Country of origin information report Turkey March 2007

Devrimci Sosyalist Yön (Revolutionary Socialist Direction) [52b]
DHKP-C / DHKP/C now known as the DHKC (Revolutionary People’s Liberation Party - Front) (Devrimci Halk Kurtulus Partisi - Cephesi)

http://www.dhkc.net [54]

Illegal. Radical left. It was formed in 1993 as a splinter faction of Dev Sol (Devrimci-Sol, Revolutionary Left), which was founded in 1978 and which went out of existence following the split. The other splinter faction, known as THKP/C Devrimci Sol, is on hostile terms with DHKP/C, but constitutes a far smaller group in scale and significance. Although DHKP/C has long had a difficult relationship with the PKK, it has repeatedly expressed is solidarity with the Kurdish armed struggle.

DHKP/C seeks to overthrow the existing Turkish system of government by armed revolution and to replace it with a Marxist-Leninist state. Its terrorist operations are aimed in particular at the Turkish security forces and public figures, as well as at bodies seen by the group as “symbols of imperialism”. An attack on a bank in Istanbul in September 1999 left 23 people injured. The authorities struck a major blow at DHKP/C in 1999, arresting 160 members and seizing a large quantity of arms and explosives. In August 2000 the police caught seven DHKP/C members trying to plant a bomb at an airforce base. DHKP/C was in action again in 2001 with various operations, including an attack on a police car on 10 April, in which a passer-by was killed and two police officers injured. The US State Dept. report for 2001 records that DHKP-C suicide bombers attacked police stations in Istanbul in January and September 2001, killing several police officers and civilians.
Many of those involved in the hunger strikes in Turkish prisons in late 2000 and early 2001 came from among DHKP/C’s ranks. The group drummed up large-scale support throughout Europe for protests in connection with those events. In Turkey itself the protests included a bomb attack on a police station in Istanbul on 3 January 2001, following which the organisation announced that this was in retaliation for the deaths of 30 prisoners in a prison clearance operation. Turkey’s Anatolia news agency reported that, according to a circular distributed to police stations in Istanbul, the organisation had planned further attacks. [2a] Ankara State Security Court prosecutor Talat Salk alleged in a 1999 court case that DHKP/C conducts its activities under the names of HÖP (Haklar ve Özgürlükler Platformu) (Rights and Freedoms Platform), the outlawed Devrimci Gençlik (Revolutionary Youth), and TODEF (Türkiye Öğrenci Dernekleri Federasyonu) (Federation of Turkish Students and Youth Associations). [23a] Publications - “Yaşadiğimiz Vatan”, “Devrimci Sol”, “Kurtuluş” (Liberation). [52a] In UK the DHKP-C is part of the List of Proscribed international groups under the Terrorism Act 2000 (Proscribed Organisations). [101]