CYPRIOT communists joined calls today for the immediate release of jailed Peoples’ Democratic Party (HDP) leaders Selahattin Demirtas, Figen Yuksekdag and others held as political prisoners in Turkey.

The Progressive Party of Working People (Akel) condemned the Turkish state’s “unlawful and political discrimination” of HDP representatives.

In a letter to Turkey’s opposition party, Akel insisted Turkey must abide by European Court of Human Rights ruling which declared that the lifting of parliamentary immunity of 40 HDP MPs in 2016 was unlawful.