Overview
- The European Court of Human Rights issued a final, binding ruling ordering Selahattin Demirtas’s release after Turkey’s last appeal was rejected.
- Nationalist MHP leader Devlet Bahceli, a key Erdogan ally, said freeing Demirtas would be beneficial, a rare endorsement from a longtime critic of Kurdish political demands.
- President Tayyip Erdogan said Turkey has entered a new phase toward ending PKK violence and signaled openness to Abdullah Ocalan addressing a parliamentary commission.
- Opposition parties, lawyers and rights groups demanded immediate compliance, with the Turkish Bar Association noting a rare Article 18 finding that points to politically motivated detention.
- Demirtas has been jailed since 2016 and received a sentence of more than 40 years in 2024, while the pro-Kurdish DEM party remains parliament’s third-largest bloc and Turkish authorities offered no immediate response to the ruling.