Seanad debates

Thursday, 21 May 2009

Human Rights Issues

 

Photo of David NorrisDavid Norris (Independent)

I welcome the Minister of State, Deputy Roche. I raise a human rights matter which involves a distinguished parliamentarian and diplomat, Mr. Remzi Kartal, who is a member of the Kurdish National Congress. Mr. Kartal visited the Oireachtas Joint Committee on Foreign Affairs with a delegation of Kurdish representatives some years ago. The Minister of State may have met him at that time. I met him and have a photograph of the two of us in Leinster House.

Mr. Kartal was granted political asylum in Belgium in 1994. I am sure the Minister of State will remember the events preceding this because a number of duly elected Kurdish members of parliament were imprisoned by the Turkish Government. It was a most extraordinary invasion of parliamentary rights. In any case, he was elected as a representative of the Democracy Party in Turkey.

Mr. Kartal was arrested in Spain in March of this year. I say as a kind of codicil to that arrest, which was flagrantly illegal, that a colleague of his, Mr. Eyyüp Doru, was also placed under similar restrictions by the Spanish authorities.

Over the past ten years, Mr. Kartal has been working for peaceful reconciliation for the Kurdish people and he has had complete freedom of movement around the states of the European Union. In March of this year, he went to Madrid to take part in a very ancient Kurdish festival called Newroz which is widely celebrated in the area of Turkey where Kurdish people predominate. He was arrested in Spain and is now subject to the possibility of being forcibly extradited to Turkey at the request of the Turkish authorities. This would be illegal under international law and I ask the Minister to protest strongly to the Spanish and Turkish authorities.

Following his arrest, he was taken to prison, held there for a couple of days and then released on condition that he must stay in a named residence, remain in Spain and report twice a week to the police. The same conditions operate in the case of Mr. Eyyüp Doru.

In this case, Turkey has abused the powers of Interpol, a matter which should also be looked at. In addition, the UNHCR has warned that in the eventuality of the return to Turkey of these two gentlemen, they face the strong possibility of torture. That reinforces my view that this possible procedure is completely illegal.

Why has this happened? Part of the reason may well be because there is a personal friendship between Mr. Erdogan, the Turkish Prime Minister, and Mr. Zapatero, the Spanish Prime Minister. Even though I have some respect for both gentlemen, that is not sufficient reason to infringe the law.

Furthermore, the dossier produced in the Spanish court contained material that was used four years ago in Germany when a similar approach was made to the German authorities and, in consequence, Mr. Kartal was arrested, brought to court and tried. The Minister of State should be aware that the German court threw out those accusations stating they were a fabrication without any substance. A German court found that to be the case but now the Spanish are using the same entirely discredited material to facilitate the inhibition of movement and the possible extradition of Mr. Kartal.

Everything is made considerably worse by the fact that the Spanish Cabinet has taken a decision to extradite. On Friday, 8 May, it approved the extradition of both Mr. Kartal and Mr. Doru to Turkey. That is a most disgraceful abuse of the courts and of international diplomacy and is a violation of the fundamental rights of this distinguished former parliamentarian and diplomat. I ask the Minister of State to intervene on his behalf.

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