Kurdish deputy tells about the moments he was beaten by the police

The Kurdish deputy who was subjected to police violence during a demonstration on Sunday told +Gercek about the incident, a day after a state official claimed that the deputy tried to deceive the public by creating a false impression during the incident.

Habip Eksik, a medical doctor by profession and a deputy for the Peoples' Democratic Party (HDP), told +Gercek's Seda Taskin how the incident in the Kurdish-majority city of Yuksekova took place:

"The police targeted us and the demonstrators after an instruction by the police chief of Yuksekova district. They encircled us, and attacked with pepper gas and rubber bullets. Only six or seven people were left with us by the time the crowd was dispersed. They encircled us as well, pressing their shields against us, choking us. I saw a reporter and my advisor being arrested, and eventually only four of us were left: Me, deputy Sait Dede and two party officials. When I saw Dede being attacked by over a dozen police officers and realized that I would be their next target, I tried to record it with my mobile phone. The police chief shouted, 'Take this one too.' The police then started pounding on us."

He continued:

"As I was trying to cover my face with my hand to protect it, I received a blow on my leg. When I heard that noise coming from my leg, I instantly knew it was broken. I collapsed under their blows. Although I told them that I was a deputy and my leg has been broken, they went on pounding on me and hitting me. They did everything they could to further injure me. They continued hitting me, trying to maim me, perhaps even to kill me. They began to withdraw when I managed to start recording. An ambulance arrived and I was taken to a hospital."

Eksik had a surgical operation for the fractures in his leg in Ankara on Monday.

The governor of Hakkari province issued a statement the same day saying that the deputies tried to create a false impression that they were beaten by the police, by "throwing themselves on the ground."