 million votes in the November 2015 general election.

Parliamentarians in Turkey normally enjoy immunity from prosecution, but the immunity of many lawmakers, including HDP deputies, was lifted earlier this year.</s>People watch the damage after an explosion in southeastern Turkish city of Diyarbakir, early Friday, Nov. 4, 2016.

ANKARA, Turkey — Turkish authorities on Friday detained 12 pro-Kurdish members of Parliament for questioning in terror-related probes, drawing expressions of concern from Europe and the U.S., while a car bomb attack in the largest Kurdish city, reportedly claimed by Kurdish militants, killed nine people.

Selahattin Demirtas and Figen Yuksekdag, the co-chairs of the pro-Kurdish People's Democratic Party, or HDP, were among those rounded up in the middle of the night. They were later ordered held in custody pending trial on terror-related charges along with six other legislators. The courts, meanwhile, released three others on condition that they report regularly to authorities.

The detentions provoked worried reactions from outside Turkey. The European Union's foreign policy chief, Federica Mogherini, expressed concern on Twitter, saying the EU was in contact with authorities and adding that she had called a meeting of EU ambassadors in Ankara.

Tom Malinowski, the U.S. assistant secretary of state for democracy, human rights and labor, tweeted that he was "deeply troubled" by the detentions, adding: "When taking legal action against elected reps, democracies have higher duty to justify actions & preserve confidence in justice."

Governments in Norway, Sweden and Demark summoned their Turkish ambassadors to explain the arrests of the pro-Kurdish lawmakers.

Hours after the overnight detentions, there was a large explosion in the southeastern city of Diyarbakir, near the riot police building. Two police officers and seven civilians were killed, the state-run Anadolu Agency reported. Prime Minister Binali Yildirim said up to 100 people were wounded, though most were released after treatment.

Yildirim also said one of the assailants was "caught dead," but did not elaborate.

The Diyarbakir governor's office said the outlawed Kurdistan Workers' Party, or PKK, claimed the attack, which Anadolu said was carried out with a minibus laden with a ton of explosives.

The blast caused a large crater near the police building and damaged several buildings and businesses nearby. Television footage showed people walking among glass and other debris near buildings with their windows blown out. Authorities imposed a temporary news blackout after the explosion, barring reports that could lead to public "fear, panic or chaos" and images showing the explosion and its aftermath.

Turkey has been plagued by a series of deadly bomb attacks in the past 18 months, carried out by Kurdish militants or Islamic State group extremists.

The PKK has waged a three-decade-long insurgency against the Turkish state and is considered a terror organization by Turkey and its allies. A fragile cease-fire collapsed in 2015 and at least 700 state security personnel and thousands of Kurdish militants have been killed since then, according to Anadolu.

It was not immediately known if the attack was in direct response to the legislators' detentions.

Officials said the lawmakers were detained for not appearing in court to testify in ongoing terrorism-related investigations. The government accuses the HDP — the third largest party in Turkey's parliament with over five million votes in the last election — of being the political arm of the PKK, an accusation the party rejects.

An Interior Ministry statement said a total of 15 detention warrants were issued by the chief public prosecutors in five mainly Kurdish provinces. Two of the legislators were abroad, and authorities are still searching for one other.

"The kind of detentions of democratically elected members of parliament we are seeing in Turkey today is an assault on the right to political representation and participation for millions of voters and defies fundamental principles of any country that claims to be democratic and based on rule of law and human rights," said Human Rights Watch's Turkey director, Emma Sinclair-Webb.

HDP lawmaker Adem Geveri described the detentions as a "political genocide operation," telling The Associated Press that they "officially put an end to the functioning of Parliament in an anti-democratic and unlawful way."

"Now with the HDP removed from the political equation, they will go to an early election and establish an authoritarian Turkey without the HDP, without any democratic opposition," Geveri added.

Main opposition Republican People's Party Chair Kemal Kilicdaroglu denounced the detentions, "If you defend democracy, then you defend that those who came with elections should go with elections. Otherwise you'll butcher democracy in Turkey."

Yildirim responded: "If they are elected but go hand in hand with terrorism, they of course need to be made to account."

President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and other senior government officials have repeatedly called for the prosecution of pro-Kurdish lawmakers on terrorism-related charges, which was made possible after legal immunities protecting legislators from prosecution were lifted in May.

Hundreds of charges were filed against HDP lawmakers following the lifting of immunity. Demirtas reacted to the lifting of immunity by saying none of his fellow party members would voluntarily appear in court to testify.

HDP lawmaker Garo Paylan told the AP that if there had been a free judiciary, the parliamentarians would have easily gone to court.

"There is no free judiciary, that is why we don't want to go," he said. "They say if you don't obey Tayyip Erdogan, if you don't obey the ideology that is going on, a fascist ideology, you are a terrorist."

Also on Friday, Internet users nationwide complained about restricted access to social media and messaging apps, including Facebook, Twitter, WhatsApp and Skype.

The TurkeyBlocks monitoring network confirmed the restricted access, saying its probes have identified "throttling at the ISP level as the source of the slowdowns."

Rights activists say restricting access to the internet is aimed at preventing calls for demonstrations.

Yildirim, the prime minister, said: "Occasionally one might have to resort to such precautions for the sake of security. as a precaution. Once the danger is gone, everything will return to normal."

Malinowski, the U.S. official, tweeted that press freedom and internet access are essential to democratic and economic health, and urged Turkey "to restore information access to its citizens now."</s>Selahattin Demirtaş, HDP co-leader known as the ‘Kurdish Obama’, held with at least 11 MPs as post-coup crackdown continues

This article is more than 2 years old

This article is more than 2 years old

The two joint leaders of Turkey’s pro-Kurdish Peoples’ Democratic party (HDP) have been detained along with at least 10 MPs because of their reluctance to give testimony for crimes linked to “terrorist propaganda”.

Police raided the Ankara home of co-leader Selahattin Demirtaș and the house of co-leader Figen Yüksekdağ in Diyarbakır, the largest city in Turkey’s mainly Kurdish south-east, early on Friday.

Demirtaş – a charismatic leader known as the “Kurdish Obama” by some admirers – and Yüksekdağ had been targeted by several separate investigations over the past few months but this is the first time that either has been detained.

At least 10 other HDP parliamentarians were also held, lawyers said, in a major escalation of the government’s crackdown on its opponents in the wake of the failed coup on 15 July. Raids also took place in the south-eastern cities of Van and Bingöl.

The raids took place against a backdrop of rising criticism over the government’s purge, which earlier this week also saw the issuing of arrest warrants against editors and staff of Cumhuriyet, the main opposition newspaper in the country, and a fresh round of dismissals in the gendarmerie.

Ankara accuses the HDP’s politicians of harbouring sympathies for, and acting to further the interests of the Kurdistan Workers, party (PKK), a separatist group engaged in an insurgency against the government. Peace talks collapsed last year amid accusations that the PKK was rearming and as the ruling Justice and Development party (AKP) drifted towards allying with the nationalist bloc in parliament.

Turkish journalists face abuse and threats online as trolls step up attacks Read more

The purges of the police and media institutions are part of a crackdown on what the authorities say are individuals and organisations with alleged links to Fethullah Gülen, a US-based preacher that Turkey accuses of masterminding the coup.

The prime minister, Binali Yıldırım, told reporters that elected officials who incite and encourage terrorism must face legal proceedings and that the MPs were detained because they had refused to give testimony.

But Turkey’s allies are likely to perceive the latest arrests as a further attempt by President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan to consolidate his power ahead of a parliamentary vote and referendum expected as early as next spring to revise the Turkish constitution and transform the country from a parliamentary democracy into a presidential system.

The leader of the nationalist bloc, Devlet Bahçeli, recently backed a referendum, making a vote on the issue more likely.

A widespread difficulty in reaching social media websites such as Twitter and Facebook as well as messaging app WhatsApp was also reported across Turkey after the detentions started at midnight.

Turkey Blocks (@TurkeyBlocks) Update: WhatsApp messaging service block in #Turkey confirmed, joining Twitter, Facebook and YouTube shutdownshttps://t.co/XA9JZaxn54 pic.twitter.com/XNusUu2rgW

Charles Lister (@Charles_Lister) Big things happening in #Turkey - internet totally off in southeast & HDP officials being detained.



+ Rumor of imminent invasion of #Iraq.

Hours after the detentions began, Diyarbakır was rocked by car bomb outside a police building that was blamed by authorities on PKK militants. Eight people were killed.

The Turkish justice minister, Bekir Bozdağ, said on Friday that the detention of the HDP MPs was in line with the law in comments broadcast on state television.



Others detained included the prominent MP, Sırrı Süreyya Önder, who in the past has been a pointman for contacts with jailed PKK leader Abdullah Öcalan. The head of the HDP’s delegation in the Turkish parliament, İdris Baluken, was also held.

HDP is the third largest party in the 550-seat Turkish parliament, with 59 seats. Parliamentarians in Turkey normally enjoy immunity from prosecution, but the pro-Kurdish party’s immunity was lifted this year.

Turkey accuses the HDP of links to the PKK, which is deemed a terrorist organisation by the US, the EU and Turkey.

Police also raided the party’s head office in central Ankara. Television images showed party officials quarrelling with police during the raid, and a witness said police cars and armed vehicles had closed off the entrances to the street of the HDP headquarters.

“HDP call international community to react against Erdoğan regime’s coup,” the party said on Twitter, referring to President Erdoğan.

A group of protesters chanting slogans tried to reach the party offices, but were stopped by police before they could enter the street, a witness said.

Turkey Untold (@TurkeyUntold) VIDEO: Police attack HDP co-char Yuksekdag's advisors to prevent them from filming the raid on her house. pic.twitter.com/55DR3kEDH5

The European Union’s foreign policy chief, Federica Mogherini, said the arrests compromised Turkey’s parliamentary democracy.

“We expect Turkey to safeguard its parliamentary democracy, including respect for human rights and the rule of law, and we are conveying these expectations directly to the Turkish authorities,” Mogherini said in a statement with the EU’s enlargement commissioner, Johannes Hahn.

Relations with the EU are delicate. Officials in Ankara accuse their European counterparts of not showing enough support for Turkey in the aftermath of the failed coup, and bristle at criticism of the crackdown. Meanwhile, a deal to limit the flight of migrants from Turkey to Europe in exchange for visa-free travel for Turkish citizens in the EU may fail in the coming weeks because Europe has not kept its end of the bargain.



A measure to reintroduce the death penalty is also likely to be debated in the coming weeks in parliament, a likely death blow to Turkey’s EU accession talks.

The raids come as Turkey remains under a state of emergency imposed after the coup, which critics say has gone well beyond targeting the plotters. Thirteen staff from the opposition Cumhuriyet newspaper, including the editor-in-chief, were detained on Monday, further heightening strains in Turkish society.

This is the biggest witch-hunt in Turkey’s history | Can Dündar Read more

Tensions have surged in the Kurdish-dominated south-east of Turkey since a fragile ceasefire declared by the PKK collapsed in 2015. The HDP seeks to promote the cause of Turkey’s Kurdish minority and defend the rights of Kurds as well as those of women, gays and workers.

But the authorities accuse the party of being a front for the PKK and failing to distance itself from terror, claims it has always vehemently denied.

Erdoğan has launched repeated personal attacks on Demirtaş, who analysts have seen as the sole politician in Turkey who comes anywhere near to rivalling his charisma. Demirtaş has made it a personal crusade to oppose Erdoğan’s plan for a presidential system in Turkey, which the HDP says would lead to dictatorship.

Reuters and Agence France-Presse contributed to this report.</s>Turkey's pro-Kurdish party announced Sunday that it will halt its legislative activities in parliament following the arrests of nine of its lawmakers.

Yet Ayhan Bilgen, the spokesman for the Peoples' Democratic Party or HDP, told The Associated Press that the party will not withdraw from parliament, saying that decision can only "be made in consultation with the people." The party will stop participating in parliamentary commissions and the parliamentary assembly.

Instead the HDP will "go house to house" listening to the people following "the most extensive and darkest attack in our democratic political history," Bilgen said at a news conference in the southeastern city of Diyarbakir.

HDP co-leaders Selahattin Demirtas and Figen Yuksekdag were arrested Friday on terrorism-related charges, along with seven other lawmakers. The move prompted messages of concern from the U.S. and Europe that the arrests undermined Turkey's democracy.

The HDP entered parliament last year as the nation's third-largest party with 59 lawmakers. In May, Turkey's parliament voted to strip lawmakers who have complaints against them of legal immunity, paving the way for the arrests.

Turkey's government accuses the HDP of being the political wing of the outlawed Kurdistan Workers' Party or PKK, which has waged a three-decades-long insurgency against the state. The party rejects the accusation.

Deputy Prime Minister Nurettin Canikli told private broadcaster NTV that the HDP's decision to halt its participation would not have a negative effect on legislation.</s>Turkey's pro-Kurdish party has decided to halt its legislative activities in parliament following the arrest of nine of its lawmakers.

Yet Ayhan Bilgen, a spokesman for the Peoples' Democratic Party (HDP), told The Associated Press on Sunday that the party will not withdraw from parliament, saying that decision can only "be made in consultation with the people."

HDP co-leaders Selahattin Demirtas and Figen Yuksekdag were arrested Friday on terrorism-related charges, along with seven other lawmakers. The move prompted messages of concern from the U.S. and Europe that Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan is using the pursuit of terrorists to detain opposition members.

The HDP entered parliament last year as the nation's third-largest party. In May, Turkey's parliament voted to strip lawmakers of legal immunity, paving the way for the arrests.</s>Turkish authorities detained nine officials from the country's main pro-Kurdish opposition party on Saturday, a party official said, a day after the party's leaders were formally arrested.

The nine officials included the provincial and district heads of the pro-Kurdish opposition Peoples' Democratic Party (HDP) in the southeastern province of Adana, the official said.

HDP co-leaders Selahattin Demirtas and Figen Yuksekdag were arrested on Friday as part of a terrorism investigation, prompting strong international condemnation of a widening crackdown on dissent under President Tayyip Erdogan.</s>The Peoples' Democratic Party (HDP) tweeted that nine of its deputies were taken into custody, with some having their houses raided.

The HDP, Turkey's third-largest political party, also claimed their headquarters in Ankara were raided.

The party said in a tweet from its official foreign affairs twitter account that an internet slowdown is in effect "to prevent reactions through social media" to the arrests.

A resident in Turkey speaking to CNN corroborated that the internet was running slowly during the time the HDP said the so-called slowdown was in effect.

Figen Yuksekdag a co-chair of the HDP, and Selahattin Demirtas, the president and co-leader of the HDP, were both taken into custody in their homes, state-run Anadolu news agency reported. How the 'Kurdish question' complicates the anti-ISIS alliance Demirtas tweeted late Thursday that "police officials are at my door in my Diyarbakir house [in southern Turkey] to detain me by force." Anadolu reported that Yuksekdag was taken at her Ankara home "for failing to comply with a summons for her testimony" in a terror investigation. The detentions come just days after Diyarbakir's first elected female mayor -- Gultan Kisanak -- and her co-mayor were detained. Kisanak, a member of HDP, was detained on terror-related charges, according to Anadolu. Demonstrators took to the streets to protest her detention, and riot police used water cannons to disperse them. A 30-year-old conflict between the Turkish state and militants from the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) reignited more than a year ago in Turkey's predominantly Kurdish southeast. The PKK is identified as a terror group by Turkey, the US and the EU. The Kurds are Turkey's largest ethnic minority. For much of the 20th century, the state oppressed this community. Idris Baluken, a member of HDP and a member of the Turkish Parliament, said, "This is an attack on Kurdish identity and dignity. This attack is no different then any attack on Kurdish officials in the last 100 years."</s>German Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier on Friday requested that the charge d'affaires in the Turkish embassy be summoned to the ministry for discussions about Turkey's arrests of Kurdish opposition lawmakers, the ministry said.

"The overnight arrests of politicians and lawmakers from the Kurdish HDP (Peoples' Democratic Party) represent a further drastic intensification of the situation in the eyes of the foreign minister," the ministry said in a statement.

The ministry said no one questioned Ankara's right to respond to the failed coup attempt of July 15. "But that cannot be a justification for silencing or even imprisoning the political opposition," the statement said.</s>Turkey's state-run news agency says the leader of the pro-Kurdish opposition party has been taken to a maximum security prison in the northwestern city of Edirne.

The Anadolou agency said Saturday that Selahattin Demirtas, co-chair of the People's Democratic Party or HDP, was among the 12 party legislators detained overnight for refusal to testify on terror-related charges.

Demirtas, along with fellow co-chair Figen Yuksekdag and seven other lawmakers were formally put under arrest pending trial. The courts released three others on condition they report regularly to authorities.

The private Dogan News Agency said Yuksekdag was taken to a maximum security prison in the northwestern city of Kocaeli.

The government accuses the HDP of being the political arm of its outlawed Kurdish rebels, an accusation the party rejects.
Turkish security forces begin mass arrests of pro-Kurdish Peoples' Democratic Party (HDP) MPs, including co-leaders Selahattin Demirtaş and Figen Yüksekdağ. Internet access is reportedly blocked across southeastern Turkey.