MESOP Tactical manouevres : Pro-Kurdish BDP leader says he will no longer consider co-chairmanship

27-4-2014 – Zaman – Pro-Kurdish Peace and Democracy Party (BDP) Co-chairman Selahattin Demirtaş told the press on Friday that he is no longer considering co-chairmanship in his political career.

“I have no plan to be the co-chairman of any institution or political party. I am not considering candidacy [for any position],” he told reporters in the southeastern province of Diyarbakır. It was unclear whether the BDP co-chair means to formally resign from his post following the statement. Demirtaş’s statement came after his party decided that all its deputies should enroll in its recently created sister party, the Peoples’ Democracy Party (HDP).

In a meeting held last week at BDP headquarters in Ankara, the two parties also formally merged, although the BDP the will continue to exist with BDP mayors continuing to serve under the party’s banner.  The HDP’s less hard-line pro-Kurdish stance will seemingly serve to appease fears in the Turkish public about Kurds separating from Turkey, a goal for which the terrorist Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) fought for nearly 30 years until the end of 2012 when the government launched — with imprisoned PKK leader Abdullah Öcalan — a settlement process to resolve the country’s Kurdish issue and terrorism problem. http://www.todayszaman.com/news-346113-pro-kurdish-bdp-leader-says-he-will-no-longer-consider-co-chairmanship.html