Turkish deputies detained after refusing to testify on terrorism cases

Policemen and civilians died in a car blast in southeastern Turkey's city Diyarbakir. The government blames members of the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) for the attack.

Vestnik Kavkaza presents an article of Daily Sabah on these events.

The attack occurred following the arrests of 11 lawmakers from the Peoples' Democratic Party (HDP), including the party's two co-leaders Figen Yüksekdağ and Selahattin Demirtaş and parliamentary group leader Idris Baluken. The HDP is accused of having links to the PKK terrorist group. They were arrested for failing to answer a summons to testify as part of a counter-terrorism investigation.

Turkey did whatever was prescribed by the rule of law, regarding the detention of pro-PKK Peoples' Democratic Party (HDP) deputies, and the same justice applies to all citizens, Justice Minister Bekir Bozdağ said on Friday. Bozdağ's comments came after HDP deputies, including two co-chairs of the party were detained after refusing to bear testimony in anti-terror probes carried out by prosecutors.

Bozdağ also spoke about the latest decision of Belgium, which does not see the PKK as a terrorist organization, even though the group is recognized as a terror group by the U.S. and EU. He said that Turkey is left alone in its fight against terror and added that the international community does not support Turkey's counter-terror efforts.

He also touched upon the increasing racist and Islamophobic attacks in Germany and France, and said that 75 mosques in Germany were attacked in 2015, but police only launched investigations for 15 of them and in France, many mosques are vandalized or closed down.