13 July 2017•Update: 14 July 2017
BERLIN
A German court has sentenced a man to three years and three months in prison on Thursday for leading a branch of the terrorist PKK in Germany.
The 47-year-old Muhlis K. was charged with “being a member of a foreign terrorist organization”.
The Higher Regional Court in the southern city of Stuttgart said in a statement that the convict was the chief operative of the terrorist organization in various regions in Germany between 2013 and 2016.
He was in the northern city of Dusseldorf when he was arrested in February last year.
The court underlined that the PKK was “a particularly dangerous terrorist organization” that not only targeted Turkish security personnel but also civilians in order to realize its goals, and founded various structures in Germany and other Western European countries for its funding, propaganda and recruitment activities.
The Turkish government has repeatedly urged German authorities to take measures against the PKK, which has also been outlawed in Germany since 1993.
The PKK has more than 14,000 followers in Germany among the Kurdish migrant population, and raised more than €13 million ($14.3 million) in 2015, according to reports by the German domestic intelligence agency, the BfV.
The terrorist group resumed its armed campaign against Turkey in July 2015 and since then has been responsible for the deaths of approximately 1,200 security personnel and civilians, including women and children.
