First and foremost, apologies for the missing bulletin yesterday — my day job got the better of me. I spent most of the day wrestling with the UK e-visa process for a member of parliament, and let me tell you, it’s an absolute nightmare. The system is about as user-friendly as a brick wall and eats up far more time than it has any right to.
Right then, let's get into today's bulletin.
Justice System and Everyday Life in Türkiye
🥇 Turkish wrestler Rıza Kayaalp claims record 13th European title
Members of the Turkish Presidential Cabinet have congratulated national wrestler Rıza Kayaalp after he secured his 13th European Championship gold at the 2026 European Wrestling Championships held in Tirana, Albania, setting a new record as the Greco-Roman wrestler with the most gold medals in the tournament’s history. Posting on NSosyal, Justice Minister Akın Gürlek praised Kayaalp for making the nation proud, while Labour and Social Security Minister Vedat Işıkhan hailed him as “the strongest on the mat”. Interior Minister Mustafa Çiftçi highlighted the wrestler’s determination, discipline and resolve in raising the Turkish flag to the top once again, and Culture and Tourism Minister Mehmet Nuri Ersoy said Kayaalp had written his name in golden letters in European wrestling history. Health Minister Kemal Memişoğlu also joined the tributes, calling the athlete “the lion of the mat” and wishing him continued success.
🏛️ Ömer Burhanlı elected Chamber President at Turkish Court of Accounts
The General Assembly of the Turkish Court of Accounts (Sayıştay) has elected Ömer Burhanlı, a member of the 3rd Chamber, to the post of Chamber President, according to a statement from the Court's presidency. Born in Ankara on 15 March 1966, Burhanlı graduated from Ankara University's Faculty of Political Sciences, Department of Public Administration, in 1991 and began his career at the Court of Accounts in 1992, before being elected as a member of the institution by the Turkish Grand National Assembly in 2013. He is married with three children and speaks English.
Politics
🤝 President Erdoğan hosts New Zealand Governor-General Kiro in Ankara
Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan has received New Zealand’s Governor-General Cindy Kiro at the Presidential Complex in Ankara, in a closed-press meeting attended by Chief Foreign Policy and Security Adviser Akif Çağatay Kılıç. According to a statement from the Directorate of Communications, talks covered bilateral relations as well as regional and global issues, with Erdoğan describing the visit as particularly meaningful given its coincidence with the 111th anniversary of the Gallipoli Campaign — an event of singular importance in the shared memory of both nations. The President stated that Turkey aims to deepen ties with New Zealand in trade, defence industry and transport, and welcomed Wellington’s principled stance against Islamophobia as well as its support for the Palestinian cause and a two-state solution, noting that New Zealand’s recognition of the State of Palestine would contribute to a resolution. Erdoğan also wished New Zealand success ahead of its hosting of next year’s Pacific Islands Forum Summit, highlighted Turkey’s progress on the green transition and climate action, and invited Kiro to the COP31 UN Climate Change Conference, which Turkey will host in Antalya in November.
🥛 President Erdoğan receives Chobani CEO Hamdi Ulukaya at Presidential Complex
Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan has met Hamdi Ulukaya, founder and CEO of yoghurt maker Chobani, at the Presidential Complex in Ankara, in a meeting held behind closed doors with no further details disclosed. During the reception, Ulukaya presented Erdoğan with a Fenerbahçe Football Club shirt bearing the number one and the name “Recep Tayyip Erdoğan” on the back.
🏫 Turkish Parliament forms commission to investigate school attacks
The Turkish Grand National Assembly (TBMM) has approved the establishment of a Parliamentary Research Commission to examine the recent school attacks in Şanlıurfa and Kahramanmaraş, alongside the risks and harmful effects children face in digital environments, with a view to developing policy proposals and preventive measures. During the general assembly debate, proposals submitted by political parties were merged and discussed jointly, with speakers from across the political spectrum agreeing that the incidents could not be treated as isolated cases. New Way Party (Yeni Yol) Group Deputy Chair Bülent Kaya argued that discipline alone could not solve the problem in the absence of moral grounding and called for stronger family support systems, while CHP Kahramanmaraş MP Ali Öztunç read out the names of those killed in the Kahramanmaraş attack, laid carnations in their memory and described the situation as a matter of national security, criticising violent scenes in television dramas and calling for stricter oversight of social media. MHP Kahramanmaraş MP Zuhal Karakoç emphasised the need for foresight rather than harsh measures, saying her party opposed not technology itself but a lack of control, while DEM Party Mardin MP Beritan Güneş Altın warned that responses limited to bans, walls, police and prison would merely sweep the problem under the rug. İYİ Party Group Deputy Chair Uğur Poyraz stressed that the issue went beyond physical security at school gates and pointed to the broader social, digital and moral climate, and AK Party Sinop MP Nazım Maviş called for a multi-layered debate covering family, social environment, virtual platforms and the aestheticisation of violence in certain films and television series. The commission will consist of 22 members, will operate for three months and may carry out work outside Ankara when necessary, with its members to be appointed at a later stage.
🚁 Turkish military CH-47 heavy transport helicopter crashes during training flight
Turkey’s Ministry of National Defence (MSB) has announced that a CH-47 heavy transport helicopter belonging to the Army Aviation Command crashed during a training flight in the Temelli district of Ankara, with the cause yet to be determined. In its statement, the Ministry confirmed that no personnel on board were harmed in the incident and said the cause of the crash would be established following a detailed investigation. The announcement concluded with the Ministry’s customary note of respectful notice to the public.
⚖️ Former Tunceli Governor Tuncay Sonel arrested over Gülistan Doku investigation
Tuncay Sonel, the former Governor of Tunceli, has been formally arrested by a magistrate’s court as part of the investigation into the disappearance of university student Gülistan Doku, who has been missing since 5 January 2020. Detained under an inquiry led by the Erzurum Chief Public Prosecutor’s Office, Sonel was referred to court following his police procedures and a medical check at Erzurum City Hospital, on charges including destroying, concealing or altering evidence, obstructing, corrupting or destroying data in an information system, unlawfully obtaining personal data, and damaging, destroying or concealing official documents. A letter from the Tunceli Chief Public Prosecutor’s Office to its Erzurum counterpart stated that sufficient suspicion had been established regarding Sonel’s actions, noting that jurisdiction over personal offences allegedly committed by governors lies with the provincial prosecutor’s office where the relevant Regional Court of Justice is located. Sonel, who served as Governor of Tunceli between 2017 and 2020, was suspended from duty following an inquiry launched on the instruction of Interior Minister Mustafa Çiftçi and was detained in Elazığ on 17 April. The wider investigation — covering offences including intentional homicide, sexual assault, concealing evidence, unlawful access to information systems, deprivation of liberty, failure to report a crime and harbouring an offender — has so far seen 11 suspects arrested, among them Sonel’s son Mustafa Türkay Sonel, former police officer Gökhan Ertok accused of deleting data from Doku’s SIM card, the then chief physician of Tunceli State Hospital Çağdaş Özdemir accused of deleting hospital records, Doku’s boyfriend Zeinal Abakarov, her mother Cemile Yücer, her stepfather and former police officer Engin Yücer, and Sonel’s former bodyguard Şükrü Eroğlu, while three further suspects were released under judicial control with travel bans. Doku, 21, was reported missing by her family the day after she was last heard from, when they travelled from their hometown of Diyarbakır to Tunceli, and searches have so far yielded no result.
♿ Turkey expands vehicle tax exemption for citizens with orthopaedic disabilities
A new regulation published in Turkey’s Official Gazette has expanded the Special Consumption Tax (ÖTV) exemption on vehicle purchases to include citizens with an orthopaedic disability rate of 40 per cent or above who are unable to obtain a driving licence due to their condition. Issued by the Revenue Administration under the Ministry of Treasury and Finance, the amendment renumbers existing sections and adds a new sub-heading under the provisions covering exemptions for those with a disability rate below 90 per cent. The exemption applies to vehicles with a domestic contribution rate of at least 40 per cent, covering passenger cars and similar vehicles under tariff code 87.03 priced below 2,873,900 Turkish lira including taxes, light commercial vehicles under code 87.04 and motorcycles under code 87.11. Under the new rules, ÖTV will still be calculated on qualifying sales but will not be added to the invoice total — the calculated amount will instead be shown separately, and although a tax return will be filed, no tax liability will be accrued. Applicants must provide a medical board report confirming an orthopaedic disability of at least 40 per cent, documentation demonstrating their inability to obtain a driving licence (with a separate medical report required if this is not stated in the original), and the sales invoice, all of which must be submitted to the tax office on the day following the declaration. The regulation entered into force on the date of its publication, 22 April 2026.
⛏️ Turkish miners freed after 14-hour detention: “We’re not leaving until this is resolved”
The Independent Miners’ Union (Bağımsız Maden İş) has announced that 110 workers detained in Ankara have been released after 14 hours in custody, with union chair Gökay Çakır vowing that the miners will not leave the capital until their demands are met. Çakır said he and 33 colleagues had effectively been taken into custody the moment they reached the vicinity of the Energy Ministry and Parliament, and were held until the evening before being moved to a narrow paved area around three metres wide beside the Ministry, flanked by a wall on one side and a line of 20 vehicles on the other. He claimed the workers were left without blankets or cardboard to sit on in temperatures of minus one degree Celsius, while the vehicles blew exhaust fumes over them through the night, describing the conditions as a “death zone” rather than the “living area” officials had claimed it to be. Çakır said the miners had been detained in a dawn raid at 6am and held without questioning throughout the day, asking what wrong the workers had committed beyond seeking the wages owed to them. Addressing all 600 members of parliament, he questioned whether it was acceptable for miners who work seven storeys underground to be detained for two days simply for demanding their rights, stressing that they had caused no harm to security forces and had only sought to march to the Energy Ministry to make their voices heard. Vowing to return the following day, the union leader declared that no amount of detentions would deter the miners, warning that workers who had gone five months without pay and could no longer provide for their families could not be stopped — and that if necessary, they would “tunnel under Ankara” to reach Parliament, the ministries and the mine owner’s home, because, as he put it, “we are miners”.
📱 Turkey to replace police station sign-ins with biometric tracking for probationers
The Turkish Ministry of Justice is preparing to roll out a new biometric verification and GPS-based tracking system for individuals under judicial supervision, replacing the current requirement to sign in at police stations. According to information in the ministry’s 2025 activity report, the Biometric Signature Method and Tracking System Project (BİOSİS) has reached the tender stage, with the aim of enabling faster intervention in cases of non-compliance and significantly expanding monitoring capacity. The report notes that the four electronic monitoring units currently in use allow only 3,000 people to be tracked, whereas the new system is expected to cover nearly 450,000 individuals under supervision. Under the new arrangement, those subject to measures such as community service or signature obligations will complete biometric verification through their own devices and have their locations monitored via GPS, removing the need to attend a police station in person and triggering automatic alerts in the event of a breach.
🔍 Questions over death of Esma Kılıçarslan brought to Turkish Parliament
The circumstances surrounding the disappearance and death of Esma Kılıçarslan — whose body was found in the Uzunçayır Dam Lake during searches for missing university student Gülistan Doku — have been raised in the Turkish Parliament, with allegations that her autopsy was waived on pandemic grounds despite claims that multiple male DNA traces were later identified on her body. In a parliamentary question submitted to the Interior Minister, DEM Party Tunceli MP Ayten Kordu drew attention to what she described as unanswered questions over the search, investigation and post-mortem process. According to the motion, Kılıçarslan disappeared on 11 March 2020 after leaving her home in the Hozat district of Dersim (Tunceli), remained in contact with her family until 15 March, but was only reported missing roughly two weeks later, while authorities allegedly urged the family not to draw attention to the case. Her body was discovered on 7 April 2020 during searches for Gülistan Doku at the Uzunçayır Dam Lake, and Kordu argued that it was debatable whether the case had been handled with sufficient priority and seriousness. The MP also pointed to uncertainties around the autopsy, noting claims that the procedure had been skipped because of Covid-19 and referencing lawyer Barış Yıldırım’s assertion that traces of DNA belonging to more than one man had been detected on the body. Kordu asked whether any inquiry had been carried out into the alleged advice to the family to stay silent and whether an autopsy had in fact been conducted, and called for the file to be reopened and examined comprehensively.
🔒 Mother of Kahramanmaraş school attacker arrested over negligent homicide
Pınar Peyman Mersinli, the mother of 14-year-old İsa Aras Mersinli who killed 10 people in a school shooting in Kahramanmaraş, has been formally arrested on charges of causing death by negligence, following the earlier arrest of the attacker’s father, Uğur Mersinli. The 14-year-old had carried out the attack at Ayser Çalık Secondary School, where he was a pupil, after placing five firearms and seven magazines belonging to his father — a chief police inspector — into his backpack and opening fire indiscriminately on students and teachers around midday, killing mathematics teacher Ayla Kara and eight pupils and wounding many others. The attacker himself died after being stabbed by a parent at the scene. His father was detained and subsequently arrested, and according to CNN Türk, his mother was brought before the courthouse today and remanded in custody on the charge of causing death through negligence.
🛂 Turkish citizens lose €511 million in rejected Schengen visa applications
Türkiye’s Schengen visa rejection rate has climbed from 3 per cent in 2010 to around 17 per cent last year, with 1.5 million Turkish applications turned down over the past decade and a total of €511 million (approximately 27 billion lira) in non-refundable fees lost in the process. The issue returned to the political agenda after the rejection of a visa application by former AK Party MP Mehmet Metiner, with an estimated 100,000 to 170,000 Turkish applicants being refused each year. CHP Antalya MP Cavit Arı said citizens were struggling even to secure appointments and attributed the problem to concerns over the rule of law in Türkiye, noting that application fees are not refunded when visas are denied. İYİ Party Edirne MP Mehmet Akalın said that 170,000 Turkish applicants had been refused last year alone, with €13.6 million lost as a result. Utku Çakırözer, MP for Eskişehir and a member of the Parliamentary Foreign Affairs Committee, told Sözcü that Türkiye’s diminished international standing over rule-of-law concerns had also eroded the value of its passport, saying “the last stop has become Kapıkule”, the country’s main border crossing into the EU. Application figures show 778,000 submissions from Türkiye in 2022, rising to 1.055 million in 2023 and 1.173 million in 2024. CHP Adana MP Bilal Bilici noted that Türkiye is the second-largest source of visa applications after China and contrasted this with Bulgaria, whose passport is accepted visa-free by 178 countries, adding that Turkish citizens face visa requirements from almost all states apart from a limited group including Japan, South Korea, Bahrain, East Timor, Jordan, Togo, Kosovo, Angola, Eswatini, Zambia, Tunisia, Morocco and Albania. Online complaints about inaccessible visa appointments have surged by 38 per cent in the past month, with allegations of a black market in which appointments are harvested by bots and algorithms the moment embassies release them and resold for around €100. The story is set against the backdrop of then-Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoğlu’s announcement on 11 December 2015 that Turkish citizens would be able to travel visa-free to the Schengen Area by October of the following year — a pledge that remains unfulfilled a decade on.
Ruling Government (AKP, MHP and DEM coalition aka People’s Alliance)
💸 Gaziantep Metropolitan Municipality sinks into debt as funds flow to Syria and banks
Gaziantep Metropolitan Municipality is facing a serious financial crisis, with its 2025 activity report revealing that resources are being drained by bank interest payments while the administration sells off plots of land to service its debts. The municipality, which has drawn criticism for funding a Millet Bahçesi (Nation’s Garden) in Syria, donating passenger buses and making other transfers abroad, has also had to take out loans to pay its electricity bill. According to the 2025 report, the municipality paid 1.49 billion lira in interest last year, and its affiliated companies are on the brink of insolvency. Gaziantep Metropolitan Council member Uğur Kalka said the budget had ballooned to two-and-a-half times the planned level, noting that the municipal transport company Gaziulaş had posted losses of 3.2 billion lira and that GBB Facility Management had declared losses of 941 million lira, accusing the municipality of running its subsidiaries not as “prudent merchants” but as “black holes consuming the budget”. Kalka questioned where capital transfers, which came in 246 per cent above the planned figure, had been directed, and noted that although 1.5 billion lira had been expected under the “donations and special income” line, only 16 per cent — around 250 million lira — had actually been collected, prompting the municipality to take on a further 1 billion lira in fresh bank borrowing at undisclosed interest rates. He pointed out that while the municipality’s total annual staff salary burden stands at 1.74 billion lira, the interest paid to banks reaches 1.49 billion lira, and asked whether diverting such a large share of Gaziantep’s tax revenues directly into bank interest could be described as “prudent management”. Kalka pledged to continue scrutinising every lira of public money and said applications were being submitted to the Court of Accounts and the Interior Ministry, arguing that transparency and accountability are not a favour but a necessity.
🎓 DEM Party co-leader Bakırhan calls for Education Minister’s resignation
DEM Party Co-Chair Tuncer Bakırhan has called on Turkish Education Minister Yusuf Tekin to take responsibility and resign following the recent school attacks in Kahramanmaraş and Şanlıurfa, during his party’s group meeting at the Grand National Assembly. Opening his remarks on the detention of 110 Doruk Mining workers who had marched from Eskişehir to Ankara demanding months of unpaid wages, Bakırhan described the treatment of the miners as shameful, saying they had been taken into custody outside the Ministry of Energy and Natural Resources rather than being asked why they were there, and insisted that the workers must be released and paid what they are owed. Turning to the school attacks, Bakırhan said he was speaking not only as a politician but as one of millions of parents who see their children off to school each morning, offering condolences to the families of the children and teachers who lost their lives and wishing the wounded a swift recovery. He argued that the attacks were neither isolated incidents nor acts of individual madness, but the product of years of accumulated anger, helplessness, isolation and impunity produced by a system that he said corrupts everything it touches, deepens inequality, erodes institutions and alienates people from one another, with children bearing the heaviest burden. Recalling that the Serbian education minister resigned after an attack at a primary school in 2023 that killed eight pupils and a security guard, Bakırhan listed a series of Turkish tragedies — the earthquakes in which tens of thousands died, deaths of miners, a hotel fire following an allegedly wrongful licence, and killings of children and teachers in schools — after which no one had stepped down. He said schools now offer “no cleanliness, no safety, no success”, only “hopelessness, insecurity and death”, and declared clearly that Minister Tekin should accept responsibility and resign. Bakırhan also said the government must do its part, describing the call as neither a polemic nor political manoeuvring but a minimum responsibility towards society and children, and added that the opposition too must examine itself and build a sincere, comprehensive politics reaching every section of society, pledging that his party would fight harder for a country in which children are not killed and can live in safety.
Opposition Parties (CHP and others)
🏫 CHP leader Özel: “You can’t shift the blame onto TV series and films”
CHP leader Özgür Özel has accused the Turkish government of presiding over a “social collapse” and rejected attempts to blame the recent school attacks on television dramas and films, speaking at his party’s group meeting in the Grand National Assembly. Özel said the country was dealing with an Education Minister he described as “unqualified, incompetent, presumptuous and hostile to the Republic”, under whose tenure 45 incidents of violence had taken place in schools, resulting in the deaths of six teachers, eleven students, two school staff and one parent — twenty people in total. He reminded MPs that Minister Yusuf Tekin had promised to step up security measures as recently as 2 March following the killing of a teacher named Fatmanur, but said the absence of any meaningful action had been painfully exposed. Özel stressed that his party did not view the crisis purely as a security issue but as part of a wider social, economic and psychological picture affecting children, citing peer bullying, substance abuse and children pushed towards crime, and noted that nearly four in ten children in Türkiye live in poverty, with the country ranking second among 37 OECD countries in child poverty, behind only Costa Rica. He tied this collapse to what he called a lack of meritocracy in government, a repressive approach to freedoms, injustice in courts, taxation and social life, and a deepening economic crisis, arguing that these same factors explain the spread of narcotics and the impunity of criminal gangs in the streets. Addressing the government directly, he said responsibility could not be shifted onto TV series or films, pointing out that the ruling bloc had governed the country for 24 years with full authority and no excuses. Özel said that even remarks by MHP leader Devlet Bahçeli and President Erdoğan pointed to a crisis and a decay. He outlined CHP’s proposals, crediting shadow cabinet member Suat Özçağdaş, including the immediate appointment of 100,000 of the teachers still without posts, along with 75,000 school nurses and 65,000 security officers — the latter to be recruited not politically but from among trained specialist sergeants already entitled by law to transfer to other public institutions after seven years of service. Closing on a political note, Özel drew parallels with Hungary and Brazil, saying that just as Viktor Orbán had been unseated and Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva had returned from prison to defeat Jair Bolsonaro, the next elections in Türkiye would be a contest between democrats and autocrats, and pledged that his party would defeat “the autocrat and all those who look to him for salvation” and restore democracy.
🏛️ Ataşehir Mayor Onursal Adıgüzel and 18 others arrested in bribery probe
Ataşehir Mayor Onursal Adıgüzel and 18 other suspects have been remanded in custody as part of an investigation into alleged bribery in tender, zoning and occupancy procedures at the Istanbul district municipality. The Istanbul Anatolian Chief Public Prosecutor’s Office launched the inquiry on the basis of tip-offs that Mayor Adıgüzel, Deputy Mayors Birkan Birol Yıldız, Orhan Aydoğdu and Oğuz Kaya, along with relevant unit heads and staff, had been receiving bribes in connection with tenders and permit processes, pursuing charges of bribery, establishing, managing and being a member of a criminal organisation, and rigging tenders. Investigators obtained reports from the Financial Crimes Investigation Board (MASAK) and mobile phone communication records of the suspects, concluding that building permits and occupancy approvals had been issued in return for payments, and the Istanbul Police Department’s Financial Crimes Unit mapped out the structure and workings of the alleged organisation. The investigation found that firms operating within the Ataşehir municipality had paid bribes reaching millions of dollars in exchange for permits, with the sums calibrated to the scale of each project and the proceeds distributed according to the position and authority of those involved within the municipality. Simultaneous operations at 45 addresses across Istanbul resulted in the detention of 20 suspects, including the mayor, with two further suspects apprehended subsequently. Following prosecutor’s questioning, the magistrate’s court remanded 19 people in custody, among them Adıgüzel, Deputy Mayors Kaya, Aydoğdu and Yıldız, the municipality’s financial affairs director, private secretariat director, building control director, permits and inspection director, zoning permits director, construction and zoning director, an architect, a deputy police chief, the drivers of Adıgüzel and Yıldız, employees of construction and architectural firms, and other municipal staff. One suspect, Nimet Karademir, was released under judicial control.
⚖️ 29 detained in second wave of Uşak Municipality bribery probe sent to courthouse
A total of 29 suspects detained in the second wave of an investigation into Uşak Municipality — including CHP Uşak Provincial Chair Celalettin Çoban and Uşakspor Club President Özhan Özgöbek — have been referred to the courthouse after completing their statements. The Istanbul Chief Public Prosecutor’s Office launched the inquiry on 27 March over allegations of bribery and corruption at the municipality, with the first wave of operations leading to the detention of 13 people including Mayor Özkan Yalım, nine of whom were subsequently remanded in custody. A second wave of operations began on Monday, 20 April, and those detained in this round gave their statements at the Istanbul Financial Crimes Unit before being transferred early this morning to the Istanbul Courthouse, where the investigation is being conducted.
📢 CHP plans protest in Adana after suspension of Yüreğir Mayor Demirçalı
Türkiye’s main opposition party CHP has announced a demonstration outside Yüreğir Municipality in Adana after the Interior Ministry removed Mayor Ali Demirçalı from office, calling the decision neither lawful nor legitimate. The CHP Adana Provincial Branch has invited citizens to a press statement scheduled for 5pm today in front of the municipality, saying the gathering will be held to raise a voice against the mayor’s suspension and to defend democracy. The move follows the Interior Ministry’s announcement that Demirçalı had been suspended after being sentenced to five years and three months in prison on charges of offering bribes. In a social media post, the CHP Adana branch argued that the removal of the mayor represents a clear violation of the rule of law, insisting that the decision rests on no legal or legitimate ground and amounts to a direct intervention against the will of the people.
Thanks for reading this far, I will see you tomorrow. ☕