Police detain multiple journalists in house raids across Turkey

Istanbul, November 27, 2024—Turkish authorities should stop treating journalists like terrorists by raiding their homes and detaining them, the Committee to Protect Journalists said Wednesday.

“Turkish authorities once more raided the homes of multiple journalists in the middle of the night, in order to portray them as dangerous criminals, and detained them without offering any justification. CPJ has monitored similar secretive operations in the past decade, and not one journalist has been proven to be involved with actual terrorism,” said Özgür Öğret, CPJ’s Turkey representative. “The authorities should immediately release the journalists in custody and stop this systematic harassment of the media.”

In a statement Tuesday, Turkey’s Interior Ministry said police had conducted simultaneous operations in 30 cities and detained a total of 261 people who suspected of having ties to the outlawed Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) or alleged offshoot organizations. At least 12 journalists are reported to be held in custody:

• Erdoğan Alayumat, former reporter for the pro-Kurdish Mezopotamya News Agency in Istanbul
• Suzan Demir, Istanbul-based freelance reporter
• Tuğçe Yılmaz, Istanbul-based reporter for the independent news website Bianet
• Emrah Kelekçier, Diyarbakır-based freelance photographer
• Ahmet Sümbül, Diyarbakır-based freelance reporter
• Roza Metina, chairperson of the Mesopotamia Women Journalists Association in Diyarbakır
• Bilal Seçkin, Istanbul-based freelance photographer
• Bilge Aksu, Istanbul-based freelance reporter
• Mehmet Uçar, Batman-based freelance reporter
• Doğan Güzel, Diyarbakır-based political cartoonist
• Abdurrahman Aydın, Antalya-based columnist for the independent news website Gazete Duvar
• Havin Derya, Antalya-based freelance reporter

The reasons for the detentions are unknown, as there is a court order of secrecy on the investigation, preventing the detainees and their lawyers from being informed of the investigation’s details and possible charges, a common practice in such crackdowns.

CPJ emailed Turkey’s Interior Ministry for comment but received no reply.

Separately, Devlet Bahçeli, leader of the government ally Nationalist Movement Party (MHP), threatened the pro-opposition outlet Halk TV and its commentators for criticizing his party with a vow that the MHP will make them suffer.

“We are taking note, one by one, of the ignorant and arrogant commentators, especially Halk TV,” Bahçeli said Tuesday at a MHP meeting in Ankara. In October, he had told the outlet to “watch your step.”

Editor’s note: The alert was updated to correct the name of Ahmet Sümbül.