Kurdish party says 99 minors detained in Turkey over Syria protests

ISTANBUL,— Turkey’s pro-Kurdish DEM party said on Thursday that police detained dozens of minors over protests linked to a Syrian military operation targeting Kurds in Syrian Kurdistan (Rojava), last month.

The party called for a parliamentary investigation into the detentions.

In a petition submitted to parliament’s human rights commission, eight DEM lawmakers reported that at least 99 minors were detained in January in connection with demonstrations related to Syria.

The party said in a statement that 25 of those minors were formally arrested by court order.

The statement said prosecutors opened investigations on suspicion of organized propaganda over social media posts. The DEM party said the content should have been protected under freedom of expression provisions.

The petition referred to the case of a 16 year old detained in the western city of Izmir. The minor was taken into custody over a hair braiding video and a song shared online.

The party said the teenager was subjected to a strip search at a juvenile detention facility in the city.

Hair braiding became a symbol of solidarity with Syrian Kurds last month, as Damascus carried out a military offensive in northeastern Syria in an effort to reassert authority. The developments led to protests among Kurds in Turkish Kurdistan.

The DEM party said some of the minors were banned from seeing a lawyer for 24 hours. Others were subjected to physical violence during detention, questioned without legal representatives present and forced to sign documents under pressure.

The statement also said some minors were subjected to strip searches when entering detention centers. Others were insulted, cursed at or had their hair cut without consent.

During the Syrian operation, social media circulated videos of women braiding their hair in response to footage showing a Syrian soldier holding a braid that he said he had cut from a Kurdish woman fighter. The claim in the video could not be independently verified.

Turkish authorities responded by taking action against related social media posts. In the northwestern town of Kocaeli, a nurse was detained on charges of terrorist propaganda and later released under judicial control.

The Turkish Football Federation fined Amedspor FC 802,500 Turkish lira, nearly 18,500 U.S. dollars, for ideological propaganda after the club posted a 20 second hair braiding clip on social media. The federation also suspended the club’s president from all football activities for 15 days.

(With files from AFP)