Turkey: "Insulting the president" charges grew 40 times after Erdogan

PanARMENIAN.Net - The Human Rights Foundation of Turkey's report on free expression violations during 2015-2019 notes a sharp increase in the number of charges of "insulting the president" after President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan's election in 2014, IFEX reports.

Based on the TİHV Documentation Center data, the report found 2,779 violations against freedom of expression in five years. Some 6,479 people were detained and 2,801 were arrested because of these violations.

In 1,372 cases, 727 people were sentenced to a total of 27,448 years in prison. Also, 184 press and broadcast outlets were closed down.

A significant part of the charges presented as grounds for violations of freedom of expression consisted of “propagandizing for a terrorist organization” (476), “insulting the president” (346), “attempting to overthrow the constitutional order” (165) and “being a member of a terrorist organization.”

The report also noted the sharp increase in the number of cases for “insulting the president” after President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s election in 2014. The number of investigations for this offense increased 47 times, and criminal cases increased 40 times during this period, according to the Ministry of Justice figures.

In the five-year period, 54 percent of the violations of freedom of expression were directly or indirectly related to the media, according to the TİHV report.

Out of 184 media outlets that were closed, 170 were closed not by court orders but by statutory decrees during the state of emergency. The decisions of the closure of 21 outlets were later reversed with new statutory decrees.