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Turkey’s top opposition leader to President Recep Tayyip Erdogan was sentenced to 20 months in prison for allegedly insulting and threatening a city prosecutor.
Ekrem Imamoglu, Istanbul’s mayor, has been in custody since March 23 on unrelated corruption charges and is expected to appeal the decision.
His sentencing this week comes at a time when Erdogan has cracked down on political adversaries, sparking widespread protests across Turkey in recent months.
“I’ve been fighting against the abuse of the judiciary and against its use as a political tool,” Imamoglu told Halk TV and other Turkish media.
“This is indeed an insult against our nation.”
His latest jailing marks the second time Imamoglu has been found guilty of insulting a public official.
Imamoglu is also in the midst of appealing a 2022 sentence of two years and six months for criticizing election officials over a decision to annul the March 2019 Istanbul election.
When a repeat election was held in June 2019, Imamoglu, the CHP Party candidate, won by a significant margin over Binali Yıldırım of the AK Party.
The Istanbul mayor has denied all charges. However, if his 2022 conviction is upheld, it could disqualify him from future elections.
In March, Istanbul University revoked Imamoglu’s university diploma, which would render him ineligible to run for president.
The Erdogan administration denied the CHP party’s claim that the charges against the mayor and others are “a politicized attempt by the government to remove electoral threats.”
More than 200 people have been jailed pending trial, while a total of 500 have been detained, in connection with investigations into municipalities run by Imamoglu’s CHP party.
“Hundreds of police officers have been sent to the doors of my house, the house of the 16 million people of Istanbul,” Imamoglu said in a social media video as he prepared for his arrest.
“We are up against a huge bully, but I will not back down.”
With Wires
English (US)