HDP officials show reporters a listening device which they say they found in their Istanbul office
Credit: HDP
A Turkish opposition party says it has discovered dozens of listening devices in its offices, in what they claim is a state-backed campaign to spy on the government’s rivals.
Turkey’s left-wing People’s Democratic Party (HDP), which supports LGBT rights, feminism and the Kurdish minority, says it found the microphones hidden in plug sockets and lamps in up to 40 Istanbul district offices.
In an interview with the Telegraph, Elif Bulut, the co-chair of HDP’s Istanbul division, said so many bugs had been found that it was almost impossible to keep track of them.
"It’s so normal for us that we don’t even inform our colleagues when we find them. I don’t think there is an office without a listening device," Ms Bulut said. The Turkish government has denied the allegations.
In one recent incident, HDP officials’ suspicions were raised when Turkish police became aware of the details of a press briefing which had not been made public, prompting a search of their Istanbul offices for devices.
“We were thinking that they were listening to us from outside the building. Then, during a press conference, we wanted to use a triple plug socket,” she said. "We realized it was broken, and one of our friends opened it up. We saw the latest device. They put this one inside the triple plug, but the others were mostly in wall plugs and lamps.”
Photograph of one of the listening devices hidden in lamps and plug sockets
Credit: HDP
The wiretapping claims emerge as Turkey faces international criticism over a widening crackdown on free expression and civil society, including the arrest of dozens of journalists under Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, the country’s hardline president.
Emma Sinclair-Webb, Turkey director at Human Rights Watch, said that HDP in particular had been subjected to “immense pressure,” with many of its officials jailed on “baseless” terrorism charges to “keep them out of politics.”
“If you go into politics and emphasize your Kurdish identity in Turkey, after all these years you still get into trouble,” she said. “Turkey has a long long way to go if it is to ensure respect for minority rights and to end entrenched discrimination against minorities.”
Concerns about wiretapping have spread to other rivals of Mr Erdogan, with Faik Öztrak, the spokesman of main opposition party CHP, warning that “there is such a concern in almost all opposition parties today.”
Earlier this month, HDP officials held a press conference where they presented the listening devices, which they described as the “clearest proof” so far that the Turkish government was spying on opposition parties.
“The government is engaged in illicit, unlawful, secret methods,” Ms Bulut told reporters. “They think they can beef up case files when they arrest one of us,” he added, referring to numerous arrests of HDP members by Turkish authorities.
While the Turkish government denies the wiretapping claims, it has accused HDP of endorsing terrorism by supporting the PKK, a Kurdish Marxist group which is battling Turkish troops on the country’s southern border with Syria.
PKK is proscribed as a terrorist organisation by Britain and the United States, though it played a key role in liberating Iraq’s vulnerable Yazidi community from Islamic State terrorists in 2014 as the rest of the world stood by.
In response, HDP said the party has "no organic connection" with the PKK, though it does support Kurdish rights, and that if there was any proof of the former charge then the Turkish government would have closed down the party by now.
The Telegraph approached the Turkish government for comment about the allegations but did not receive a response.
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