Politics
Provocation leads to delay in former Istanbul mayor’s corruption trial
Ekrem Imamoğlu, the disgraced former mayor of Istanbul for the main opposition Republican People’s Party (CHP), attempted to disrupt the court on the 31st day of his trial in Istanbul on charges of corruption.
The new week of the trial against what prosecutors call “the Imamoğlu criminal organization” began in the city’s Silivri district in the early hours of Monday with testimony of Ahmet Güldü, one of the defendants. Barın Kaya, a lawyer for one of the co-defendants, intervened in and accused the judges of not heeding their demands. The chief judge of the trial told the lawyer to wait for the turn of his defendant. However, a heated argument broke out in the hearing anyway. When the judges accused lawyers of disrespect, tensions escalated. In the face of the developments, the chief judge ordered the suspension of the hearing.
As the defendants and plaintiffs were leaving, Imamoğlu and his lawyer, Mehmet Pehlivan, defied the judge. The former mayor insisted on not leaving the court and requested the gendarmerie troops providing security to “force” him out. Imamoğlu was among the last ones to leave while gendarmerie troops waited. On his way out, he claimed that it was the judges who tried to drag down the trial.
The corruption investigation into Imamoğlu, who was suspended from his post as Istanbul metropolitan mayor and jailed, was completed with the preparation of a 3,809-page indictment on Nov. 11, 2025.
In the indictment, he is identified as the alleged “leader of a criminal organization” and is accused of several offenses, including establishing an organization for the purpose of committing crimes, bribery, laundering criminal proceeds, fraud against public institutions and organizations, recording personal data, illegally obtaining and disseminating personal data, concealing criminal evidence, obstructing communications, damaging public property, receiving bribes, publicly spreading misleading information, extortion, laundering assets derived from crime, rigging tenders, deliberately polluting the environment, violating the Tax Procedure Law, violating the Forestry Law and violating the Mining Law.
Prosecutors are seeking a prison sentence ranging from 828 years and two months to 2,352 years for Imamoğlu over 142 alleged acts. The first hearing was held on Monday, March 9.
In the last hearing, contractor Adem Soytekin, a key witness in the case, testified. He alleged in court that bribes were paid in connection with municipal tenders and project payments, saying the system operated through informal arrangements involving cash, apartments and commercial units.
Soytekin, who benefited from effective remorse provisions, told the court he decided to cooperate after he was “left alone” by the municipality. He alleged that contractors were pressured to make payments in order to receive money owed to them for work carried out on municipal projects. “I paid bribes in exchange for tenders. This is how the system works,” Soytekin was quoted as saying in court.
According to Soytekin’s testimony, the general manager of IBB’s real estate subsidy KIPTAŞ, Ali Kurt, allegedly demanded $500,000 from him in connection with project payments. Soytekin said he did not have the full amount in cash at the time and asked an associate to collect $400,000, later completing the sum himself. He alleged that the money was delivered to Kurt through the suspect Murat Eren.
Soytekin said contractors believed they would not receive the payments they were owed unless they complied with the demand.
“If we had not given the money they wanted, we would not have received the money we were entitled to on time,” Soytekin told the court. “It was made clear to us that if the requested money was not paid, the funds that should have been transferred to contractors from KIPTAŞ accounts would not be sent to us for a long time.”
Soytekin also described what he called an informal payment and offsetting system inside the municipality. He said contractors were directed to build nurseries, cultural centers and dormitories, then collect their receivables through checks, apartments, shops or cash from third parties.
In another part of his testimony, Soytekin said three apartments in the Deniz Istanbul Project’s Mercan residences were transferred to his company in February 2020 without direct payment. He claimed the apartments were given in return for renovation work at the CHP’s Istanbul provincial headquarters in the Ayazağa district, a building previously linked in public debate to footage showing cash counting.
Soytekin further said municipalities often do not construct public buildings solely through their own resources, adding that projects are sometimes carried out under what he described as “voluntary donations.”
During questioning, the presiding judge asked Soytekin about his earlier statement that $1.5 million had been sent to Kurt. Soytekin initially did not provide details, prompting the judge to say the court was having difficulty communicating with him. “Bribe, Mr. President, bribe,” Soytekin replied.
Türkiye’s Justice Ministry announced on Monday the establishment of specialized terrorism investigation units within provincial prosecutors’ offices across the country in an effort to improve coordination, consistency and efficiency in terrorism-related investigations.
According to a directive prepared on the instructions of Justice Minister Akın Gürlek and signed by Deputy Justice Minister Can Tuncay, dedicated Terror Crimes Investigation Bureaus will be established within provincial chief public prosecutors’ offices. The directive was sent to 175 chief public prosecutors’ offices with heavy penal court jurisdiction in all 81 provinces.
Under the new system, prosecutors assigned to the bureaus will handle only terrorism-related cases and will not be assigned other prosecutorial duties, including court appearances, on-call shifts or unrelated investigations.
The directive said terrorism offenses directly affect public security, social order, the constitutional system and the country’s territorial integrity, emphasizing that investigations should be conducted promptly, carefully and in accordance with existing legislation.
All terrorism-related investigations will be carried out through the newly established bureaus. District prosecutors’ offices will be permitted to conduct urgent investigative procedures only upon instruction from the relevant provincial prosecutor’s office, after which case files must be transferred without delay.
The measure is an administrative directive governing the internal division of work within prosecutors’ offices rather than a legislative amendment.
Specialized terrorism investigation bureaus already operate in major courthouses, including those in Ankara, Istanbul, Diyarbakır and Van. The new directive expands that model to all chief public prosecutors’ offices with heavy penal court jurisdiction across Türkiye and requires prosecutors assigned to those bureaus to work exclusively on terrorism-related cases.
The Justice Ministry also ordered the creation of a monthly coordination mechanism between prosecutors and law enforcement agencies. Meetings, coordinated by the ministry’s General Directorate of Criminal Affairs, will bring together officials from the Interior Ministry’s police and gendarmerie counterterrorism departments to review ongoing investigations, developments involving terrorist organizations and operational priorities.
The ministry said monthly nationwide statistics on terrorism investigations will also be compiled and shared with relevant security institutions before the coordination meetings to support intelligence sharing and policy planning.
Turkish authorities said the measures are designed to strengthen institutional coordination among prosecutors’ offices and improve the effectiveness of terrorism investigations.
Opposition lawmaker Özgür Özel on Tuesday delivered what he described as his final address from the Republican People’s Party (CHP) parliamentary group, announcing his new political party as he formally signaled his departure from the country’s main opposition party. His exit marks a new era in the opposition, which is probably the most fragmented ever in the brief history of the Republic of Türkiye. It comes about two months after Özel was ousted from the chairmanship of CHP by a court verdict that reinstated his predecessor Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu to the top post in Türkiye’s oldest party.
Opening his speech (apparently his last as the parliamentary group chair of the party) with an emotional farewell, Özel told lawmakers he had taken the podium “with the sadness of a farewell whose time has come,” describing the moment as “a historic crossroads” for both himself and Turkish politics. Özel counts on CHP’s success in the 2024 municipal elections to finally bring CHP to power after successive defeats to the ruling Justice and Development Party (AK Party).
Addressing supporters, Özel said the newly formed party would emerge as the country’s main opposition party by a wide margin, among the slogans “Istiklal (Independence)” by a fervent audience, the rumored name of his new party. For weeks, he and his supporters were touting opinion polls reportedly showing his camp within the CHP ahead, long before he vaguely implied a new party. Retaining the position of main opposition party will require more than three dozen lawmakers, and although several CHP lawmakers openly sided with Özel, none has formally resigned from the CHP so far.
Reflecting on developments within the CHP since November 2023, Özel remarked that the events of the past several years would occupy an important place in Türkiye’s political history. He argued that while political victories and defeats would eventually become part of the historical record, the conduct of political actors during the period would also be remembered.
“When everything is over, we will not forget,” Özel warned. “No one should think that the attitudes, actions or conspiracies of today will simply be forgotten with time.” He was referring to Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu, who accepted the job as the party’s chair, amid protests of pro-Özel members of the party who branded him a “traitor.”
Around the same time Özel was announcing his resignation, Kılıçdaroğlu was visiting Rüzgarlı (Windy) Street of Ankara, a hub of shops selling construction materials. Earlier, he convened around a breakfast table at a cooperative of shopkeepers, hearing their economic complaints, strictly distancing himself from Özel’s agenda. President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, who spent the past two days in Istanbul at his residence, also had no scheduled events, fitting with his earlier comments on CHP’s divide, which he branded as a strictly internal matter of the opposition.
Path to new party
Özel said the split within the CHP stemmed from disagreements over the party’s future following its declining public support.
He said some within the party argued for maintaining the current course and focusing on the next local elections, while others warned that the CHP risked losing voters unless it embraced change.
Reiterating the current situation of the main opposition: “People will not go into another local election with us if we continue like this. If we act this way, they will turn their backs on us. Voter turnout will fall to a historic low. Don’t you see the polls? The party has dropped to around 13% or 14% and continues to decline,” Özel criticized, “A major defeat is coming. After another local election disaster, people will lose hope in the ballot box altogether. We have to act.'”
Özel said that disagreement marked the point at which party members “went their separate ways,” adding that he continued to value those who later joined his push for change as much as those who supported it from the outset. The Özel camp was fighting for a petition to hold a new congress in the CHP, assured that Özel would win the next intraparty election against Kılıçdaroğlu.
Challenge to Kılıçdaroğlu
In one of the most notable moments of his speech, Özel challenged CHP Chairperson Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu, saying the party’s leadership should be decided directly by members.
“Let’s put a ballot box in front of the delegates from either congress, or before all 2 million party members, and let them decide who should lead the party,” Özel said. “If I receive less than 90% support, I will consider it a vote of no confidence and step aside. Are you willing to do the same?”
Özel described the launch of his new party as “opening a new path” after a court ruling declaring the previous CHP congress legally null and void, saying the decision to leave was “not a choice, but a necessity.”
He said 61 days had passed since the court’s ruling and accused party leaders of believing public criticism would quickly subside.
“We can either remain trapped in this deadlock and disappoint the people, or we can untie these knots one by one and clear the way for the country,” Özel said.
He added that throughout his years as CHP deputy parliamentary group chair and parliamentary group leader, he had defended the party’s legacy and values, and had fought through legal, political and public channels to protect them before concluding that a new political path had become unavoidable.
The “terror-free Türkiye” initiative for the disarmament of the PKK terrorist group took a new turn this week as Parliament Speaker Numan Kurtulmuş began visiting political parties to hold talks on a framework law to speed up the process.
The law is expected to reduce the sentences of PKK members who surrender to authorities.
Kurtulmuş on Tuesday met Nationalist Movement Party (MHP) leader Devlet Bahçeli. Government ally Bahçeli is the architect of the initiative, which informally began with his call to PKK jailed ringleader Abdullah Öcalan.
In 2024, Bahçeli urged Öcalan to convince the PKK to lay down its arms. Öcalan complied and made the call in February 2025. Soon, the PKK itself announced its dissolution.
Turkish security forces, however, have yet to confirm the group’s full disarmament, an essential component of the initiative. The Turkish Parliament is at the heart of the initiative and awaits confirmation of disarmament before proceeding with drafting the framework law. Turkish intelligence is tasked with monitoring the process abroad. The PKK’s senior cadres are holed up in northern Iraq, and apart from a ceremony in which the group’s members burned their weapons, there have been no signs of disarmament so far.
The parliament speaker’s next stop was the parliamentary offices of the Peoples’ Equality and Democracy Party (DEM Party). The DEM Party is known for its close links to the PKK, and its lawmakers served as informal envoys between Öcalan and Parliament, relaying his messages on the initiative to the public. A DEM Party delegation visited Öcalan in the island prison where he is held near Istanbul on Monday and released his message to the public hours before Kurtulmuş’s visit to the DEM Party on Tuesday.
In his message, Öcalan said they were on the eve of “creating the legal ground for the Kurdish-Turkish alliance.” “It is time to create that ground in a way that heeds mutual sensitivities. Let’s build a common life by abandoning narrow-minded approaches and act with patience to carve this path, which is a historic opportunity,” he said.
Later on Tuesday, Kurtulmuş was scheduled to visit other parties in Parliament, including the main opposition Republican People’s Party (CHP).
The new law will be temporary in nature and will clearly define the fate of PKK members, according to media reports. The law will also exclude Öcalan and other PKK members who were sentenced to aggravated life imprisonment, though it may offer leniency to other members of the terrorist group. The law will only be implemented after Turkish authorities confirm that the PKK has been fully dissolved and has abandoned its arms.
Justice and Development Party (AK Party) sources told the Sabah newspaper last month that the law’s rationale was to offer its benefits to members of the group only after they dissolved the organization and Türkiye was able to confirm this. The National Intelligence Organization (MIT) and the Turkish Armed Forces (TSK) are authorized to confirm the disarmament, but the National Security Council (NSC) will have the final say on the matter. Sources say the confirmation will be announced only after the disarmament process reaches around 80%.
It is unclear how long the law will remain in force, but a period of six months to one year is being considered. It will definitely exclude Öcalan, who was sentenced to death on June 29, 1999, on charges of treason, before his sentence was commuted to life imprisonment. Any leniency in the prison terms of Öcalan and other PKK members convicted of acts of terrorism will be out of the question. Those convicted of grave acts of terrorism and currently at large abroad will also be excluded from the law.
The law does not grant amnesty to PKK members, and it will only annul terrorism charges for those imprisoned on charges of PKK membership and those who face prosecution for similar charges. This means early release from prison for some convicts or a significant reduction in their sentences. In most terrorism cases, suspects face a wide variety of charges in addition to those related to acts defined as terrorism under Turkish law. For instance, a convict involved in a bombing would only serve a sentence for manslaughter instead of terrorism. Currently, Türkiye has 4,300 people convicted of terrorism in its prisons. The case of each inmate will be reexamined by the courts once the law is implemented.
For PKK members residing abroad without any criminal record in Türkiye, the country plans to allow their return, although they will be subject to judicial supervision.
PKK’s senior cadres, who are currently hiding in the Qandil Mountains in northern Iraq, will also be excluded from the law, while sources say they have already left their hideouts for several other destinations. Sources also say it is believed that the majority of PKK members would not return to Türkiye even if the law is implemented and would instead prefer to settle in Iraq, where they have spent years.
Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan announced on Tuesday that Türkiye has been admitted to the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) as a dialogue partner.
Fidan noted that only 11 countries had previously been granted this status by the bloc. The decision to accept Türkiye was taken in Manila, the Philippines, during the ASEAN Foreign Ministers’ Meeting. The three-day meeting opened on Tuesday with a focus on the U.S.-Israel-Iran war.
“Under the leadership of our esteemed President, we have achieved another significant milestone in our foreign policy, which is capable of taking a multidimensional view of the world and global developments while influencing the international agenda and the global system. This places Türkiye in the highest status within ASEAN after full membership. Following our application in 2024, I would like to extend my sincere thanks to my fellow foreign ministers who supported our bid throughout the process, as well as to the Philippines, the current ASEAN chair, and the ASEAN Secretariat,” Fidan said in a social media post.
“This development is of great importance in enhancing our influence in the Asia-Pacific, the eastern pillar of our global diplomacy, advancing our long-term strategy toward the ASEAN region, and bringing our existing initiatives to fruition. Since laying the foundation of our institutional relations with ASEAN in 2010, we have expanded cooperation with ASEAN member states across all fields and increased our bilateral trade volume from $6.5 billion to $16 billion. With Dialogue Partner status, we believe our political and economic cooperation with the ASEAN region, home to nearly 700 million people and an economy worth more than $4 trillion, will deepen even further. I hope this new chapter will be beneficial for both our country and the ASEAN member states,” he added.
The Ankara Metropolitan Municipality (ABB), run by the main opposition Republican People’s Party (CHP), is setting records in the sale of its valuable assets and properties, rapidly depleting its resources, according to a report by the Sabah newspaper. Plots of land, shops and residences in prime locations are being put up for sale one after another.
The municipality, led by Mansur Yavaş, a popular figure in the party who was once regarded as a future presidential candidate, will launch a new tender on Thursday for the sale of several properties with a starting price of TL 1.3 billion ($28 million). With the latest tender, the municipality’s total real estate sales over the past seven years have exceeded TL 35 billion.
The rapid liquidation of public properties in sought-after districts such as Etimesgut, Çankaya, Altındağ and Mamak, along with the involvement of municipal subsidiaries in the process, has fueled criticism over what opponents describe as the municipality’s failure to improve public services despite the revenue generated from the sales.
According to the latest announcement by the Real Estate Branch Directorate of ABB’s Department of Real Estate and Expropriation, 11 more valuable municipal properties have been put up for sale.
When the real estate policy pursued by Mansur Yavaş since he took office in 2019 is examined through the figures, the scale of the process becomes clear. What began in 2019 with just three tenders has, by 2026, grown into 110 separate tenders, effectively becoming what critics describe as a “real estate liquidation.” Between 2019 and 2021, annual property sales averaged between TL 450 million and TL 570 million. In 2022, sales rose sharply to TL 1.4 billion. In 2023, they increased further to TL 6.5 billion before reaching a record TL 11 billion in 2024. In 2025, sales remained at approximately TL 10 billion.
Critics argue that how these enormous resources have been spent remains a major unanswered question.
The sale of municipal assets has not been limited to the main municipal budget; municipal subsidiaries have also become part of the process. In particular, through PORTAŞ Inc., which operates in the construction sector, hotels, commercial properties and land have been sold off rapidly. The total value of the properties sold by PORTAŞ has been reported to exceed TL 344 million. Critics argue that there is no corresponding major infrastructure or transportation project visible across Ankara that reflects this level of investment.
Under Yavaş (whose last name literally means “slow” in Turkish), the capital added few new metro lines, nor expanded the existing ones. Repeated delays on two major metro lines, cancelled public tenders and engineering issues add to mass transit woes of the capital, where the traffic congestion, though still far behind Istanbul, is worsening.
The municipality was also criticized by political opponents for almost regular water outages and low pressure in the water grid, something blamed on a lack of spending on infrastructure improvement.
Frequent flooding in the capital, which submerges underpasses and narrow streets, is also blamed on underwhelming investment in drainage systems.
Greece is accelerating efforts to strengthen its air force with Israeli-made weapons systems as the possibility of the U.S. resuming sales of F-35 fighter jets to Türkiye raises concerns over the regional military balance, according to Israeli and Greek media reports.
The issue gained renewed attention after U.S. President Donald Trump said during this month’s NATO summit in Ankara that his administration would reconsider Türkiye’s return to the F-35 program. Ankara was removed from the program in 2019 after acquiring Russia’s S-400 air defense system.
Israeli business daily Globes, citing Greece’s Kathimerini newspaper, reported that Athens has moved into the final stage of certifying Israeli-made Rampage air-to-surface missiles and Spice precision-guided munitions for operational use on its F-16 fighter jets. Final certification is expected in the coming weeks, with live-fire testing scheduled for September.
According to the reports, Greek authorities decided to move ahead with integrating the systems before testing is completed, reflecting what analysts describe as growing concern over Türkiye’s potential acquisition of fifth-generation fighter aircraft.
The Rampage missile, jointly developed by Elbit Systems, Israel Aerospace Industries and Tomer, is designed to strike targets at ranges of roughly 150 to 250 kilometers and can be integrated onto multiple combat aircraft platforms.
Kathimerini also reported that the Trump administration is expected to decide in September on Greece’s request to modernize an additional 38 F-16 fighter jets. If approved, the estimated 1 billion euro ($1.14 billion) program would increase the number of Greece’s upgraded F-16s from 56 to 120.
Separately, Israel and Greece continue negotiations over the proposed “Achilles Shield” air defense project, valued at approximately 3 billion euros, according to Globes. The initiative envisions equipping Greece with a multilayered Israeli-made air defense network.
Greece and Israel have expanded military and defense cooperation in recent years, underpinned by close economic and diplomatic relations.
The two countries also operate a joint air training center in Greece and have held regular joint military exercises, reflecting a growing strategic partnership in the Eastern Mediterranean.
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