The Labour Party (in Turkish: ''Emek Partisi'', EMEP) is a

communist party A communist party is a political party that seeks to realize the socio-economic goals of communism. The term ''communist party'' was popularized by the title of '' The Manifesto of the Communist Party'' (1848) by Karl Marx and Friedrich Engel ...

Turkey Turkey ( tr, Türkiye ), officially the Republic of Türkiye ( tr, Türkiye Cumhuriyeti, links=no ), is a transcontinental country located mainly on the Anatolian Peninsula in Western Asia, with a small portion on the Balkan Peninsula ...

. Its chairman is Ercüment Akdeniz. The party was founded as ''Emek Partisi'' (Labour Party, EP) in 1996. Due to its ban by the

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 ...

, it was refounded with the name ''Emeğin Partisi'' (Party of Labour, EMEP), the same year. In 2005, the name "Emek Partisi" was reinstalled after the

European Court of Human Rights The European Court of Human Rights (ECHR or ECtHR), also known as the Strasbourg Court, is an international court of the Council of Europe which interprets the European Convention on Human Rights. The court hears applications alleging that ...

held the ban was a violation of Article 11 of the

European Convention on Human Rights The European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR; formally the Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms) is an international convention to protect human rights and political freedoms in Europe. Drafted in 1950 by ...

. Its ideological stance is in accord with the line of ICMLPO. In its programme, EMEP identifies its goal as creating a "Independent and Democratic Turkey". The party publishes the daily '' Evrensel'' (). The party is one of the participants in the People's Democratic Congress, a political initiative instrumental in founding the Peoples' Democratic Party in 2012. It is one of the few political parties in Turkey that recognize the Armenian deportations of 1915 as genocide.

Electoral results

The party participated in 1999 General Elections, getting 51,756 votes, i.e. 0.17% of the total vote. In 2007 EMEP became a constituent party in the Thousand Hopes Alliance formed around DEHAP. The aim of the alliance was to present its candidates to the

Turkish Parliament 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 ...

as independents in order to circumvent the 10% threshold which has been introduced in the

Turkish Constitution The Constitution of the Republic of Turkey ( tr, Türkiye Cumhuriyeti Anayasası), also known as the Constitution of 1982, is Turkey's fundamental law. It establishes the organization of the government and sets out the principles and rules of ...

in 1982. At the 2007 General Elections the party gathered 26,574 votes i.e. 0.08%.

Split in the Peoples' Democratic Party (HDP)

The Labour Party (EMEP) had been a member of the

Peoples' Democratic Congress , logo = Peoples' Democratic Congress.png , logo_size = 200px , leader1_title = Spokesman , leader1_name = Ertuğrul Kürkçü , leader2_title = Spokeswoman , leader2_name = Sebahat Tuncel , foundation ...

and had participated in the establishment of the HDP in 2012. However, the EMEP released a statement on 17 June 2014, announcing a split with the HDP. The split was attributed to the restructuring of the Kurdish nationalist

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 ...

into a local-only party under the new name

Democratic Regions Party The Democratic Regions Party ( tr, Demokratik Bölgeler Partisi, DBP, ku, Partiya Herêman a Demokratîk, PHD) is a Kurdish political party in the Republic of Turkey. The pro-minority rights Peoples' Democratic Party (HDP) acts as the fraterna ...

(DBP), while the BDP's parliamentary caucus would be integrated into the HDP. This would, in turn, require the HDP's constitution to be altered in order to ensure greater compliance and conformity with the ideology of the BDP. This caused the EMEP to formally announce their secession from the HDP, but stated that they would continue their participation with the HDK. Despite the split, the Labour Party endorsed the HDP presidential candidate

Selahattin Demirtaş Selahattin Demirtaş (born 10 April 1973) is a politician, author, and former member of the parliament of Turkey. He was the co-leader of the left-wing pro- Kurdish Peoples' Democratic Party (HDP), serving alongside Figen Yüksekdağ from 2014 ...

for the 2014 presidential election and also announced that they would not be running in the June 2015 general election.

References

External links

Labour Party
Official website

Presentation at the official website (March 2006)
Evrensel Daily Newspaper
(in Turkish)
Evrensel Daily Newspaper Europe Edition
(Some pages in German) {{Authority control 1996 establishments in Turkey Communist parties in Turkey European Court of Human Rights cases involving Turkey Far-left politics in Turkey Hoxhaist parties International Conference of Marxist–Leninist Parties and Organizations (Unity & Struggle) Labour parties Peoples' Democratic Congress Political parties established in 1996 International Meeting of Communist and Workers Parties