Sebahat Tuncel is a Kurdish politician, women’s rights advocate, former nurse and member of Parliament

Grand National Assembly of Turkey

The Grand National Assembly of Turkey , usually referred to simply as the Meclis , is the unicameral Turkish legislature. It is the sole body given the legislative prerogatives by the Turkish Constitution. It was founded in Ankara on 23 April 1920 in the midst of the Turkish War of Independence...

 in Turkey

Turkey

Turkey , known officially as the Republic of Turkey , is a Eurasian country located in Western Asia and in East Thrace in Southeastern Europe...

.
She was born in Malatya

Malatya

Malatya ) is a city in southeastern Turkey and the capital of its eponymous province.-Overview:The city site has been occupied for thousands of years. The Assyrians called the city Meliddu. Following Roman expansion into the east, the city was renamed in Latin as Melitene...

 and studied Cartography and Land Surveying in Mersin

Mersin

-Mersin today:Today, Mersin is a large city spreading out along the coast, with Turkey's second tallest skyscraper , huge hotels, an opera house, expensive real estate near the sea or up in the hills, and many other modern urban...

 University and began her political career through the Women’s Branch of the Party of People’s Democracy (HADEP) in 1998. She is currently Vice Co-chairperson and Istanbul

Istanbul

Istanbul , historically known as Byzantium and Constantinople , is the largest city of Turkey. Istanbul metropolitan province had 13.26 million people living in it as of December, 2010, which is 18% of Turkey's population and the 3rd largest metropolitan area in Europe after London and...

 Deputy of the Democratic Society Party

Democratic Society Party

The Democratic Society Party was a Kurdish Kurdish nationalist political party in Turkey. The party considered itself social democratic, and had observer status in the Socialist International. It was considered to be the successor of the Democratic People's Party...

 (DTP

DTP

-Computing:* Distributed transaction processing, in computer systems, usually refers to the X/Open model of co-ordinating transactions between multiple participants* Desktop publishing, a technological publishing method * Dynamic Trunking Protocol...

), which she helped to found. She has also worked with international organizations including UNDP and Amnesty International

Amnesty International

Amnesty International is an international non-governmental organisation whose stated mission is "to conduct research and generate action to prevent and end grave abuses of human rights, and to demand justice for those whose rights have been violated."Following a publication of Peter Benenson's...

. She went on trial for membership of PKK in 2006, accused of making frequent trips to PKK camps in northern Iraq, and was subsequently imprisoned. She ran for the parliamentary elections

Turkish general election, 2007

Turkey's 16th general election was held on July 22, 2007 and resulted in a resounding victory for the incumbent Justice and Development Party...

 from prison and after winning a seat in Istanbul with 93,000 votes, was released from custody in July 2007. She is the youngest woman to serve in the Turkish parliament and the first person in Turkish history to be elected to parliament from prison.