Ultranationalist leader targets top court in Turkey

The leader of the ultra-nationalist MHP (National Movement Party), Devlet Bahceli, described the Constitutional Court’s (AYM) decision to release the treasury grant to the People's Democratic Party (HDP) as "imprudent and unnational."

The Constitutional Court on Thursday surprisingly overturned its own previous narrow ruling to block the HDP accounts holding state funds, while hearing a broader case in which the state sought to ban the party for alleged links to the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK), which the HDP denies.

"The members of the court who voted for this decision have not listened to the voice of their conscience, but to the voice of treason. They call it justice when it works for them, and they are hypocritical enough to claim that justice is suspended when it does not," Bahceli said.

He added:

"The Constitutional Courts foundation and procedural principles should be radically changed, and its disastrous existing structure that extends olive branches to traitors should be completely eliminated. The Constitutional Court is not the court of the Turkish nation. We consider it an abomination that opens the treasury to terrorists."

The HDP, the third-largest party in parliament, is entitled to 539 million liras ($28.5 million) in party funds this year.

The party, which won 11.7% of the vote in the 2018 parliamentary elections, is not part of the main opposition alliance. However, it has signaled that it could support the bloc's candidate, Kemal Kilicdaroglu, in the presidential election if principles are agreed upon.