Former HDP MP Ömer Faruk Gergerlioğlu released from jail after top court's rights violation ruling

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Former Peoples' Democratic Party (HDP) lawmaker Ömer Faruk Gergerlioğlu was released from jail on July 6 evening, a few hours after a local court ordered his release. 

The politician's son Salih Gergerlioğlu shared his and his father's picture on Twitter, saying: "Now he is free :)"

The former HDP lawmaker also took Twitter after his release from prison, saying: "Where were we? :)" 

After being denied to make a press statement in front of Ankara's Sincan Prison, Gergerlioğlu held a press conference at the HDP headquarters. 

"They can tyrannize as much as they want. We have won by resisting all the way. When they were taking me out of my house by beating, we had said, 'The story will not end here.' We had said, 'We will not take a step back because we are right,'" he said. 

He said that thousands of people like himself suffer at the hands of the judiciary upon the government's instructions. 

"Five years ago, just because I asked for peace, I have been declared a terrorist and was dismissed from my post as a public doctor after 27 years in service. And then judiciary processes were launched...Hundreds of thousands of people are made to suffer like me," he said. 

Earlier on July 6, the Constitutional Court sent the rights violation ruling it issued in the politician's case to the Kocaeli 2nd Heavy Penal Court.

After the top court's move, the local court ordered Gergerlioğlu's release from jail. 

The Constitutional Court ruled on July 1 that Gergerlioğlu's rights were violated with his imprisonment on terrorism charges, opening the way for his release and restoration of his parliamentary status.

The top court said that Gergerlioğlu's right to be elected and engage in political activity as well as his right to personal freedom and security had been violated.

Gergerlioğlu's file will be sent to parliament for him to regain his status.

Gergerlioğlu had his parliamentary status removed in March and was jailed in April after a 2-1/2 year jail sentence on politically motivated "terror" charges.

The charges were related to a link he shared on Twitter to a news story about the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK). He was found guilty in February 2018 of “spreading terrorism propaganda” on the basis of the social media post.

Before being elected to parliament in the 2018 general election, Gergerlioğlu was well known for his engagement over many years in human rights activism alongside his professional work as a doctor. After he was arbitrarily dismissed by emergency decree from working in the public health sector, he worked briefly in a private hospital and continued his human rights work.

After he became a lawmaker, Gergerlioğlu made human rights his main focus and has been a voice for tens of thousands of people arbitrarily dismissed and jailed in the aftermath of the 2016 failed coup attempt. 

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