Turkey’s ruling Justice and Development party, as well as nationalist National Movement party had introduced a bill related to the amendments of the Regulations to the parliament, which was legalized by the latter. The bill envisages the prohibition of usage of several “abusive expressions” by deputies. This is reported by the French “Nor Haratch” newspaper. According to the bill, the usage of “abusive” geographical names and expressions, such as, “Kurdistan”, “Kurdish towns”, “Amet, the capital of Kurdistan”, “Lazistan”, “Ionia” (today’s name given to the south coast of the cities of Izmir and Aytın), or “Pontus”, will be prohibited.
Also, the terms “Armenian Genocide” and “Dersim Massacre” are also banned, which is also considered “abusive expressions”.
Indeed, from now on members of parliament who use these expressions in the National Assembly of Turkey will be fined.
The opposition Republican People’s Party and the pro-Kurdish Party of Democratic Nations opposed to these restrictions, but the defenders of the resolution insisted that “this has nothing to do with the democracy or freedom of speech. This refers to the situation threatening our existence”.
It should be noted that Armenian deputy Garo Paylan, speaking about the Genocide, created a turmoil in the Turkish parliament last January, after which he was deprived of the right to participate in three parliamentary sessions.