While threatened with ban by the government, Turkey's main Kurdish party, the People's Democratic Party (HDP), which has dozens of MPs and mayors in the country, has been the target of a deadly attack , Thursday, June 17, in Izmir, in the west of the country.

An armed man broke into the local training headquarters and repeatedly shot Deniz Poyraz, a 40-year-old activist who was cooking an evening meal.

The suspect, an employee "resigned" from the health sector "according to the Izmir governor's office, was arrested shortly after the attack. He also attempted to burn down the duty office during his first interrogation. , he said that "his aim was to find a few people there," stressing that "if there had been other individuals he would have shot them as well." 

The portrait of the victim, Deniz Poyraz

#DenizPoyraz yoldaşımızı yarın (18 Haziran Cuma) saat 17: 00'de Kadifekale'de sonsuzluğa uğurluyoruz.

Kalbi ve fikri barıştan, özgürlükten yana olan herkesi "Deniz" olmaya, faşizme karşı omuz omuza mücadeleyi büyütmeye ve yoldaşımızı uğurlamaya bekliyoruz.

# HDPhalktır pic.twitter.com/X3sg8qvyof

- HDP (@HDPgenelmerkezi) June 17, 2021

If Deniz Poyraz lost his life in the attack, the toll could have been much heavier.

HDP co-chairman Mithat Sancar told reporters that a meeting of 40 party officials was to take place in Izmir's office, but it was canceled shortly before the attack, unrelated to any threat.

"Speeches with hateful, intolerant and vengeful accents"

This crime comes amid a tense context around the HDP, which has called for demonstrations to protest the attack.

The party, the third largest force in the country, is frequently the target of verbal attacks from the camp of President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and his informal coalition partner, the Nationalist Action Party (MHP, far right).

The Head of State in person has accused the HDP for several years of being the "political showcase" and of acting as an "extension" of the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK), the Kurdish separatist movement listed as terrorist by Ankara , but also by the United States or the European Union.

And this, despite the categorical denials of the HDP.

According to Turkish media, the suspect, who told investigators "has no connection with anyone", claimed to have entered "the building because he hates the PKK".

Since the announcement of his arrest and the revelation of his identity by local media, numerous photographs of the suspect have been circulating on social networks, some of which show him armed and in paramilitary clothing in neighboring Syria. Another snapshot shows him making the rallying sign of the Gray Wolves, the Turkish ultra-nationalist group often used by supporters of the MHP. For its part, the far-right party described the attack on the HDP office as a "plot" to "test the nerves of Turkish society".

"It is undeniable that part of Turkish society is mobilized by certain hateful, intolerant and vengeful speeches emanating from the country's political elites", indicates Adel Bakawan, specialist in Kurdish issues and director of the French Center for Research on Iraq (CFRI), interviewed by France 24. "These elites are trying to put in place strategies of identity, social, cultural and ethnic instrumentalization which endanger social cohesion in Turkey".

Shortly after Deniz Poyraz's assassination, the HDP accused the government and the ruling AKP party, President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, and his allies, of being responsible for the attack.   

Our friend, Deniz Poyraz, was murdered in the attack on our İzmir district building.

The instigator and abettor of this brutal attack is the AKP-MHP government and the Ministry of Interior which constantly targets our party and our members.

# HDPhalktır pic.twitter.com/LewsXGu0rB

- HDP English (@HDPenglish) June 17, 2021

"Our friend, Deniz Poyraz, was murdered in the attack on our İzmir district office. The instigator and sponsor of this brutal attack is the AKP-MHP government and the Interior Ministry who constantly take target our party and our members.

Demonization strategy

"The Turkish state is constantly trying to demonize the HDP by presenting it as being ideologically and organically linked to the PKK, which is classified as a terrorist organization," explains Adel Bakawan. For its part, the HDP, which is democratic and civilian, rejects categorically any link with the PKK which has a totally different ideological vision and strategy of action, and always asks the Turkish power to prove its accusations with factual and proven data ".

For Adel Bakawan, the strategy of demonizing the HDP aims to convince the Turkish judiciary to ban the HDP. "This is the ultimate goal of the Turkish president and the ongoing procedures aimed at achieving this goal, as the HDP has been seen as a direct threat since it deprived Recep Tayyip Erdogan and his party, the AKP, of the parliamentary majority in 2015 ".

The Constitutional Court of Turkey had delayed, at the end of March, the examination of a request for prohibition of the HDP, accused of "terrorist" activities, because of "procedural flaws". She referred the case to the prosecutor, who had stated in his indictment that "HDP members strive, through their statements and actions, to destroy the indivisible union between state and nation", for additional information. A new indictment was submitted in June to the court, which is due to consider it in the coming days.

For the United States, a possible dissolution "would unduly subvert the will of Turkish voters, further undermine democracy in Turkey, and deprive millions of Turkish citizens of their elected representatives," the Biden administration said.

"Continuous judicial harassment and maximum pressure"

"The leading executives of the HDP whom I was recently able to join evoke continued judicial harassment and maximum pressure and they believe that a possible ban on their party would be synonymous with a coup, one year before the presidential election in Turkey ", emphasizes Adel Bakawan.

The HDP has been the object of reprisals and vexations since the failed coup of 2016, with the arrest of several of its elected officials and leaders, including its figurehead Selahattin Demirtas.

The latter was sentenced, on May 28, by a court in Ankara to a new sentence of two years and six months in prison for having made statements considered threatening against a prosecutor saying that he was going to him. claim "accounts".

Imprisoned for "terrorism" since 2016, he risks, despite repeated calls from the European Court of Human Rights to release him, up to 142 years in prison.

Despite the repression aimed at it, the HDP, clearly anchored to the left and attached to the defense of minorities, still manages to seduce many voters, including outside its area of ​​Kurdish influence.

And this, thanks to its progressive and ecological program which allowed it to exceed the 10% mark in the two legislative elections of 2015 and 2019.

"The strength of the HDP, which is even stronger than in 2015, lies in its political project, since despite the persecutions and the imprisonment of several of its leaders, the party remains active and popular because it has the particularity of not to be articulated around a charismatic personality, but well around a political project, deciphers Adel Bakawan. And that is what the Turkish president fears ".

In the event that the HDP is banned, the specialist in Kurdish issues sees the electoral base, "not only the Kurds, but other minorities as well as the social categories who voted in favor", seek to regroup and bring their votes to the one who will represent the alternative to Recep Tayyip Erdogan and the AKP.

"This is what happened during the last municipal elections in Istanbul, in 2019, and it was very expensive for the presidential camp, which lost the city of which he had been at the head for 25 years," he concludes.    

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