Calling for Turkey to Immediately Release Kurdish Political Prisoner Selahattin Demirtas

Floor Speech

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Mr. RASKIN. Madam Speaker, today I rise to renew my call for President Recep Tayyip Erdogan of Turkey to immediately release Kurdish political prisoner Selahattin Demirtas, who has been held in prison for more than three years.

Last week, we celebrated Human Rights Day. Every year on December 10th, we commemorate the historic day in 1948 when the United Nations General Assembly adopted the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, proclaiming that all people, by their inherent dignity as members of the human family, are entitled to certain universal rights, no matter who they are, where they come from, what they believe in, or how they pray or think.

Seventy-one years later, under Erdogan, Turkey has conducted a campaign of repression against anyone who dares disagree with his barbaric policies. He has put the Dictator's Playbook into action, arresting journalists, targeting academics, threatening judicial independence, and jailing rival political leaders, such as Selahattin Demirtas and other members of the Peoples' Democratic Party. As an Executive Committee Member of the Tom Lantos Human Rights Commission, I am proud to stand with Demirtas and to advocate for his immediate release.

The bipartisan Lantos Commission is charged with promoting, defending, and advocating for international human rights as enshrined in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, such as the right not to be subjected to arbitrary arrest or detention, the right to freedom of opinion and expression, and the right to take part in government, directly or through freely chosen representatives. These are some of the rights that President Erdogan has callously disregarded in his continued imprisonment of Demirtas. As fellow parliamentarians, we cannot simply look the other way when a colleague is targeted by an oppressive regime simply because their party is out of power.

Today, I call on my House colleagues to stand with Selahattin Demirtas. I call on President Erdogan to immediately release not only Demirtas, but every political prisoner who is being incarcerated for advocating for democracy and human rights in Turkey. We must stand together with all those who stand up for human rights and democracy in the face of tyranny.

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