FLASH
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In Turkey, such waves of political arrests are common. During the Ergenekon trials held between 2007 and 2013 aimed at eliminating the then military tutelage regime, dozens of arrests were used...
Ekrem Imamoglu, the imprisoned mayor of Istanbul, has been isolated in a cell for 5 weeks, and an illustration depicting his cell in Silivri prison was recently distributed.
"I drew my room and my friends illustrated it," Imamoglu - the popular politician widely thought to have what it takes to defeat Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan in a fair process - said in an April 25 social media post.
Prisoners in Turkey use their X accounts with the help of their lawyers. They have neither phones nor internet in prison.
Imamoglu was arrested about five weeks ago, on March 19. He has not been seen in public since. A short video of Imamoglu was recorded by a citizen at the police station where he was taken the day he was detained, while a photo of Imamoglu was displayed on a large screen in the prison courtroom where he appeared for his bail hearing. Several illustrations of him in the courtroom have also been published.
New wave of detentions
On March 19, more than a hundred people were arrested along with Imamoglu. On April 26, another 54 people were detained in a new wave of detentions.
In Turkey, such waves of political arrests are common. During the Ergenekon trials held between 2007 and 2013 aimed at eliminating the then military tutelage regime, dozens of arrests were used.
"What's up? Can't you fill out your empty court file?" Imamoglu wrote on X in response to the new arrests.
His words were clearly aimed at Erdogan – Turkey's ruler has reiterated how more substantial evidence will be released in response to persistent questions about what exactly Imamoglu's alleged crimes are.
"Have you been deceived again?" Imamoglu wrote.
Erdogan is known for his divisive statements. “We were deceived,” he has said on several occasions. He once claimed to have been deceived by Fethullah Gulen (the late leader of the Gulenists who were Erdogan’s allies but were later accused of orchestrating the failed 2016 coup), while the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (the banned PKK, which, in turn, sometimes serves Erdogan’s agenda), Barack Obama and the EU are others the president thinks he has been foolish about.
"Those who have turned the judiciary into an apparatus continue to betray the nation with new operations, blindly trying to remove obstacles in front of whoever they sold Canal Istanbul to," Imamoglu also added.
On April 17, Imamoglu wrote on X that the government was exploiting his imprisonment to accelerate the Canal Istanbul megaproject.
Women's turn
The wife of Imamoglu's press secretary, Murat Ongun, was among those arrested on April 26.
"I was like, 'What's next?' It's proven to be an attack on the sacred," Ongun (@Mrt_Ongun) wrote on X.
"You arrested my darling, who has committed no crime before becoming my wife, at dawn in front of my children," he complained.
"I thought women and children were sacred? I thought they were immune from political conflicts? You have no conscience," Ongun added.
Ongun called on his friends to ensure that his children are not abandoned while their father is in prison and their mother in detention. /Pamphlet adapted from Intellnews/
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