Adnan Selçuk Mızraklı

Adnan Selçuk Mızraklı (born in Siverek, 1963) is a Kurdish politician of the Peoples' Democratic Party (HDP) and former member of the Grand National Assembly of Turkey and Mayor of Diyarbakir.

Early life and education When Mızraklı was three years old his family moved to Eskişehir due to his father's work. Due to his involvement in the DTK, he was arrested for 2 months in 2017. In the Municipal election of the 31 March 2019 he was elected as Mayor of Diyarbakir with 62.93% of the votes. He became well known amongst the opposition as he made public a luxury suite in Diyarbakir Municipality which was built before he took office. Due to political pressure, he was dismissed as the Mayor of Diyarbakir on 19 August 2019. The population of Diyarbakir protested for weeks against this decision.

Legal prosecution

Mızraklı was detained on the 21 October 2019 and charged with being a member of terror organization. The prosecution alleged that Mizrakli had attended funerals of PKK members and that he shall have performed surgery for an alleged member of the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK). Human Rights Watch stated that "the evidence in an indictment against him does not support the charge that he was involved with terrorism or committed crimes." On the 9 March 2020 he was sentenced to 9 years and 4 months imprisonment for membership in a terror organization. He was accused of terror propaganda since April 2020 in an additional case. In that case, the prosecution saw his participation in meetings organized by the HDP or his activism against the execution of Ramin Hossein-Penahi in Iran as terror propaganda. He is one of several elected mayors of the HDP, currently in detention in Turkey.