© Geoffroy Van Der Hasselt/Agence France PressePeople hold a banner reading "Stop Erdogan (Turkey's President), do not touch our elected representatives. Turkey's government out of Rojava, out of Kurdistan" during in a protest in Place de la Republique in Paris on November 5, 2016
Turkey's pro-Kurdish HDP party (Peoples' Democratic Party) has stated that it will "halt its legislative efforts" in the country's parliament in the wake of the arrest of its leaders by the Turkish authorities.
"After discussions with our parliamentary group and our central executive board, we have decided to halt our legislative efforts in light of everything that has happened," party spokesman Ayhan Bilgen said in a statement that was read out and then posted online.
The party will not stop its activities in the parliament entirely, however. Though its deputies will remain members, they won't participate in general assembly sittings or parliamentary commission meetings.
On Friday, Turkey arrested the HDP's two leaders, Selahattin Demirtas and Figen Yuksekdag, as well as 13 other legislators from the party, as part of a terrorism investigation. Over 1,000 HDP members have been formally arrested in the past year, according to Reuters.
Ankara accuses the HDP of having links to the PKK, or Kurdistan Workers' Party, which is banned in Turkey and has taken responsibility for several terrorist bombings. The HDP denies having these links.
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