LONDON'S Green Party Euro-MP Jean Lambert has warned Turkey that a Kurdish MP jailed for 15 years for speaking Kurdish in the national parliament must not face a further retrial announced today.
Leyla Zana and three co-defendants jailed in 1994 were released last month in the face of EU pressure on Turkey's human rights record. The Turkish authorities have today announced the four will face a third trial.
Mrs Lambert had welcomed last month's decision to release Zana - one of the first Kurdish women to enter the Turkish National Assembly - but today warned Turkey must drop all charges against her and her co-defendants or jeopardise its ambitions to join the EU for continuing to violate international human rights standards.
Leyla Zana, winner of the
European Parliament's Sakharov Peace Prize in 1995, was sentenced to 15 years'
in prison in 1994 for speaking in Kurdish during her inauguration as an assembly
member three years earlier. The offending words were: "I take this oath in
the name of fraternity between
the Turkish and Kurdish peoples".
Her imprisonment sparked an international outcry and a challenge to the European Court of Human Rights, which in July 2001 ruled that Turkey had breached Article 6 of the European Convention of Human Rights by denying Zana her right to a fair trial.
Zana and three co-defendants had their convictions upheld by the Turkish appeals court in April but were released in June following pressure from the EU. It was announced today that they would face a second retrial.
Mrs Lambert, who is a member of the European Parliament's Civil Liberties Committee, said: "Turkey's rejection of Zana's appeal was an appalling violation of the right to a fair trail as guaranteed in international law - and an unacceptable slap in the face of the European Court of Human Rights.
"All charges against Zana and her colleagues must be dropped immediately to bring an end to this repeated miscarriage of justice once and for all."
ENDS
Editors' Note: Background information
on the case can be found at
http://www.amnestyusa.org/action/special/zana.html
For more information please contact Ben on 020 7407 6280, 07973 823358 or at press@greenmeps.org.uk