Ruling AKP removes deputy’s insults from official parliament records

Duvar English

A main Republican People's Party (CHP) lawmaker has said that the ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) had tampered with the official written records of Turkish parliament to have an insult uttered by an AKP deputy erased.

CHP MP Mehmet Bekaroğlu and AKP MP Şirin Ünal had an argument during a meeting of parliament's planning and budget committee, daily Birgün reported on Nov. 12. Bekaroğlu said that during this argument he was referred to as a “low-quality” person by Ünal.

The CHP lawmaker said that this wording however has been erased from the written records of Turkish parliament as it could have been subject of an insult case.

“A big crime has been committed at parliament. They are tampering with official recordings. This is the first time that such an incident is happening,” Bekaroğlu told Birgün.

The CHP lawmaker called on the AKP to release the audio recording of the meeting as soon as possible. “Taking out a word from the official records is a big crime, which should not be underestimated. Not even a letter can be taken out of the records, which can be considered as holy as they are the documents of our speeches,” he said.

“Those who accused me of being a 'low-quality' person have not even owned up to their statements and have committed a big injustice. This needs to be looked into; what has been done is forgery,” he said.

AKP MP Ünal had made the headlines last year after Nadira Kadirova (23) was found dead in his house. Kadirova was an Özbek immigrant worker and she was working as a caretaker for the family. It was claimed that she shot herself dead with Ünal’s weapon in her room. The prosecutor’s office had concluded that there was a lack of grounds for legal action and the investigation into the incident had been dismissed, despite claims by the young woman's close circle that the deputy had been harassing her.