03/09/2019 (Agence Europe) – On Tuesday 3 September, the Party of European Socialists urged Turkey to release the former co-chairman of the pro-Kurdish HDP party. On Monday, a court in Ankara ordered his release as part of his terrorism trial. Mr Demirtas was already sentenced in December 2018 to four years and eight months in prison for terrorist propaganda, but the sentence was found illegal by the European Court of Human Rights. "By keeping him in prison, Turkey is violating Selahattin’s rights as well as the political rights of the Turkish people (...) We demand that Demirtas be freed immediately", said PES President and MEP Sergei Stanishev. The Bulgarian considered that the charges against Mr Demirtas were motivated "by political considerations and (that) their sole purpose was to eliminate the democratic opposition". (CG)