Murat Bozlak, (30 December 1952,
Şereflikoçhisar
Şereflikoçhisar is a town and district of Ankara Province in the Central Anatolia region of Turkey, 148 km south of the city of Ankara. According to 2010 census, population of the district is 35898 of which 29,091 live in the town of Şeref ...
–4 January 2015) was a Kurdish politician active in several political parties. He was the president of the
People's Democracy Party
People's Democracy Party ( tr, Halkın Demokrasi Partisi, HADEP) was a Kurdish population, Kurdish political party in Turkey. Murat Bozlak founded the party on 11 May 1994. The party disbanded in 2003.
History
Bozlak's first chairmanship
P ...
(HADEP) and a member of the
Grand National Assembly of Turkey
The Grand National Assembly of Turkey ( tr, ), usually referred to simply as the TBMM or Parliament ( tr, or ''Parlamento''), is the unicameral Turkish legislature. It is the sole body given the legislative prerogatives by the Turkish Consti ...
for the
Peoples’ Democratic Party (HDP). Bozlak was a Kurdish politician and a founding member of the
Social Democracy Party (SODEP), the
Social Democratic Populist Party (SHP), the
People's Labor Party
The People's Labour Party ( tr, Halkın Emek Partisi, HEP), sometimes translated as the People's Work Party, was a pro-Kurdish political party in Turkey. It was founded on 7 June 1990 by seven members of the Turkish Grand National Assembly expell ...
(HEP), the
Democracy Party (DEP) and the HADEP. The first two parties were dissolved, while the latter three were banned by the Turkish
constitutional court
A constitutional court is a high court that deals primarily with constitutional law. Its main authority is to rule on whether laws that are challenged are in fact unconstitutional, i.e. whether they conflict with constitutionally established ...
.
Education and early life
Bozlak graduated from
Ankara University Law Faculty and following worked as an independent lawyer.
Political career
In February 1994, when he was secretary-general of the DEP, Bozlak survived an assassination attempt in
Ankara
Ankara ( , ; ), historically known as Ancyra and Angora, is the capital of Turkey. Located in the central part of Anatolia, the city has a population of 5.1 million in its urban center and over 5.7 million in Ankara Province, maki ...
. Following the detention of DEP deputies in March 1994 and a move to close the DEP, he founded the HADEP in May 1994.
In November 1998, after
Italy
Italy ( it, Italia ), officially the Italian Republic, ) or the Republic of Italy, is a country in Southern Europe. It is located in the middle of the Mediterranean Sea, and its territory largely coincides with the homonymous geographical re ...
refused to extradite
Abdullah Öcalan
Abdullah Öcalan ( ; ; born 4 April 1949), also known as Apo (short for Abdullah in Turkish and Kurdish for "uncle"), is a political prisoner and founding member of the militant Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK).
Öcalan was based in Syria from ...
to Turkey, he was detained together with dozens of other HADEP members and accused for having supported a country wide hunger strike in opposition to the Turkish approach towards the
Kurdish Turkish conflict In the same month he was arrested and sentenced to a prison term of one year for speeches he held in 1993.
Several Members of the
Parliament of the United Kingdom
The Parliament of the United Kingdom is the supreme legislative body of the United Kingdom, the Crown Dependencies and the British Overseas Territories. It meets at the Palace of Westminster, London. It alone possesses legislative suprema ...
around
Jeremy Corbyn
Jeremy Bernard Corbyn (; born 26 May 1949) is a British politician who served as Leader of the Opposition and Leader of the Labour Party from 2015 to 2020. On the political left of the Labour Party, Corbyn describes himself as a socialist ...
condemned the arrest, noting that Bozlak has only pursued a negotiated solution to the Kurdish-Turkish conflict. Bozlak was able to leave the prison in April 1997. He shortly delivered the presidency of the HADEP to Turan Demir in September 1999.
He reassumed the presidency during the 4th party congress in November 2000, after Demir was sentenced to 10 months in prison for terrorist propaganda. For the
general elections of November 2002, in worries of a party ban of the HADEP, he resigned from its presidency and joined the
Democratic People's Party (DEHAP). But his candidacy for the
Diyarbakır province
Diyarbakır Province ( tr, Diyarbakır ili, Zazaki: Suke Diyarbekır ku, Parêzgeha Amedê) is a Provinces of Turkey, province in southeastern Turkey. The province covers an area of 15,355 km2 and its population is 1,528,958. The provincia ...
was invalidated by the Turkish electoral authorities.
[Cigerli, Sabri; Saout, Didier Le (2005), pp.201–202] In his stead, his wife Zeycan Bozlak became the DEHAP candidate for Diyarbakır.
The HADEP was closed down by the Turkish constitutional court in October 2003 and Bozlak was banned from politics for five years.
In the June 2011 elections, Bozlak was elected to the Turkish parliament as an independent candidate representing Adana for the
Labor, Democracy and Freedom Bloc supported by the
Peace and Democracy Party
The Peace and Democracy Party ( tr, Barış ve Demokrasi Partisi, ku, Partiya Aştî û Demokrasiyê, BDP) was a Kurdish political party in Turkey existing from 2008 to 2014.
Development
BDP succeeded the Democratic Society Party (DTP) in 20 ...
(BDP). In 2014, Bozlak and 26 other MPs of the BDP joined the HDP, which following formed a parliamentary group.
Political positions
He maintained that
Kurdistan
Kurdistan ( ku, کوردستان ,Kurdistan ; lit. "land of the Kurds") or Greater Kurdistan is a roughly defined geo-cultural territory in Western Asia wherein the Kurds form a prominent majority population and the Kurdish culture, Kurdish la ...
was separated into four parts after
World War I
World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, the United States, and the Ottoman Empire, with fightin ...
and included into a "national-colonial system" and reserved for the Kurds the right for "self-determination".
He then also wanted that the Kurds in Turkey, were able to be recognized as such and allowed to organize themselves democratically.
He further denied that the Kurds had a problem with the Turkish people, but more with the Turkish Government.
Personal life
He served as an Adana deputy until January 2015, when he died. He refused a ceremony traditionally held for deceased deputies in front of the Turkish Parliament. Instead, a ceremony was held on 6 January in front of the headquarters of the DBP in Ankara before he was buried in his hometown village.
He was married and a father to three children.
[{{Cite web, title=Murat Bozlak Kimdir ? - Murat Bozlak Hayatı ve Biyografisi, url=https://www.haberler.com/murat-bozlak/biyografisi/, access-date=2020-10-21, website=www.haberler.com]
References
1952 births
2015 deaths
Turkish Kurdish politicians
Democratic Regions Party politicians
Politicians arrested in Turkey
Peoples' Democratic Party (Turkey) politicians
People from Şereflikoçhisar