Abdullah Zeydan (born 13 March 1972 in Yüksekova) is a Turkish politician of Kurdish descent and a member of the Peoples Democratic Party (HDP).

Education

He attended primary school and high school in Yüksekova in the

Hakkari Province Hakkari or Hakkâri may refer to: *Hakkari (historical region), a historical region in modern-day Turkey and Iraq *Hakkâri (city), a city and the capital of Hakkâri Province, Turkey *Hakkâri Province, a province in southeast Turkey *Hakkari (el ...

Political career

Abdullah Zeydan was elected as a member of the

Grand National Assembly of Turkey The Grand National Assembly of Turkey ( tr, ), usually referred to simply as the TBMM or Parliament ( tr, or ''Parlamento''), is the unicameral Turkish legislature. It is the sole body given the legislative prerogatives by the Turkish Consti ...

in the general elections of June 2015 representing Hakkari and re-elected on the snap elections in November of the same year.

Juridical prosecution

He was imprisoned on the 4 November 2016 together with fellow HDP deputies and charged for having attended funerals of members of the

Kurdistan Workers' Party The Kurdistan Workers' Party or PKK is a Kurdish militant political organization and armed guerrilla movement, which historically operated throughout Kurdistan, but is now primarily based in the mountainous Kurdish-majority regions of sou ...

(PKK) but also the Peoples Protections Forces (YPG) who fought against the

Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant An Islamic state is a state that has a form of government based on Islamic law (sharia). As a term, it has been used to describe various historical polities and theories of governance in the Islamic world. As a translation of the Arabic term ...

(ISIL). Abdullah Zeydan was imprisoned in the

F-type prison F-Type-Prisons, officially called F-type High Security Closed Institutions for the Execution of Sentences (''F tipi cezaevi / F Tipi Yüksek Güvenlikli Kapalı Ceza İnfaz Kurumu''), are high-security prisons designated by Turkish Law 5275 on the ...

Edirne Edirne (, ), formerly known as Adrianople or Hadrianopolis (Greek: Άδριανούπολις), is a city in Turkey, in the northwestern part of the province of Edirne in Eastern Thrace. Situated from the Greek and from the Bulgarian borders, ...

together with

Selahattin Demirtaş Selahattin Demirtaş (born 10 April 1973) is a politician, author, and former member of the parliament of Turkey. He was the co-leader of the left-wing pro- Kurdish Peoples' Democratic Party (HDP), serving alongside Figen Yüksekdağ from 2014 ...

, with who he joined a

hunger strike A hunger strike is a method of non-violent resistance in which participants fast as an act of political protest, or to provoke a feeling of guilt in others, usually with the objective to achieve a specific goal, such as a policy change. Most ...

in protest of the detention conditions in March 2017. He also joined an other

in protest of the detention conditions of

Abdullah Öcalan Abdullah Öcalan ( ; ; born 4 April 1949), also known as Apo (short for Abdullah in Turkish and Kurdish for "uncle"), is a political prisoner and founding member of the militant Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK). Öcalan was based in Syria from ...

, which was initiated by

Leyla Güven Leyla Güven (born 6 May 1964, Cihanbeyli, Konya, Turkey) is HDP MP for Hakkari, co-chair of the Democratic Society Congress (DTK) and former mayor of the municipality of Viranşehir in the Şanlıurfa Province of Southeast Anatolia of Turkey, wh ...

. He was to take part in it for 10 days. He was punished for this the same month by the prison authorities, but Öcalan was permitted a visit of his brother days after Zeydan joined the hunger strike. In January 2018, Abdullah Zeydan was sentenced to 8 years imprisonment for allegedly supporting a terrorist organization making terrorist propaganda. In November 2019, a court ruled he be released. But this decision was opposed by the prosecutor of

Diyarbakır Diyarbakır (; ; ; ) is the largest Kurdish-majority city in Turkey. It is the administrative center of Diyarbakır Province. Situated around a high plateau by the banks of the Tigris river on which stands the historic Diyarbakır Fortress, ...

on the same day, following which the court reconsidered and decided to keep him imprisoned. The State Prosecutor to the

Court of Cassation A court of cassation is a high-instance court that exists in some judicial systems. Courts of cassation do not re-examine the facts of a case, they only interpret the relevant law. In this they are appellate courts of the highest instance. In th ...

in Turkey

Bekir Şahin Bekir Şahin (born 1 March 1960, Mecitözü, Turkey) is a jurist, former judge and the current State Prosecutor of the Court of Cassation in Turkey. Education He was educated at the Imam Hatip school and studied law at the Dokuz Eylül Univers ...

filed a lawsuit before the

Constitutional Court A constitutional court is a high court that deals primarily with constitutional law. Its main authority is to rule on whether laws that are challenged are in fact unconstitutional, i.e. whether they conflict with constitutionally established ...

on the 17 March 2021, demanding for Zeydan and 686 other HDP politicians a five-year ban to participate in politics. The lawsuit was filed together with the request for a closure of the HDP due to the parties alleged organizational links with the PKK. On the 6 January 2022, after having attended a hearing in Elâzığ, Zeydan was released from prison.

Personal life

He is married to Dilsah Zeydan and the couple has three daughters. He is the son of Mustafa Zeydan, a former deputy of the

Justice and Development Party Justice and Development Party may refer to several political parties, the best-known ones being: * Justice and Development Party (Morocco) * Justice and Development Party (Turkey) Justice and Development Party may also refer to: * Justice and De ...

(AKP)

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Zeydan, Abdullah 1972 births Kurdish politicians Deputies of Hakkâri Living people Politicians arrested in Turkey People from Hakkâri Province Turkish Kurdish politicians Peoples' Democratic Party (Turkey) politicians