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Turkey opposition slams ‘ill-treatment’ of jailed students

By : AFP

Date: 31 Mar 2025

TURKEY-POLITICS-OPPOSITION-DEMO

Protesters shout slogans as they march through a tunnel after attending a rally called by the Republican People's Party (CHP) in support of Istanbul's arrested mayor Ekrem Imanoglu in Maltepe, on the outskirts of Istanbul on March 29, 2025. Protesters were to join a mass rally in Istanbul on March 29, 2025 at the call of Turkey's main opposition CHP over the jailing of the city's mayor Ekrem Imamoglu, a top figure in the party whose arrest has sparked 10 days of the country's biggest street demonstrations in a decade. Imamoglu's detention on March 19 has also prompted a repressive government response that has been sharply condemned by rights groups and drawn criticism from abroad. (Photo by Ed JONES / AFP)

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Protesters shout slogans as they march through a tunnel after attending a rally called by the Republican People’s Party (CHP) in support of Istanbul’s arrested mayor Ekrem Imanoglu in Maltepe, on the outskirts of Istanbul on March 29, 2025. Protesters were to join a mass rally in Istanbul on March 29, 2025 at the call of Turkey’s main opposition CHP over the jailing of the city’s mayor Ekrem Imamoglu, a top figure in the party whose arrest has sparked 10 days of the country’s biggest street demonstrations in a decade. Imamoglu’s detention on March 19 has also prompted a repressive government response that has been sharply condemned by rights groups and drawn criticism from abroad. (Photo by Ed JONES / AFP)

Turkish opposition chief Ozgur Ozel on Monday denounced the “ill-treatment” of students arrested over the mass protest gripping the country following the March 19 arrest of Istanbul’s mayor.

“These students have been badly treated, their hands cuffed behind their backs, held for hours without being told which prison they were being taken to,” said Ozel who heads the main opposition Republican People’s Party (CHP).

Ozel’s remarks came a day after he visited Silivri prison to see Ekrem Imamoglu, the Istanbul mayor who is viewed as the only politician capable of challenging President Recep Tayyip Erdogan at the ballot box.

Imamoglu was named CHP’s candidate for the 2028 race on the day he was jailed.

While in the prison, Ozel said he spent eight hours talking to students jailed over the protests that erupted in Istanbul after Imamoglu’s arrest and quickly spread across Turkey in the country’s worst street unrest since 2013.

“Each student was subjected to verbal abuse, curses and ill-treatment,” he said, also citing cases of people lying on the floor being “kicked in the face” or had “pressure exerted on their head”.

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Their detention, which coincided with the Eid public holiday marking the end of Ramadan, amounted to “psychological torture,” he charged.

Despite everything, they were generally “in good health, but not should be kept in jail for another 18 to 20 days until the first hearing,” he said, demanding their immediate release as they had “no blood on their hands”.

“We have avoided targeting our police and will continue to do so but there is no forgiveness for ill-treatment,” he said, urging victims to “keep evidence” of any abuses for a future reckoning.

So far, around 2,000 people have been detained across Turkey since March 19, of which some 260 have been held in pre-trial detention, the interior minister said on Thursday.

Lawyer Ferhat Guzel told AFP on Thursday that at least 511 students had been detained in Istanbul alone, of which 275 had been jailed. He said the real figure was “probably much higher”.

In a statement released on Saturday, public healthcare associations said they had “observed ill-treatment both during (police) interventions and detentions, in police custody and during legal proceedings,” notably in Turkey’s main cities.

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