Last week, university student Esila Ayık was released after 40 days in detention. She had been arrested for displaying a banner at a protest in Istanbul that referred to Türkiye’s president, Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, as a dictator. The protest opposed the politically motivated arrest and detention of Istanbul mayor Ekrem İmamoğlu in March and subsequent arrests of students during related demonstrations. Ayık was charged with “insulting the president” under article 299 of the Turkish penal code, which could result in up to four years imprisonment. Her detention attracted media attention due to her chronic kidney and heart conditions.
Ayık’s case is part of a broader pattern of detentions and prosecutions on similar charges. The European Court of Human Rights has repeatedly found Türkiye guilty of violating freedom of expression rights through these prosecutions. In 2021, it ruled that the crime of “insulting the president” conflicts with such rights and should be amended. However, Turkish authorities continue to prosecute thousands under this law.
Swedish journalist Joakim Medin also faced prosecution. On April 30, an Istanbul court sentenced him to an 11-month suspended sentence due to his newspaper’s use of a photograph depicting an effigy of Erdoğan at a 2023 demonstration in Stockholm within his news coverage. He was released on May 16 and returned to Sweden.
Similarly, lawyer Burak Saldıroğlu was charged earlier this month for insult following significant social media attention he received for commenting on the blocking of jailed mayor İmamoğlu’s Turkish-language X account. An old post questioning whether the president was “in his right mind” led to his detention pending trial.
These instances involving banners, news articles, and social media posts are considered protected speech internationally and do not constitute criminal evidence or justify detention.
Despite international norms leading to the disuse of such offenses worldwide, Ministry of Justice statistics indicate over 11,000 prosecutions for “insulting the president” occurred in Türkiye in 2021 alone. The ministry has not disclosed more recent figures for this or other offenses since then but they likely reach tens of thousands. It is urged that these figures be published and that charging individuals with “insulting the president” cease entirely as it does not align with democratic principles.
