Mayor in SE Turkey faces life in prison over assisting PKK

Turkish prosecutors have requested "aggravated" life imprisonment for four people, including a mayor, in the southeastern province of Diyarbakir for reportedly providing the PKK terrorist organization with a municipality-owned excavator to dig a pit in September last year. 

The Chief Prosecutor’s Office in Diyarbakir on Wednesday issued an indictment, which provided detailed information about the incident, the PKK, and the formation of YDG-H, the youth branch of the PKK. 

Abdulsamed Bilgin, mayor of the Dicle district in Diyarbakir, deputy mayor Fevziye Arukan, the district’s technical works director, Ilhami Guzel, and excavator operator Fesih K. have been accused of "deteriorating the unity and integrity of the state".  

Bilgin and Guzel were arrested in October last year and later freed.

According to the indictment, the PKK terrorists dug pits with help from construction machines before carrying out an assault in Dicle district of Diyarbakir province on Sep. 2, 2015. The terrorist organization also attacked security forces by planting explosives into the pits and detonating them. 

The armed rocket and bomb attacks on Sept.2, 2015 by the terrorist group broke connection of the Dicle district with neighboring districts through these pits, said the indictment.

On the same day, a construction machine belonging to Dicle Municipality was found abandoned in an empty field after a pit had been dug in Dicle. 
The machine’s operator Fesih K.,who used it during the incidents, was arrested, according to the information provided in the indictment.  

On Tuesday, Turkish Deputy Prime Minister Numan Kurtulmus said there were many rulings on detaining, arresting, and firing mayors and municipality officials, who were affiliated with the PKK terrorist organization, calling their relationship with the organization "unacceptable".