Nearly 300 people detained in operations targeting HDP in a month, says official

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Some 295 individuals have been detained in Turkey in the last month as part of investigations and operations targeting the Peoples' Democratic Party (HDP), a party official said today.

Sixty-one of the detained have been remanded in custody, Nuray Özdoğan, co-spokesperson of the party's Law and Human Rights Commission, said at a press conference.

Four separate investigations have been recently launched against the HDP and other Kurdish-focused organizations, including political parties, media outlets and lawyers' groups.

Özdoğan noted that the crackdown came weeks into the crucial elections, saying that "the government continues its election campaign with its own methods."

She listed the following incidents:

*On March 4, 12 of our party members, including the co-chair of the HDP Urfa province, were detained. On the same day, 16 people, including members of the HDP Youth Council, were detained in Istanbul.

*On April 25, two HDP members of the Central Executive Board, 25 lawyers who were working on election security, and 143 people who were working on the election campaign and as ballot box officials were detained in Diyarbakır. There are still people who are wanted in connection with these detentions. In these detentions, 48 people, including 5 lawyers and 4 journalists, were arrested. Dozens of people who wanted to make a press statement against this political genocide operation were also detained.

*On April 26, the Green Left Party candidate in Kocaeli was arrested.

*After the election rally held in Muş on April 27, many people were detained.

*On April 29, 19 people, including two journalists and party members, were detained in Ankara.

*On May 3, World Press Freedom Day, two journalists and five more people were arrested.

*On April 30, the district co-chair of Gebze and four party employees were detained and arrested.

*Also on April 29, our election convoy was intervened by riot police in Ankara and three people, including our party lawyer, were beaten.

*On April 30, 23 people, including Mr. Şahin Tümüklü, the co-chair of our constituent party ESP [Socialist Party of the Oppressed], Green Left Party candidates, ESP members, and opposition journalists were detained in Eskişehir and İstanbul. Mr. Tümüklü, the Green Left Party candidate and a journalist were among the six people who were arrested.

*On May 1, during the election campaign in Kocaeli, our candidates for parliament, Ömer Faruk Gergerlioğlu and Arzu Eylem Kayaoğlu, were subjected to physical and verbal violence under police surveillance." (VC/VK)