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TürkiyeNew arrests of elected officials from the main opposition party
Three new mayors of the main opposition party in Türkiye was arrested on Saturday on the pretext of an investigation into accusations of organized crime.
This photo, taken and disseminated by the Turkish presidential press service on September 11, 2019, shows Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan (on the left) welcoming Zeydan Karalar (right), mayor of Adana and member of the People’s Republican Party (CHP), the main secular opposition party. In the center is Mansur Yavaş, mayor of Ankara (CHP), before a meeting in Ankara. On July 5, 2025, the Turkish authorities arrested three other opposition mayors in the context of an alleged corruption investigation, CHP officials announced. (Photo obtained from the Turkish / AFP presidential press service)
AFPThese arrests were denounced as a “political operation” by those responsible for this training. They are the latest elected officials from the Republican People’s Party (CHP), on which the Turkish government has exerted increasing pressure since its broad victory against the AKP party of President Recep Tayyip Erdogan during the local elections of 2024.
These arrests are linked to an investigation into allegations of corruption which led to the dismissal in March of the powerful mayor of Istanbul, Ekrem Imamoglu, the most important political rival of Mr. Erdogan and the CHP candidate for the presidential election of 2028.
The incarceration of Mr. Imamoglu had sparked mass demonstrations and the worst riots that Turkey has known since 2013.
At the start of the week, police arrested 137 people as part of an investigation into allegations of corruption in the opposition bastion of Izmir, the third city in the country.
The three mayors arrested on Saturday, Zeydan Karalar, Muhittin Bocek and Abdurrahman Tutdere, are respectively at the head of the cities of Adana, Antalya and Adiyaman, in the south and southeast of Turkey.
As he was taken by police officers, a journalist managed to question the mayor of Adana about the reason for his arrest. “Where there is an influential journalist or politician, they reduce him to silence,” replied Mr. Karalar, according to the images broadcast on social networks.
“We will not bow to injustice, anarchy or political operations,” reacted on X Mansur Yavas, the mayor of Ankara. The councilor of the Turkish capital has castigated “a system where the law folds and varies according to politics, where justice applies to one group and not another”.
The pro-Kurdish party Dem, the third most important in the Turkish parliament, also denounced the arrests. “This persecution of elected officials must stop,” wrote Tulay Hatimogullari, co-president of the DEM, on X.
“Not to recognize the will of the people provokes profound divisions within society,” she wrote. “These operations are not a solution, but block the road to a democratic Türkiye,” she said.
The DEM has collaborated closely with the Erdogan government to help put an end to the conflict that has been going on for decades with the Kurds. It facilitated the talks which, in May, led the Kurdish activists of the PKK to put an end to their armed struggle, a conflict that cost the lives of nearly 40,000 people.
Saturday’s arrests are the last of a series of legal maneuvers aimed at the CHP.
On Monday, an Ankara court began examining a case concerning allegations to purchase votes during the primaries of the party in 2023, which could lead to the cancellation of the election of his leader, the popular Ozgur Ozel, who made himself known for his role in the coordination of demonstrations in March.
According to the Anadolu news agency, the mayors of Adana and Adiyaman were linked to a case concerning allegations of tendering and corruption calls. Police also arrested the deputy mayor of the Buyukcekmece district in Istanbul, Ahmet Sahin.
The mayor of Antalya was placed in detention as part of a separate investigation into allegations of corruption, and the police also arrested his son.
