STRUGGLES

evidence to prosecute me, too. They recorded my mobile phone conversations for four years.
According to Turkish law, you can’t do that because you have to renew the court order every
month. But they did it anyway. For example, they recorded a telephone conversation with
Selahattin Demirtaş [The co-leader ofthe HDP] inviting me for a meeting and then they used
it as evidence against me.
They took all ofmy computers, telephones and USBs from my home. When I was in custody,
the police told me that forty people’s photos and names had been found on my computer. The
police actually planted these photos and names on my computer and then said that I had put
them on there. I'd never seen them before. They then tried to accuse me ofcreating false
identities for PKK members [this wasn't successful]. In court, they convicted me ofhaving
information about people's private lives on my computer without their permission.
CW: Can you tell us about the court case?
At the court case more than 100,000 people protested in solidarity with us. Over one hundred
lawyers attended the court. People marched in protest from Wan to the prison. In total, they
opened two different cases against thirty-six people. One case had fifteen people in, and
another with twenty-one people. There were twelve heads ofthe BDP, seven mayors, and
former mayors and former heads ofparty. All were politicians from the BDP. I was on trial
with fourteen others, seven ofwhom were mayors.
Because I’m a known person, the government had to be careful and they had to let me see my
lawyer. But one year before this, they had arrested thirty-seven lawyers, too. Because ofthis,
the lawyers didn't have so much power.
I couldn’t speak at the court for one year because they ordered me to speak in Turkish and I
wouldn't accept it. I wasn't allowed to defend myselfin my mother language ofKurmanji.
I spent one year in prison and was then released, but the case continued. In June 2015, they
sentenced me to twelve and a halfyears in prison.
voices from the struggles for freedom in bakur
There is no justice in Turkey for Kurds. They arrested thousands ofpeople but they couldn’t
find any evidence against anyone. The aim was to stop Kurdish people from being politically
active. The Amed bombing [ofa People's Democratic Party rally, just before the general
election in June 2015] was also to prevent Kurds from being involved in politics. [President]
Erdoğan said himselfthat he wanted to prevent Kurds from being involved in politics.
Nowadays, Erdoğan admits that the accusations used in the KCK trials were false and that
false documents were used, but he says that the Gülen movement [a religious movement,
currently in a power struggle with Erdoğan's ruling Justice and Development Party] did it.
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