Detained Istanbul Mayor Ekrem Imamoglu has denied “terrorism” fees introduced in opposition to him, in accordance with a courtroom doc seen by the Reuters information company
“I see immediately throughout my interrogation that I and my colleagues are confronted with unimaginable accusations and slanders,” Imamoglu mentioned Saturday in his defence throughout a listening to, the doc confirmed.
Afterward Saturday, Imamoglu arrived on the Caglayan courthouse, the place he was to be questioned by prosecutors, a spokesman for metropolis corridor mentioned. Imamoglu will seem in courtroom on Sunday as a decide is predicted to determine whether or not to jail or launch him.
The mayor, a key opposition determine and potential challenger to longtime President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, was detained on Wednesday by the federal government for alleged corruption and “terrorism”.
His detention got here 4 days earlier than his Republican Folks’s Celebration (CHP) deliberate to call him as its 2028 presidential candidate.
Erdogan on Saturday accused the CHP’s management of turning the celebration “into an equipment to absolve a handful of municipal robbers who’ve turn out to be blinded by cash.”
He additionally accused it of “doing every thing to disturb the general public peace, to polarize the nation.”
Court docket look
Reporting from Ankara, Al Jazeera’s Stefanie Dekker mentioned Imamoglu goes to be moved from police custody to judicial custody on Saturday.
“We perceive he could have a well being test together with 100 or so others who’re charged too, after which he can be transferred to the courthouse. So he can be questioned by a prosecutor later tonight,” she mentioned.
“Then tomorrow morning, he seems earlier than a decide, and the decide will make a ruling on whether or not … he’s launched with out cost, launched pending trial or detained pending trial,” she added.
‘Feeling of being trapped’
Imamoglu’s arrest has sparked a wave of protests which have unfold inside 48 hours to greater than two-thirds of Turkiye’s 81 provinces, even together with strongholds of Erdogan’s ruling Justice and Growth Celebration, such because the central space of Konya and Trabzon and Rize on the Black Sea.
Justice Minister Yilmaz Tunc instructed reporters this week that the arrests had nothing to do with the federal government. “Linking investigations and circumstances initiated by the judiciary to our President is, at greatest, presumptuous and inappropriate,” he mentioned.
Erdogan’s communications directorate has additionally mentioned the presidency would proceed to defend him in opposition to what it referred to as an “irrational smear marketing campaign”.
Regardless of a ban on protests and a heavy police presence, enormous crowds of protesters have taken to the streets.
Turkiye noticed a fourth straight evening of protests on Saturday.
“The sensation of being trapped – economically, socially, politically and even culturally – was already widespread,” Kemal Can, a journalist and creator of quite a few books on Turkish society, instructed the AFP information company.
However Erdogan does nonetheless retain help in lots of elements of the nation that trusts the federal government as a result of nation’s divisive historical past and present polarized setting.
Imamoglu’s arrest, Can mentioned, had sparked a powerful response, “particularly amongst younger individuals fearful about their future in a rustic the place freedoms are more and more restricted. It’s a response that goes nicely past Imamoglu.”
“This isn’t solely in regards to the CHP however about everybody. The query is whether or not Turkiye will reside below an authoritarian regime or be a democratic nation,” Ilhan Uzgel, who handles the celebration’s exterior relations, mentioned.
In a bid to focus on the nonpartisan nature of the protest motion, the CHP has invited all Turks, not simply celebration members, to affix its symbolic major vote on Sunday when Imamoglu is to be named the celebration’s presidential candidate.
Imamoglu counseled the protests and mentioned in a submit on X on Saturday that they had been geared toward defending “democracy” as an “inspiration” to the world.
Protest crackdown
Turkish police have cracked down on protesters.
Officers mentioned 343 individuals have been arrested within the demonstrations to date, which have seen a whole lot of 1000’s of individuals protest in Turkiye’s largest cities in a large present of defiance.
On Saturday, detention warrants had been issued for 94 suspects accused of posting “provocative” calls to protest and create public “panic”, the Turkish information company Anadolu quoted the Istanbul chief public prosecutor’s workplace as saying.
Police carried out simultaneous raids, detaining 56 of the suspects, and are trying to find the 38 others, Anadolu reported, including that authorities have additionally seized unlawful medication throughout searches of the suspects’ houses.
The investigation in opposition to İmamoglu is a part of a sweeping probe involving 106 suspects over corruption and “terror” allegations.
