The Diyarbakir Criminal Court sentenced former DEP deputy Leyla Zana to three years in prison on charges of making propaganda for a terrorist organization in two separate demonstrations.
Zana did not participate in Thursday’s hearing.
Zana delivered a speech during a meeting of the Democratic Society Party, or DTP, in the southeastern province of Diyarbakir on Sept. 20-22, 2008.
She also spoke at a sit-in-protest in Ankara’s Batikent neighborhood on Nov. 1-3, 2008.
The DEP was established in 1991. Zana, Hatip Dicle, Orhan Dogan, Ahmet Türk and Sirri Sakik, who were members of the People’s Labor Party, or HEP, joined the DEP after the HEP was closed.
After several deputies took their Parliament oath in Kurdish instead of Turkish in 1994, the DEP deputies’ immunity was lifted and they were sent to prison. The Constitutional Court closed the DEP on June 16, 1994.
The Constitutional Court decided on Dec. 11 to shut down the DTP on charges of links to the outlawed Kurdistan Workers’ Party, or PKK, which is considered a terrorist organization by Turkey, the U.S. and the European Union.
While disbanding the DTP, the court also banned 37 DTP members, including chairman Türk and deputy Aysel Tugluk, from politics for five years.

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