“We have a pool of names. We have received suggestions for the presidential candidate. Talks carried out within and outside the party suggest that [former HDP co-chair] Selahattin Demirtas has emerged as the front-running potential candidate,” Temelli said in a speech he delivered in the southeastern province of Diyarbakır.

Demirtas has been held in Edirne Prison since November 2016 and is being tried in a series of other cases, facing decades in jail on charges including “leading a terrorist organization.”

On April 30, prosecutors demanded five-year jail sentences for Demirtas and HDP Ankara deputy Sirri Sureyya Onder on charges of “making terrorist propaganda.”

Reporter’s code: 50101