3rd Week of November: Politics Rocked by Planned Öcalan Visit

Weekly Turkey Report: 3rd Week of November 2025 – Politics Rocked by Planned Öcalan Visit

Executive Summary

• A planned parliamentary commission visit to Abdullah Öcalan on İmralı Island – backed by AKP, MHP and DEM Party – has shaken Ankara and underscored that the state now treats Öcalan as a de facto legitimate political interlocutor.
• CHP walked out of the key “National Solidarity, Brotherhood and Democracy Commission” meeting after AKP insisted on holding the session behind closed doors, deepening the rift between the government and the main opposition over the Kurdish issue.
• The Interior Ministry authorized a criminal investigation into Ankara Mayor Mansur Yavaş over alleged irregularities in concert expenditures, in what appears to be a new attempt to sideline a high-profile opposition mayor after Ekrem İmamoğlu.
• MHP leader Devlet Bahçeli publicly called for the İmamoğlu trial to be broadcast live on TRT and all TV channels; CHP Chair Özgür Özel embraced the idea and urged Parliament to pass a law to allow full live coverage.
• Despite a binding European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) judgment in his favor, Selahattin Demirtaş remains in prison. AKP continues to stall on implementation while maintaining the trustee (kayyım) regime and pressure on Kurdish language and culture.
• Demirtaş sharply refuted claims by former Speaker Bülent Arınç after a prison visit, declaring he entered jail “with his honor” and will leave “with his honor,” and announcing that he will no longer meet with politicians or lawyers outside his own circle.
• A case challenging the legal basis of the trustee (kayyım) regime reached the Constitutional Court, but there is little confidence that the Court can act independently from the presidency.
• The 2025 Global Crime Index places Turkey in the top 10 globally and first in Europe, with extremely high scores for state-linked criminal actors and human trafficking, highlighting the fusion between organized crime, corruption, and the state.
• Chronic shortages of critical medicines, from cancer drugs to insulin, have turned what were once episodic disruptions into a structural public health crisis. At the same time, lethal food and pesticide incidents show how everyday life is increasingly shaped by state failure.

State Collapse in Daily Life: Food Safety and Lethal Negligence

Turkey has left behind another intense week in which the public once again experienced, in very concrete ways, the collapse of the state in everyday life and the attempts to construct a new regime in place of the old Kemalist order.

While Ankara was preoccupied with “grand” issues of security and the Kurdish question, “small” people across the country were dying from pesticide exposure and food poisoning. The absence of meaningful food safety standards now threatens even the reputation of Michelin-starred restaurants.

On social media, a tourist from Saudi Arabia reported that he and 15 friends suffered food poisoning after dining at an upscale restaurant in Istanbul. Even more shocking, a family of four visiting from Germany died after the hotel in which they were staying was treated with a banned insecticide and staff allegedly locked their room doors and left. In the aftermath, reports of food poisoning poured in from across the country like a rainstorm.

These incidents illustrate how deregulation, impunity, and profit-at-all-costs have combined with a hollowed-out state to generate lethal conditions for ordinary citizens, even as political elites focus on power engineering at the top.

Targeting Mansur Yavaş After İmamoğlu

On the political front, President Erdoğan’s latest move has been read as an attempt to eliminate another potential rival: Ankara Metropolitan Mayor Mansur Yavaş.

The Interior Ministry granted permission to open an investigation into Mansur Yavaş and his Chief of Staff Nevzat Uzunoğlu on allegations of “misconduct in office” and “neglecting supervisory duties” over supposed irregularities in the municipality’s concert expenditures.

Reacting on social media, Yavaş recalled that in the earlier “concert investigation” brought by the Ankara Chief Public Prosecutor’s Office, his name did not even appear in the indictment. At that time, the Prosecutor had already requested an authorization from the Interior Ministry, inspectors had been appointed, and Yavaş had submitted a written statement.

Yavaş noted that the Ministry, which previously did not even see the need to take his testimony, has now decided to issue an authorization to investigate him and his Chief of Staff. He also reminded the public that in numerous complaints related to previous terms, authorities had ruled that mayors could not be held personally accountable for every action taken by subordinate units. The current reversal, he argued, is a clear case of double standards.

For many observers, the pattern is familiar: after legal and political pressure on Istanbul Mayor Ekrem İmamoğlu, Ankara’s Mansur Yavaş is now being drawn into the same vortex.

The İmralı Visit: Öcalan as De Facto Political Actor

The most dramatic development of the week came around the question of a visit to Abdullah Öcalan on İmralı Island – a move that, in practice, confirms his recognition as a legitimate political actor in the eyes of the state.

The process began when MHP Chair Devlet Bahçeli used his party group speech to call on the National Solidarity, Brotherhood and Democracy Commission, which was due to meet that day, to designate a delegation to go to İmralı. Bahçeli declared:

If no one is willing to undertake this visit, if everyone insists on playing the three wise monkeys, I am saying this openly: I will take three of my colleagues, and I will not hesitate to go to İmralı with our own means. I will not shy away from sitting at a table face to face.

The Commission convened under the chairmanship of Parliamentary Speaker Numan Kurtulmuş for its 17th meeting. Interior Minister Ali Yerlikaya, Defense Minister Yaşar Güler, and National Intelligence Organization (MİT) Director İbrahim Kalın made presentations in a session held behind closed doors.

The real clash, however, erupted when the issue of visiting Öcalan arose. AKP insisted that this segment of the meeting also be closed to the public. CHP opposed this insistence and walked out of the meeting. CHP further proposed that instead of a physical visit to İmralı, a video-conference format be used – a proposal that was rejected.

In the end, the AKP, MHP, DEM Party, and the New Path Group (Yeni Yol Grubu) voted to keep the meeting closed. The Commission adopted, by majority vote, a decision to visit İmralı: 32 members voted “yes,” two “no,” and three abstained.

According to reports from the closed session in which CHP did not participate, AKP, MHP, DEM Party, as well as TİP and EMEP, voted “yes.” DP, DSP, and HÜDA PAR voted “no,” while two members from the New Path Group abstained.

DEM Party criticized CHP’s stance, while social media criticism of CHP also grew. CHP Chair Özgür Özel responded by stating that his party would not become a wagon hitched to the AKP train.

The episode has reopened old strategic and ethical questions: is the state seeking to instrumentalize Öcalan in a new “process,” and if so, at what cost to democratic institutions, transparency, and the broader Kurdish political movement?

Will the İmamoğlu Trial Be Broadcast Live on TRT?

In another significant intervention, MHP leader Bahçeli supported calls by CHP Chair Özgür Özel and imprisoned Istanbul Mayor Ekrem İmamoğlu for the “İBB trial” to be broadcast live.

Bahçeli argued that the proceedings should be shown by TRT first and by all other television channels as well.

Özgür Özel welcomed Bahçeli’s proposal during his parliamentary group speech, saying in essence: let the public hear the slander in real time and the response in real time. He noted that CHP had already submitted a draft law to Parliament to allow the full broadcast of these hearings.

The push to televise the trial is, on one level, a tactical move by both sides: Bahçeli appears confident the proceedings will discredit İmamoğlu and CHP; Özel is betting that transparency will expose the political nature of the case and rally public sympathy.

ECHR Judgment Ignored: No Release for Demirtaş

MHP Deputy Chair Feti Yıldız drew attention on social media with a remark on European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) violation decisions. Yıldız underlined that where an ECHR violation stems from unlawful detention, the only way to end the violation is to release the detainee; there is no alternative remedy.

His statement immediately called to mind the ECHR’s final judgment in favor of former HDP Co-Chair Selahattin Demirtaş, in which the Court found his prolonged detention unlawful and ordered his release.

Despite this, AKP continues to drag its feet. Demirtaş remains in prison, as do many other Kurdish political prisoners. The government persists with the trustee (kayyım) regime in Kurdish municipalities and maintains pressure on Kurdish language and culture through a variety of administrative and legal mechanisms.

The gap between ECHR jurisprudence and the Turkish government’s practice has become one of the clearest indicators of the collapse of the rule of law.

Demirtaş Refutes Arınç

Following a visit by former Parliamentary Speaker Bülent Arınç, Selahattin Demirtaş issued a handwritten statement rejecting comments attributed to him in the press.

Demirtaş stated that the words Arınç claimed he had said did not reflect the truth, and wrote:

I entered here with my honor. I will leave with my honor. From now on, I will not meet with any politician or lawyer except my own comrades.

Arınç had said that Demirtaş wanted to meet President Erdoğan and that in such a meeting he would tell Erdoğan to “set aside past events.” Demirtaş’s response not only denied this but also signaled a refusal to be used in any backchannel scenario designed to legitimize the regime.

Trusteeship (Kayyım) Before the Constitutional Court

A key legal development occurred regarding the dismissal and suspension of elected mayors through trustee appointments.

In the case challenging the suspension of Esenyurt Mayor Prof. Dr. Ahmet Özer, the Istanbul 9th Administrative Court referred Article 46/2 of the Municipal Law – the legal basis for the trustee regime – to the Constitutional Court on grounds of unconstitutionality.

The Constitutional Court has placed the application on its docket. However, given the Court’s record in politically sensitive cases and the perception that it cannot take decisions independently of the presidential palace, expectations for a genuinely rights-protective outcome remain low.

Turkey’s Crime Alarm: State-Linked Actors and Human Trafficking

According to the 2025 Global Crime Index, Turkey is sounding all the alarms.

Out of 193 countries, Turkey ranks in the top ten worldwide and number one in Europe. The score for state-linked criminal actors is 9 out of 10, one of the worst levels globally. Human trafficking also scores 9 out of 10. Drug trafficking, arms smuggling, human trafficking, tax evasion, corruption, financial and cybercrime are all reported to be on the rise.

These findings support domestic and international assessments that organized crime networks are deeply intertwined with political power and segments of the bureaucracy, eroding both public security and trust in institutions.

Chronic Medicine Shortages Become Structural

Finally, the long-running shortage of medicines in Turkish pharmacies has ceased to be a periodic disruption and has instead become a structural crisis.

From drugs used in cancer treatment to cardiovascular medicines, and from metformin-based medications and insulin for diabetes patients to many other essential pharmaceuticals, access is often impossible for weeks or even months.

The health system is thus experiencing a slow-onset breakdown: doctors prescribe treatments that cannot be filled, patients are forced into dangerous improvisations or black-market solutions, and the social state’s basic promise of access to healthcare is broken.

Combined with lethal food safety incidents, chronic medicine shortages reinforce the picture of a country where the state is very strong in policing politics, but increasingly absent or ineffective when it comes to protecting the lives and health of its citizens.