Brussels, 20/05/2016 (Agence Europe) - On Friday 20 May, High Representative of the EU for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy Federica Mogherini and European Commissioner for Neighbourhood Policy and Enlargement Negotiations Johannes Hahn spoke of their serious concern about the Turkish law authorising the removal of parliamentary immunity from certain Turkish parliamentarians.
“In line with relevant international recommendations, immunity must apply to all on a non-discriminatory basis and decisions on lifting immunity must be based on the merits of each specific case, according to transparent criteria and not subject to any political considerations”, they say in a press release.
Adopted the same day by the Turkish Parliament (by 376 votes in favour out of 550, in other words over the two thirds of votes required for direct adoption without going through a referendum), the Turkish law allows the immunity to be lifted of Turkish parliamentarians who are targeted by judicial procedures.
According to S&D Group leader Gianni Pittella, the law “violates the Turkish constitution” and is “clearly targeting members of the opposition People's Democratic Party (HDP)” - a pro-Kurdish party. Fifty of the HDP's 59 parliamentarians in the Turkish Parliament could thus be prosecuted as “supporters of terrorism”. “This is a clear violation of their rights as MPs designed to eliminate opposition, and will only worsen the conflict [in the south-east of Turkey] by shutting down democratic dialogue”, Pittella added, saying that silencing parliamentarians for their political viewpoint was against all democratic principles. (Original version in French by Matthieu Bion and Camille-Cerise Gessant)