Politics
Türkiye rejects Greece’s unlawful fishing restrictions in Aegean, EastMed
Türkiye’s Foreign Ministry rejected Greece’s unlawful attempts to impose fishing bans beyond its jurisdiction in the Aegean and Eastern Mediterranean, stressing that such measures have no legal validity under international law.
The ministry said Greece’s Fisheries Inspection Directorate published maps and established fishing-restricted zones in areas where Athens has no authority, including parts of the Aegean Sea and Eastern Mediterranean.
Ankara emphasized that maps drawing imaginary maritime boundaries between Türkiye and Greece are invalid, noting that such depictions violate Türkiye’s maritime jurisdiction.
The ministry underlined that Greece’s authority is limited to its 6-nautical-mile territorial waters, and that any restrictions imposed beyond these limits – including in international waters – are null and void.
It stressed that Türkiye will not accept any unilateral and unlawful actions aimed at restricting the legitimate activities of Turkish fishermen, which are based on international law and historical rights.
Reaffirming its commitment to dialogue, the ministry said disputes should be resolved on the basis of international law, equity and good neighborly relations, in line with the Athens Declaration on Friendly Relations and Good Neighborliness signed on Dec. 7, 2023.
Meanwhile, Vice President Fuat Oktay said maps published by Greece designating fishing-restricted zones in areas beyond its jurisdiction have no legal validity, stressing that attempts to impose unilateral restrictions on the legitimate, international law-based activities of Turkish fishermen in the Aegean and Eastern Mediterranean are unacceptable. He added that Türkiye has never allowed – and will not allow – such unlawful unilateral moves or faits accomplis.
Türkiye, which has the longest continental coastline in the Eastern Mediterranean, rejects the maritime boundary claims of Greece and the Greek Cypriot administration, arguing that their excessive claims violate the sovereign rights of both Türkiye and the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus (TRNC).
Turkish authorities detained 21 more suspects in an ongoing corruption investigation into allegations of bribery, extortion and forming a criminal organization tied to the former administration of the Manavgat Municipality in Antalya province, prosecutors said Tuesday.
The Manavgat Chief Public Prosecutor’s Office said the detentions were carried out under an investigation coordinated by prosecutors and executed by provincial gendarmerie anti-smuggling and organized crime units.
The suspects were detained in raids at identified addresses and included municipal employees, tourism sector figures, businesspeople and contractors, authorities said.
The investigation is part of a broader case in which former Manavgat Mayor Şükrü Sözen fom the Republican People’s Party (CHP) and his brother, Fatih Sözen, were arrested on Sept. 11, 2025.
They face accusations including bribery, embezzlement, bid-rigging, extortion, money laundering and establishing a criminal organization. Authorities previously said large amounts of cash and jewelry were seized during searches of the brothers’ homes.
In follow-up operations, eight more suspects, including two former deputy mayors, were arrested. In a separate operation on Dec. 2, 2025, 19 suspects were detained and three were later jailed. On March 10, 12 of 40 detained suspects were also arrested.
After some suspects were released pending trial, the number of jailed suspects in the case stood at 11.
A separate Manavgat Municipality case involving 43 defendants also continue including Niyazi Nefi Kara, another former Manavgat mayor who was previously detained and suspended from duty.
Kara, his nephew and others were arrested on charges of bribery, corruption and malversation. Police seized 3 kilograms (6.61 pounds) of gold bullion, 500,000 euros and $153,160 that his nephew had hidden at an agricultural warehouse.
Previously, Muhittin Böcek, the former mayor of Antalya province, was also arrested in July on allegations of accepting a TL 195 million bribe with his son, reportedly laundered through jewelry stores and currency exchanges. The Interior Ministry later suspended him from duty.
The main opposition CHP is under mounting scrutiny as a wave of corruption, bribery and terrorism-related investigations sweeps across its municipalities.
Speaking to reporters after a Cabinet meeting on Monday, Justice Minister Akın Gürlek, who took office in February, vowed closure in unresolved murder cases. Gürlek said the ministry has established a new unit that examines such cases, many of which were concluded due to a lack of evidence or other reasons.
“Officials will check if there were any shortcomings in the previous investigations,” he said.
Gürlek’s statements come amid a landmark breakthrough in the case of Gülistan Doku, a 21-year-old university student who went missing in 2020 in the eastern province of Tunceli. Doku was suspected of being murdered, though months of searches for her in the province could not find any trace. After a suspect claimed to be her boyfriend was detained and later released due to lack of evidence, Doku’s family complained about shortcomings in the investigation and long appealed to authorities to find the culprit or culprits in her disappearance. The case took a new turn after a secret eyewitness came forward in 2025, claiming Doku was murdered by Mustafa Türkay Sonel, the son of then-Governor Tuncay Sonel, and his friend Umut Altaş. The witness also claimed that the governor’s guard buried the body. No trace of Doku was found in another search, but a new investigation netted several suspects, including the former governor himself, who was detained a few days after his son’s detention. A police officer, then working for the governor, has also confessed that he was instructed to destroy phone and messaging records of a cellphone line used by Doku. The case has been in the headlines this month, after media reports claimed Sonel used his power as governor to cover up the murder, allegedly enlisting the assistance of police officers and the chief physician of a local hospital.
The minister said on Monday that the judicial process for the former governor was still underway, while media outlets reported that Sonel invoked his right to remain silent when interrogated. “What matters now is finding where (Doku) was buried. Our colleagues work on that,” he said.
Gürlek noted that they would particularly focus on cases that triggered public reaction. “We need a new pair of trained eyes on these cases. We see that there is a high public anticipation after Gülistan’s case, but this does not mean that all unresolved cases remained unresolved due to failures in the investigation or for other reasons. Still, we have the determination to solve all the cases,” he said.
The minister had previously announced that authorities would investigate two other well-known unresolved cases, including the death of Rojin Kabaiş, a university student whose body was found in 2024 on the shores of Lake Van, in the eastern province of Van, where she was attending university. An initial forensics report found DNA traces of two men on the body, raising suspicion that she was murdered and dumped on the coast. Kabaiş’s family has filed a criminal complaint to find the likely culprits. The other case involved Rabia Naz Vatan, an 11-year-old girl who was found injured outside her home in northern Türkiye’s Giresun in 2018. She later succumbed to her injuries. The case was inconclusive as investigators could not determine whether she fell from a height or committed suicide. Vatan’s father has claimed that his daughter was injured when a car ran her over, and the motorist left the body outside their home. Launching his own investigation, the father claimed to find out that nephew of the then mayor of Giresun’s Eynesil ran her over.
Devlet Bahçeli, chair of the government ally Nationalist Movement Party (MHP), hit out at the main opposition Republican People’s Party (CHP), which is pushing for a by-election ahead of the 2028 general election. Addressing the parliamentary group meeting of his party in the capital Ankara on Tuesday, Bahçeli said that the timetable was clear on the election. “We won’t allow different formulas, indirect ways, arbitrary plots,” he said.
Following a string of arrests of mayors of CHP-run municipalities on charges of corruption, the CHP has escalated calls for an early election. Its chair, Özgür Özel, challenged incumbent President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan to hold the vote, apparently encouraged by the main opposition’s unprecedented success in the 2024 municipal elections. When he failed to garner support for an early election, Özel has now called for a by-election for the vacated seats in Parliament, believing that any success in that vote may pave the way for the early election the CHP has fervently urged.
Bahçeli stated that the relentless, ill-timed calls for elections are merely the “intrigues of the opposition.” He asserted that those insisting on elections are speaking not out of concern for the nation’s troubles but out of their own anxieties.
“It is a futile effort for those who experience misplaced and untimely bursts of self-confidence and lose their sense of proportion to attempt to dictate Türkiye agenda. An election is not a toy to be put forward through political trickery or the instigation of artificial crises. It is already clear when the ballot box will be brought forward,” he said.
“We will not open stability up for debate, we will not compromise our peace for the sake of personal ambitions, and we will not sacrifice the national will to the politics of exploitation. Türkiye will continue on its path, and no one will be able to stop this march. Because this march is not that of a single party, but of a nation,” he added.
Turkish police detained 21 suspects in raids across four provinces centered in Istanbul as part of an investigation into the outlawed Revolutionary People’s Liberation Party-Front (DHKP-C), authorities announced Tuesday.
The Istanbul Chief Public Prosecutor’s Office said the operation targeted suspects alleged to be active in the group’s “Grup Yorum,” “Prisoners’ Families Solidarity Association (TAYAD)” and “Mahalle Alan” networks.
Police carried out simultaneous raids at 23 addresses in Istanbul, Hatay, Ankara and Kocaeli, detaining 19 suspects in the initial operation, the statement said. Authorities also seized numerous organizational documents and digital materials during searches.
Separately, police searched the Idil Cultural Center in Istanbul’s Şişli district, which prosecutors described as a gathering place for people acting in line with the group’s ideology. Two more people were detained there and added to the investigation.
Efforts to capture four additional suspects for whom detention orders were issued were continuing, prosecutors said.
Türkiye, the United States and the EU classify DHKP-C as a terrorist group.
The terrorist group pursues a far-left ideology and has been actively carrying out attacks and assassinations in the country since the 1980s, but its campaign of violence hit a snag when faced with Türkiye’s barrage of counterterrorism operations.
The DHKP-C’s most high-profile attacks include a suicide bombing that targeted the U.S. Embassy in the capital Ankara in 2013 and the killing of a prosecutor in an Istanbul courthouse in 2015.
Former police chief Hayati Başdağ, who is wanted in multiple cases linked to the outlawed Gülenist Terror Group (FETÖ), was detained in Istanbul and later jailed pending trial, Turkish authorities announced Tuesday.
The Istanbul Police Department’s counterterrorism and intelligence units, working under the coordination of the Istanbul Chief Public Prosecutor’s Office, located Başdağ in the city’s Fatih district and captured him in an operation, authorities said.
Başdağ, a former police chief dismissed from public service as part of an FETÖ investigation, was previously arrested in 2014 and released in 2020, according to the court records cited by officials.
Authorities said arrest warrants had been issued for Başdağ by courts in Ankara and Istanbul on charges including membership in an armed terrorist organization and unlawfully recording personal data.
Investigators also alleged that Başdağ used ByLock, an encrypted messaging application used by FETÖ members, and that he took part in the terrorist group’s alleged network within the Police Academy.
Testimony in the case further described him as a person who received rank directly from FETÖ leader Fethullah Gülen, authorities unrevealed.
The group, which is designated as a terrorist group by Türkiye and led by U.S.-based deceased Gülen, is accused of orchestrating the 2016 coup attempt in Türkiye that killed 251 people and injured nearly 2,200.
Başdağ is also among the defendants in several high-profile FETÖ-linked cases, including alleged illegal wiretapping and espionage, the Tahsiye case, and a tape conspiracy targeting former opposition leaders.
The Tahşiye group is known to be a branch of the Nur Movement. The group and its leader, Mehmet Doğan, a former imam, are known for their opposition to FETÖ and have a firmer stance against interfaith dialogue than other movements.
The group is also charged with recording and distributing over the internet sex tapes of former Republican People’s Party (CHP) leader Deniz Baykal.
Others, mostly lawmakers from the Nationalist Movement Party (MHP), had also stepped down from their posts after their videos were published online.
Türkiye will step up efforts to enhance school safety following recent attacks that shocked the nation, President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan said, stressing that no concessions will be made when it comes to ensuring the protection of students, teachers and families.
Speaking to reporters after a Cabinet meeting in the capital Ankara, President Erdoğan said the attacks, which took place in Kahramanmaraş and Şanlıurfa, affected all 86 million citizens and plunged the country into mourning.
Ten people were killed, and at least 20 others were injured after a student aged about 13 opened fire in Ayşel Çalık Middle School in Kahramanmaraş. The fatal attack took place just one day after another shooter wounded 16 people and then killed himself in a school in the Şanlıurfa province a day earlier.
President Erdoğan said the government will introduce stricter measures targeting firearm ownership, including heavier penalties for gun owners who fail to meet their duty of care, particularly in cases where weapons are accessed by children.
He added that additional legal regulations will be enacted to further limit gun ownership and that a comprehensive policy document and action plan will be implemented. The president also stressed that authorities, including the Radio and Television Supreme Council (RTÜK), are determined to take a tougher stance against violence and moral degradation in media content, especially on television.
The Turkish Parliament is set to establish a special commission to investigate school violence and propose measures to prevent similar incidents.
“The pain that struck Kahramanmaraş has also struck the hearts of all our provinces,” he said, adding that authorities acted swiftly by dispatching four ministers to the region while officials, lawmakers and party representatives supported the victims’ families from the outset.
He emphasized that violence cannot be addressed through a single approach, highlighting the need for a comprehensive strategy that includes school environments, family dynamics, digital media awareness, deterrence measures and stronger institutional cooperation.
“Today’s world is no longer the same,” Erdoğan said, warning that children are increasingly influenced by digital environments, often spending more time online than with their families. He noted that digital interactions and social media platforms can have a profound impact on young people’s development.
Erdoğan also warned of the risks posed by unregulated online spaces and algorithm-driven content, describing the issue as a complex challenge requiring coordinated and multifaceted solutions.
Erdoğan noted that authorities are examining both attacks from all angles, including digital footprints, to determine possible connections, influences and contacts of the perpetrators.
He said eight suspects have been arrested in connection with the Şanlıurfa incident, while the father of the attacker in Kahramanmaraş – identified as the owner of the weapon used – has also been detained. Erdoğan added that he is closely monitoring the ongoing process.
Describing the incidents as unprecedented for the country, Erdoğan pointed to the broader impact of digitalization and globalization, saying such factors increasingly influence young people. He warned that the side effects of technology and internet exposure can manifest in harmful ways.
Referring to similar attacks worldwide, particularly in the United States, Erdoğan said such acts aim to terrorize society and create widespread fear. “These perpetrators seek to provoke public outrage in a manner similar to terrorist organizations,” he said.
The president also criticized certain media outlets, organizations and political figures, accusing them of making irresponsible statements that may have unintentionally amplified the attackers’ objectives. He urged restraint and criticized attempts to politicize the incidents before full investigations are completed.
“No one has the right to cause anxiety among our teachers, students and families,” Erdoğan said, calling for calm and a measured, collective response guided by reason and pedagogical principles.
Türkiye detain 21 in widening CHP Manavgat municipality corruption case
After the workers, the civil servants also revolted in the CHP Karşıyaka Municipality: 455 civil servants staged a 1-day work stoppage.
Turkish central bank keeps key policy rate unchanged again
Türkiye detain 21 in widening CHP Manavgat municipality corruption case
After the workers, the civil servants also revolted in the CHP Karşıyaka Municipality: 455 civil servants staged a 1-day work stoppage.
Turkish central bank keeps key policy rate unchanged again
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