Sit-in against PKK terrorist group continues in southeast Turkey

DIYARBAKIR, Turkey

Families of children abducted or forcibly recruited by the PKK terrorist group continued their protest in southeastern Turkey on Monday.

The families in Diyarbakir province have been protesting for 714 days since Sept. 3, 2019, encouraging their children to lay down their weapons and surrender to Turkish authorities.

The protest outside the offices of the opposition Peoples' Democratic Party (HDP) in Diyarbakir started with three mothers who said their children had been forcibly recruited by the terrorists.

The Turkish government says the HDP has links to the terrorist PKK and has filed a court case to have the party banned over these ties.

Guzide Demir, one of the protesting mothers, said she has been protesting for her son Aziz for the past two years in front of the local HDP office.

"The HDP should send their own children [to the PKK]...I want my son back. I want my son back from the HDP," Demir said.

She called on her son to surrender along with other children who are in the hands of the terrorist PKK to Turkish security forces.

Suleyman Aydin, one of the protesting fathers, said the HDP took away his son Ozkan six years ago.

Calling on his son to surrender to the security forces, Aydin said "the HDP and PKK deceived you. Come surrender to your government."

In its more than 35-year terror campaign against Turkey, the PKK – listed as a terrorist group by Turkey, the US and the European Union – has been responsible for the deaths of at least 40,000 people, including women, children and infants.