Accusation of sedition: Head of Turkish opposition party arrested

In Turkey, the head of the ultra-right Zafer party was arrested on charges of sedition. An investigation had already been initiated against Ümit Özdag because he was said to have insulted Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, as the state news agency Anadolu reported on Tuesday evening.

The vice-president of the Zafer party, Batu Soral, said on Now TV that the allegations of sedition related to posts on Platform X. The accusation of insulting the president, however, referred to a speech at a party meeting at the weekend. Pro-government media quoted Özdag as saying that in the past thousand years no crusade had caused as much damage to the Turkish state and people as President Erdogan and his AKP party.

Özdag was initially arrested on Monday in a restaurant in Ankara on charges of insulting the president and taken to Istanbul by the police. According to Anadolu, the public prosecutor’s office there is leading the investigation. An arrest warrant was later issued for sedition.

Politicians from other parties criticized the action against Özdag. Özgür Özel from the largest opposition party CHP called the action “murder of democracy and the independence of the judiciary.”