24-30 November 2025
Arbitrary Detention and Arrest
Throughout the week, prosecutors ordered the detention of at least 100 people over alleged links to the Gülen movement. In October 2020, a UN Working Group on Arbitrary Detention (WGAD) opinion said that widespread or systematic imprisonment of individuals with alleged links to the group may amount to crimes against humanity. Solidarity with OTHERS has compiled a detailed database to monitor the Gülen-linked mass detentions since a failed coup in July 2016.
25 November: Turkish authorities arrested both parents of a 4-year-old tuberculosis patient over alleged Gülen movement links despite medical reports stating he needs maternal care.
27 November: Justice ministry data show that more than 3.09 million people in Turkey have been investigated for terrorism since 2016, with over 527,000 convicted, underscoring the vast political use of broadly defined counterterrorism laws against alleged Gülen movement followers and other critics.
Arbitrary Depriviation of Life
26 November: A Syrian man, Anas Laila, was allegedly shot dead by Turkish police during a mistaken pre-dawn raid in Hatay, with his family claiming officers realized they had the wrong address but left him to die.
Enforced Disappearances
No news has emerged of Yusuf Bilge Tunç, a former public sector worker who was sacked from his job by a decree-law during the 2016-2018 state of emergency and who was reported missing as of August 6, 2019, in what appears to be one of the latest cases in a string of suspected enforced disappearance of government critics since 2016.
Freedom of Assembly and Association
25 November: The Beyoğlu District Governor’s Office in İstanbul announced on November 25, 2025, that all outdoor assemblies, demonstrations, press statements, leaflet distribution, sit-ins and similar actions and events in the district were banned for one day as of November 25, 2025.
26 November: The ECtHR ruled that Turkey violated Article 3 by blocking any investigation into İstanbul’s governor and police chief over a 2013 May Day operation in which protester İbrahim Akan lost an eye after being struck by a tear gas canister.
Freedom of Expression and Media
28 November: Turkey’s ruling AKP has proposed an omnibus bill allowing authorities to remove online content immediately—before any judicial ruling—granting broad, undefined powers to restrict posts, pressure platforms, and tighten state control over digital information.
25 November: İstanbul courts sentenced YouTuber İlker Canikligil to a 26-month suspended term for livestream comments deemed criminal incitement, after six weeks of pretrial detention, leading his channel FLU TV to end political programming amid tightening legal restrictions on online speech.
26 November: A Turkish court sentenced prominent journalist Fatih Altaylı to four years and two months in prison for allegedly “threatening” President Erdoğan in historical remarks about deposed Ottoman sultans, a ruling condemned by press freedom groups as an intimidation tactic against the media.
28 November: A Turkish appeals court upheld journalist Ozan Kaplanoğlu’s one-year-10-month prison sentence for alleged terrorist propaganda over his reporting on a 2018 Afrin protest.
Judicial Independence & Rule of Law
28 November: A Turkish prosecutor sought up to seven years in prison for jailed Kurdish leader Selahattin Demirtaş over 2015 speeches allegedly insulting President Erdoğan, as a Mersin court merged the cases and adjourned the trial to January 6, 2026.
Kurdish Minority
25 November: A Turkish prosecutor indicted Kurdish journalists Öznur Değer and Osman Akın for allegedly “targeting a public official” after reporting torture claims against a gendarmerie commander.
Prison Conditions
26 November: İstanbul Bar lawyers reported that women’s prisons in Turkey suffer from severe overcrowding, poor hygiene and inadequate support for pregnant inmates, highlighting systemic failures amid a nationwide prison population now exceeding official capacity by 40 percent.
Refugees and Migrants
27 November: A Kurdish-Iranian political activist and asylum seeker, Mohammad Abbaspour, has spent 45 days in Turkish detention and now faces possible deportation to Iran despite a high risk of torture.
