The arrest of the mayor of Istanbul, Ekrem Imamoglu, rocked Turkey, causing demonstrations and a strong political reaction both at national and international level.
Imamoglu, the main opponent of Recep Tayyip Erdogan, was arrested on Wednesday under serious accusations of “corruption” and “terrorism”, after allegations of support for the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK), a Kurdish group qualified as terrorist by Turkey and several countries.
Imamoglu, who was to be appointed as a candidate for the People’s Republican Party (CHP) for the 2028 presidential elections, was arrested in the company of more than 80 other people. This gesture comes in a tense context where student demonstrations broke out in Istanbul to protest against his arrest and the cancellation of his university diploma. The arrest caused an additional depreciation of the Turkish pound, affected by the wave of political arrests.
The authorities have restricted access to several social networks, and gatherings have been prohibited in certain districts of Istanbul, but thousands of people have braved these measures to express their support for Imamoglu, whose name is now synonymous with political resistance. The president of the CHP, Özgür Özel, denounced what he considers as an attempted coup, insisting that the incarceration of imamoglu is an attempt to deprive the people of his choice for the presidency.
The convictions of this arrest have flocked from several major European cities, where mayors have expressed their concerns and castigated an “arbitrary imprisonment”. The arrest of Imamoglu is not an isolated case: several figures of the Turkish opposition have been recently targeted by repressive measures, amplifying political tensions a few years from the next presidential elections.
