Turkey arrests scores in opposition bastion - Region

Al-Ahram Weekly

3 days ago

Turkish police on Tuesday arrested more than 120 people at city hall in the opposition stronghold of Izmir, hours before a key rally in Istanbul, in the latest move targeting President Recep Tayyip Erdogan's opponents.
The early-morning arrests, part of a probe into alleged graft, came after a similar operation in opposition-run Istanbul in March that removed and jailed mayor Ekrem Imamoglu, Erdogan's top challenger ahead of presidential elections in 2028.
A former mayor and numerous "senior officials" were among those detained in Izmir, Turkey's third-largest city, which the opposition has run for years, said the deputy chairman of the opposition CHP party, Murat Bakan.
In total, the Izmir public prosecutor's office has issued arrest warrants for 157 people, local media reported.
"This process is similar to what happened in Istanbul," Bakan wrote on X, saying those arrested included former Izmir mayor Tunc Soyer and CHP's provincial chairman, Senol Aslanoglu.
"These dawn arrests are not a legal need but are a clear political choice," he wrote, saying that many of those detained were already under investigation.
"These people are in the public eye every day. If they had been called to testify, they would have done so," he said.
It was the latest in a slew of legal manoeuvres targeting the CHP, which aced last year's local elections and is rising in the polls.
It came hours before the CHP was to hold a rally at 1730 GMT outside Istanbul City Hall marking 100 days since the removal of Imamoglu, the party's candidate for the 2028 presidential race.
Opposition under pressure
The arrest of Imamoglu and hundreds of other elected officials in Istanbul sparked a wave of mass protests which spread across the country, in Turkey's worst street unrest in over a decade.
In a police crackdown, nearly 2,000 people were arrested. Although the protests have tailed off, CHP has since been holding rallies across Turkey, boosting its standing in the polls.
The Izmir crackdown came a day after an Ankara court began hearing a case against the CHP involving allegations of vote-buying at its 2023 leadership primary.
The case could end up overturning the election of current leader Ozgur Ozel, who has become the face of the spring protests.
Critics say the case is another politically motivated attempt to undermine the CHP in line with the move against Imamoglu, which the party denounced as a "coup".
"No conspiracy against our party is ever unrelated to the March 19 coup," Ozel wrote on X.
Monday's hearing in the CHP leadership primary case was brief, with the judge adjourning the proceedings until September 8 over a question of jurisdiction.
The Izmir arrests came as firefighters continued to battle several large wildfires raging near the western resort city, which have forced the evacuation of more than 45,000 people in the area.
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