The association, which has worked on LGBTI+ rights for 33 years, said the office was a community space where LGBTI+s gathered, built solidarity and carried out volunteer activities.

Lambdaistanbul said the sealing was a continuation of measures targeting LGBTI+s’ living and organizing spaces following the Sep 12 "My Family Is Safe" operations.

"We do not accept that our association activities, which we have carried out openly, transparently and on record for years, are now being cited as grounds for the allegation of 'operating an unauthorized venue,' or that our living spaces are being restricted," the association said.

"We are not giving up the collective solidarity spaces of lubunyas," it added, using a Turkey queer community term.

Active since 1993

Lambdaistanbul’s history dates back to the "Sexual Freedom Events" planned in İstanbul in 1993, which were banned by the governor’s office.

After the event was banned and members of the organizing committee were detained, the group continued meeting. It adopted the name Lambda İstanbul that same year and joined the International Lesbian and Gay Association (ILGA).

In its early years, the group met in homes and at venues belonging to other organizations. In 2002, it opened its first office in Terkos Çıkmazı and established the Lambdaistanbul Culture Center.

The center hosted meetings, workshops, talks and solidarity events.

Lambdaistanbul was among the organizations that held İstanbul’s first Pride March in 2003.

Closure order overturned by Court of Cassation

The group obtained association status in 2006. A closure case was later filed against it.

A court decision ordering the association’s closure was overturned by the Court of Cassation in 2009.

Lambdaistanbul left its Beyoğlu premises in 2014 and closed the Lambdaistanbul Culture Center in 2016. It continued its activities in different venues and through online meetings in subsequent years.

The association says it works to help LGBTI+s come together, build solidarity networks and strengthen their rights advocacy. It says its work is based on solidarity against discrimination, horizontal organizing, nonviolence, volunteerism, participation and transparency.

Nine suspects who were referred to the courthouse yesterday after procedures at the gendarmerie were remanded in custody by a duty judgeship.

Two others, including Başaran, chair of the company's board, were released under judicial control measures requiring house arrest.

The 11 detainees included the company chair, factory manager and employer representative, quality and planning manager, administrative manager, Aliağa branch manager, steelworks manager, mechanical maintenance chief, steelworks chief, periodic inspection engineer, department engineer and crane mechanical maintenance engineer.

Sister of HABAŞ blast victim: The dead cannot defend their rights, that is our duty

12 November 2026

Meanwhile, Abdullah Kılınç, who was seriously injured in the explosion, died in hospital yesterday, Nov 11.

Kılınç was initially taken to Aliağa State Hospital before being transferred to İzmir Bakırçay University Çiğli Training and Research Hospital.

Six other workers injured in the explosion remain under treatment in hospitals.

Kılınç's death brought the reported death toll to 19.

Anadolu Agency (AA) reported that the number of people killed had risen to 18 following Kılınç's death. However, Güner Gökçe was not included on the agency's list.

Deputy Justice Minister Can Tuncay told reporters after inspecting the facility on Nov 10 that one worker's body had not been recovered.

"According to applications from the families, the body of one of our workers has not been reached," he said. "Inspections at the scene are continuing."

Following the statement, several news agencies, local news platforms and the Workers' Health and Work Safety Assembly (İSİG) reported that Gökçe's body had been found under the debris.

A condolence message for Gökçe, who was born in Paşalı, formerly known as Berdik, in Erzurum's Şenkaya district, was also published on a local community page.

The 19 workers reported killed in the explosion are Abdülkadir Kınacı, Abdullah Kılınç, Barış Güney, Ceylan Bıyıklı, Ersin Oğuz, Fatih Işık, Ferhat Maraşlı, Göksel Ünaldı, Güner Gökçe, Hüsnü Ersoy, İlker Sığırtmaçoğlu, Kadir Kaan Özçelik, Mustafa Sert, Orhan Altay, Özcan Efe, Recep Fedai, Serkan Kurt, Uğur Temel and Yasin Taşçı.

His sister, Şevval Özçelik, told bianet that her brother had accepted the job because he believed working at HABAŞ would strengthen his résumé.

About six weeks before the fatal explosion, Kadir Kaan Özçelik suffered burns to his hands at work, she said. Although the burns were serious enough to affect the use of his hands, he did not want the incident recorded as a workplace accident.

HABAŞ’s own report had documented a rise in workplace accidents

10 November 2026

"When we asked him why, he said people working there, or people partly responsible for the area, had told him things like, 'If you have this recorded as a workplace accident, they will give you trouble, you won't be able to find a job, they will fire you, you will struggle, and it will stain your résumé,'" she said.

Özçelik said her brother wanted to avoid problems because he was trying to support his family and pay for her private tutoring.

She said he had repeatedly spoken to family members and friends about serious safety problems at the factory.

"My brother died for 40,000 liras," she said, adding that he worked in the machinery maintenance department. According to Özçelik, employees sometimes worked from 9 am until midnight on maintenance days instead of their usual 9 am to 5 pm schedule, without receiving overtime pay.

Özçelik also questioned whether the publicly reported death toll fully reflected the number of people killed.

"While I was waiting for my brother's body, waiting outside the factory and going from hospital to hospital, I saw many people, many families, looking for their loved ones," she said.

At the time of the explosion, Özçelik was taking a practice exam at a private tutoring center. Her parents learned about the blast and went directly to the factory.

"We searched until 7 or 8 in the evening, crying and dragging ourselves around, asking, 'Is my brother under the rubble? Is he in a hospital?'" she said. "They hid from us who had died. They did not even make an effort to give us their names."

She recalled asking a person responsible at the scene for a list of the dead and missing.

"We said, 'Where is the list of the dead? Where is the list of the missing? Give us the list.' The man said mockingly, 'Find them, make those lists already,' even though he was the person who was supposed to do it," she said.

After the family learned of Kadir Kaan Özçelik's death, they were directed to the Şirinyer Forensic Medicine Institute.

Özçelik said families were repeatedly told that severe burns were making DNA comparisons difficult and that announcements promised within half an hour were not made on time.

“Neither my mother nor I could see my brother’s body,” she said. “In the end, we could only see his hair. That was what we were deemed worthy of. My father asked someone he knew for help, and we were only able to get a limited look.”

Özçelik said she wanted those responsible to receive meaningful punishment rather than short prison terms.

"The dead cannot defend their own rights, that is our duty," she said. "My brother is dead. I cannot bring him back. Even if I secure his rights, I will not gain anything. I will still be left with what I lost."

She said she did not want other siblings or parents to experience the same loss.

"I don't want anyone to have to settle for seeing their brother's burned hair," she said. "I want this to end, or at least to decrease, and I want those responsible to receive sufficient punishment. I don't want them to spend three or five months in prison just for a media show and then be released."

Özçelik, who will turn 19 on Nov 16, said her brother had been planning to buy her a birthday present.

"I had borrowed money from him. He told me, 'I'm going to buy you a birthday present anyway. This can be on top of it,'" she said. "He gave me his last spending money and went to heaven."

She said her brother had also wanted to grow his hair, lose weight and achieve the physique he wanted through fitness.

“He was sacrificed to someone else’s pursuit of profit,” she said.

Özçelik said one of her brother’s greatest wishes was for women and young girls in Turkey to be able to build careers and become financially independent, rather than having to depend on people who might hurt them.

"This is my second year after graduation, and my brother was paying for my tutoring center," she said. "I will still study. I will go back to my tutoring center when I recover. But I no longer have a brother who will pay my tuition."

Abdullah, who was forced to close his restaurant in 2022, came to public attention in his new role following a visit to the Hak Industrialists and Businesspeople’s Association (HAKSİAD) on October 30, 2026.

During the visit, Abdullah and Muhtar Abdullahi Ali, an executive at Somalia-based Aw Ali Company, discussed trade relations between Turkey and Somalia and opportunities for cooperation.

His restaurant was forced to close

Muhammed İsa Abdullah began running Saab Cafe, which served Somali and African cuisine, in Ankara’s Kızılay neighbourhood in 2019.

From 2021 onwards, however, the business made headlines over police inspections and changes to its sign.

The restaurant faced police interventions because it had a foreign name and its sign featured yellow, red and green.

In June 2022, police painted the restaurant’s sign white. The operators protested, saying they held the necessary legal permits.

The General Directorate of Security argued in a statement at the time that the name on the sign differed from the name on the business licence and that the sign did not comply with standards.

He faced a deportation order

Abdullah was detained on September 20, 2022, and taken to the Akyurt Removal Centre in Ankara.

He was released on October 25 following legal action by his lawyers.

After the interventions targeting his restaurant, however, Abdullah announced in December 2022 that Saab Cafe had closed.

Sharing a photograph of the closure on social media, Abdullah wrote: “Beginning–Middle–End!”

Court found discrimination in police conduct

In an April 2024 ruling, Ankara’s 5th Administrative Court found that police actions against the Somali business owner had been motivated by racist prejudice.

The court identified discrimination in the treatment of businesses run by migrants.

It also examined video recordings submitted by Abdullah that contained discriminatory remarks by police officers.

Speaking after the ruling, Abdullah said he had faced discrimination because he was a Somali citizen and that the court’s decision had established what he had experienced.

Another café with a foreign name opened at the same address

After Saab Cafe closed, a new business called “Verte Coffee House” opened at the same address in 2024.

Abdullah criticised the authorities, pointing out that his restaurant had been targeted over its foreign-language sign while another business with a foreign name was allowed to operate at the same location.

Describing his experience as “institutional racism,” Abdullah said he had been forced to close his restaurant.

Returning to Turkey on a diplomatic assignment

Abdullah arrived in Turkey to study in 2012 and attended Ondokuz Mayıs University in Samsun. He later completed a master’s degree at Bursa Uludağ University.

After finishing his education, Abdullah went into business in Ankara. He left Turkey following the administrative and legal proceedings he faced in 2022.

Abdullah has now reportedly been appointed trade attaché at the Somali Embassy in Ankara.

Journalists who obtained accreditation for COP31 months ago cannot use it to cover the Turkey-hosted Leaders’ Summit from inside the hall. Entry is restricted to journalists in a special press pool jointly selected by the UN Climate Change and Turkish government media teams.

Responding to bianet’s questions, the COP31 press desk said approximately 20 journalists selected on the basis of geographical representation would be admitted, alongside journalists and photographers accompanying leaders. The press desk did not disclose the total number of journalists who would be allowed into the hall.

The UN Climate Change media team also told bianet that access was limited. It said journalists unable to enter could follow the summit via livestream, adding that similar restrictions had been applied to Leaders’ Summits at other COPs.

“UN and Turkish government media teams selected the press”

bianet also emailed the UN Climate Change media team to ask how the press pool had been selected and how accredited journalists could access the summit.

The team responded:

For these events, the UN Climate Change media team, in cooperation with the Turkish government media team, will select and manage a geographically balanced media pool representing outlets from all regions. Individual media representatives will not be able to register for the pool.

While there are no longer any places available to remain inside throughout the summit, photographers will be admitted for the first few minutes of each national statement and escorted out after taking photographs.

Şık, the wife of Workers’ Party of Turkey (TİP) İstanbul MP Ahmet Şık, was then taken to the İstanbul Courthouse in Çağlayan to give a statement.

Yonca Verdioğlu Şık was informed that she was accused of “political and military espionage.” She was released after more than an hour of questioning by the prosecutor.

Şık had recently been targeted by the Yeni Şafak newspaper.

Operating in Aliağa since 1987, HABAŞ is one of Turkey’s major iron and steel producers.

According to HABAŞ’s current corporate figures, the steelmaking facility at its Aliağa plant has an annual production capacity of 4.5 million tonnes of liquid steel. The company also operates in industrial and medical gases, energy, heavy machinery, LPG and natural gas.

However, HABAŞ has long been associated with intense production pressure, understaffing, long working hours, deferred maintenance and shortcomings in workplace safety.

HABAŞ’s 2025 sustainability report shows a marked deterioration in the company’s occupational health and safety indicators compared with the previous year.

According to the report, the number of lost-time workplace accidents among HABAŞ employees rose from 109 in 2024 to 146 in 2025, an increase of approximately 34 percent in one year.

The increase was considerably higher among subcontractor employees. Lost-time workplace accidents rose from 38 in 2024 to 83 in 2025, an increase of more than 118 percent.

The company explicitly acknowledged the rise in its report:

“The increase in the number of lost-time accidents in 2025 became a priority on HABAŞ’s occupational health and safety performance management agenda.”

The company also stated that it recorded no fatal workplace accidents among its own employees or subcontractor employees throughout 2025.

Işıkhan: “Inspections found no very serious problems”

Minister of Labour and Social Security Vedat Işıkhan said that 37 occupational health and safety specialists, two workplace physicians and one healthcare worker were employed at the factory.

Işıkhan said the ministry’s Directorate of Guidance and Inspection had conducted checks and inspections at the workplace on various occasions. “Our inspectors found no very serious problems. However, this workplace accident has caused a very serious problem,” he said.

Asked by a journalist when the factory’s crane had last undergone maintenance, Işıkhan replied:

“It is too early to say anything at this stage; the incident has only just happened. The necessary statements will be made once the checks and inspections are complete.”

At least 110 metalworkers killed in 10 months

The deaths at HABAŞ came at a time when workplace fatalities remained high across the country.

According to the Health and Safety Labour Watch (İSİG) October 2026 report on workplace killings, at least 193 workers died while working in October alone, bringing the total for the first 10 months of 2026 to at least 1,930.

At least 110 workers died in the metal industry during the same period. According to İSİG’s monthly figures, 16 metalworkers died while working in January, 10 in February, six in March, 10 in April, 10 in May, 19 in June, 10 in July, 11 in August, six in September and 12 in October.

The İzmir Governor’s Office said preliminary findings indicated that the explosion occurred when an overhead crane broke loose and fell into an electric arc furnace during the pouring of molten steel.

The explosion has brought renewed attention to previous fatal workplace accidents and incidents resulting in serious injuries at HABAŞ’s factory and port facilities in Aliağa.

Over the years, explosions, molten steel spills, falls from height, crane accidents and mass poisoning incidents at these facilities have killed numerous workers and injured dozens more.

Open sources provide the following accounts of fatal and non-fatal workplace incidents at HABAŞ’s Aliağa facilities:

• 1999: According to a statement made in 2018 by Ali Ekber Tali, the Aliağa representative of the Türk Metal union, four workers were killed when a ladle fell at the HABAŞ Iron and Steel Plant in 1999. Around 20 workers required prolonged hospital treatment.
• December 2001: According to a periodic report by the Human Rights Association (İHD), Şevket Taşa’s feet became trapped beneath a pallet during the replacement of a furnace vessel in the steelmaking section of HABAŞ’s Aliağa plant. He lost one leg.
• November 16, 2007: An artillery shell exploded during scrap sorting at the HABAŞ Iron and Steel Plant’s scrap storage area, killing 29-year-old İlyas Kırdı and injuring 10 people.
• August 24, 2008: Kutbettin Özkaya, 37, a worker at HABAŞ’s Aliağa iron and steel plant, was killed when a 2.5-tonne iron block slipped from a crane and crushed him during truck loading.
• May 15, 2013: Olgar Öner, 24, who worked in the steelmaking section of the HABAŞ Iron and Steel Plant, was killed when a crane’s lifting cable snapped and the load struck him on the head.
• August 2013: Four separate workplace accidents occurred at HABAŞ within a month. In one, Engin Solmaz was electrocuted due to an electrical fault in a grinding machine’s cable. Workers sustained serious injuries in the other three incidents.
• October 16, 2013: Two separate workplace accidents occurred at HABAŞ on the same day. Ergün Öztürk suffered burns when molten material erupted from a furnace. Records from the time also noted a second incident involving injury at the plant that day.
• July 8, 2014: More than 100 workers at the HABAŞ Iron and Steel Plant were taken to hospital with suspected food poisoning after lunch. Reports at the time said three workers were in serious condition.
• September 2015: A crane accident occurred in HABAŞ’s Rolling Mill 3 section. A worker identified as Durmuş was trapped under debris and sustained injuries to his head and arm.
• July 26, 2018: Five workers were injured in an explosion while broken electrodes were being removed from the HABAŞ Iron and Steel Plant’s 150-tonne steel furnace. One of the injured workers, 29-year-old Evren Erik, died in hospital on August 3.
• August 30, 2018: An explosion at the plant’s continuous casting machine seriously injured Veli Yılmaz, Ramazan Şen and Hüseyin Gül.
• October 18, 2018: HABAŞ worker Hasan Bostancı died after falling from a dust collection stack approximately 15 metres high, which he had climbed to clean.
• May 8, 2019: A 120-tonne ladle tipped over while being placed on a transport vehicle in HABAŞ’s Aliağa steelmaking section. Around 80 tonnes of molten steel spilled into the work area, injuring 11 workers, four of them seriously.
• August 14, 2020: Subcontracted worker Şaban Karaca was seriously injured after becoming trapped between steel blocks while they were being moved in the plant’s outdoor yard. He died after being taken to hospital.
• October 7, 2020: HABAŞ worker Kadir Özdemir, 36, died after falling approximately 10 metres while working in the steelmaking section. In a compensation lawsuit brought by his family, HABAŞ was found primarily at fault, with its share of responsibility assessed at 70 percent.
• November 6, 2020: Raif Çatan, who worked for a subcontractor at HABAŞ Port, died after falling into the sea during nighttime ship-loading operations.
• January 11, 2024: Kemal Özdemir, 50, who worked as a cleaner at HABAŞ Port, was killed when a metal coil fell onto him during ship-loading operations.
• May 7, 2024: An explosion in the HABAŞ Iron and Steel Plant’s steel furnace injured four workers, one of them seriously.
• September 28, 2025: An explosion in a furnace in HABAŞ’s Aliağa steelmaking section injured seven workers, one of them seriously.
• September 30, 2025: Citing workers, Evrensel reported that two interns had died at HABAŞ that year. The report said the incident had occurred two months earlier but did not provide their names, the exact dates of their deaths or the circumstances in which they died.
• October 21, 2026: Hakan Doğan, 55, who worked for subcontractor Akyaka, died after falling approximately eight metres from a ladder at the HABAŞ facility.
• November 5, 2026: Eyüp Eğinli, who worked at the HABAŞ plant for subcontractor Serdar Endüstri, was killed when a heavy machinery tyre exploded while being inflated. Another worker was injured in the explosion.

The We Want Freedom Campaign has called for solidarity ahead of the November 12 first hearing in the trial of five trans women arrested during the operations dubbed “My Family Is Safe.”

The five trans women, who are held in Sincan Closed Prison, will appear before the Ankara 61st Criminal Court of First Instance at 10:30 am on Thursday, November 12.

The campaign said the indictment treats the women’s social media posts and gender identities as grounds for criminal charges, and called on the public to observe the hearing.

In a statement titled “We have a court date: We will be at Ankara Courthouse on November 12 to demand freedom for imprisoned trans women,” the campaign said:

“As the We Want Freedom Campaign, we call on everyone to come to court on November 12 to stand in solidarity with imprisoned trans women, to say ‘Being trans is not a crime,’ and to reiterate our demand for freedom.”

“I am waiting for the day I will be free”

The campaign’s statement also included a message sent from Sincan Prison by Efsun Yakar, one of the trans women held in pretrial detention. The campaign’s statement also included a message from Efsun Yakar, one of the trans women held in pretrial detention at Sincan Prison.

Yakar described prison conditions:

If you’re wondering what it’s like in here, even drinking water costs money. There is neither life nor freedom here. I feel like a lion locked in a cage. I am waiting for the day I will be free. May that day come for everyone unjustly imprisoned!

Joint call from LGBTI+ organizations

Ahead of the hearing, 14 LGBTI+ organizations also issued a joint statement calling on the public to gather in solidarity at Ankara Courthouse on November 12.

Noting that the five trans women face “obscenity” charges, the organizations said: “We will not leave our friends alone as they face charges of ‘obscenity,’ the old and new guise of hostility toward LGBTI+ people. We will once again say ‘We Want Freedom’ at Ankara Courthouse.”

The statement said LGBTI+ activists, members of associations’ executive and supervisory boards, and trans women had been subjected to ill-treatment in prison following the operations that began on September 12. It also noted that more trans women had been arrested in two separate operations in Ankara and İzmir following the initial operation in Ankara.

The joint statement continued:

We call for freedom; those in power choose oppression. Yet, drawing on more than 30 years of struggle, the justness of defending our existence and life itself, and our confidence that everyone in this land who stands for goodness, beauty, a dignified life, equality, freedom, and democracy stands with us, we know this: No one can prosper through oppression!

The statement was signed by the May 17 Association, the November 20 Association for Combating Hate Crimes, the Ankara Rainbow Families Association (GALADER), the Young LGBTI+ Association, the HEVİ LGBTI+ Association, the Kaos GL Association, the Red Umbrella Association, the Lambdaistanbul Association, the Association of Families and Relatives of LGBTI+ People (LİSTAG), the Mersin 7 Colors LGBTI+ Solidarity Association, the Pink Life LGBTI+ Solidarity Association, the Social Policy, Gender Identity and Sexual Orientation Studies Association (SPoD), the Free Colors Association, and the UniKuir Association.

Background

The operations dubbed “My Family Is Safe” began on September 12. Members of LGBTI+ associations, rights defenders, activists, and journalists were taken into police custody. Rights defenders, including members of Kaos GL’s executive and supervisory boards, were subsequently remanded in custody.

Five trans women were also remanded in custody in Ankara, while orders were issued blocking access to LGBTI+ organizations’ websites and social media accounts. 

Five trans women were also remanded in custody in Ankara, while access to the websites and social media accounts of LGBTI+ organizations was blocked by court orders.

Representatives from nearly 200 countries will negotiate key issues on the global climate agenda, including efforts to address climate change, emissions reductions, adaptation policies, and climate finance.

COP31 must deliver beyond Antalya’s conference halls

28 October 2026

First day’s theme: Food, agriculture, and health

The first day of the conference is dedicated to “Food, Agriculture and Health.” Sessions throughout the day will address the resilience of agricultural and food systems to climate change, the efficient use of water resources, and the effects of the climate crisis on public health.

At an event scheduled for 11 am at the Australia Pavilion in the Blue Zone, civil society organizations from Turkey and Australia will call for a transition away from fossil fuels. Bringing together civil society representatives from Turkey, hosting country of COP31, and Australia, which is presiding over the negotiations, the session is expected to address both countries’ responsibilities in phasing out fossil fuels.

Other events throughout the day will focus on a just energy transition, climate finance, the transformation of electricity grids, and states’ obligations under international climate law.

'Staggering hypocrisy': Activists condemn Sinpaş Holding's 'climate supporter' role at COP31

14 October 2026

Leaders’ summit begins on November 11

The Antalya Leaders’ Summit, bringing together heads of state and government as part of COP31, will take place on November 11–12. Hosted by President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, the summit is expected to provide a platform for world leaders to share their priorities and commitments on tadressing climate change.

Their statements are expected to shape the negotiations, particularly on emissions reductions, adaptation to climate change, and financing for developing countries.

The two weeks of COP31 negotiations are scheduled to conclude on November 20.

People’s Climate Summit begins on November 14

The People’s Climate Summit, bringing together climate justice advocates from around the world, will begin on November 14. Participants will mark its opening with a rally on the Global Day of Action on November 14.

Climate Justice Forum on November 15

The Climate Justice Forum will also bring together numerous rights defenders in Antalya as part of events organized as an alternative to COP31.

COP31 and Climate Justice

27 October 2026

Investment fund probe expands to senior officials as prosecutors seek lengthy sentences for journalists

Turkey’s investment fund investigation has widened to include serving regulators, former senior financial officials and political figures, while prosecutors are seeking prison sentences of up to nearly 19 years for journalists who reported or commented on the case.

Mustafa Alper Taş, the serving head of the Banking Regulation and Supervision Agency’s (BDDK) Fourth Implementation Department, was remanded on Nov 7 on a bribery charge after being detained four days earlier.

Former Capital Markets Board (SPK) deputy chair Enver Usca and former SPK Market Surveillance and Supervision Department head Ercan Urkan were also remanded on Nov 7 on bribery allegations. Former SPK Corporate Finance Department head Kürşat Sait Babuçcu was released under judicial supervision, while former SPK board member Bülent Murat Haholu was released after giving a statement to prosecutors.

The latest arrests follow proceedings against several other former senior officials. Former Borsa İstanbul chief Korkmaz Enes Ergun was remanded on a bribery allegation after his detention on Oct 31. Former SPK department head Erman Çete was remanded on Oct 26.

Erkan Kilimci, a former Central Bank deputy governor who later served on the board of Tera Yatırım, was remanded on Sep 25 as the investigation expanded to Tera and other fund-related companies.

Former Family and Social Policies Minister Fatma Betül Sayan Kaya, who resigned as the deputy chair of the ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) after the crisis unfolded, was remanded on Nov 5 on allegations of violating the Capital Markets Law and membership in a criminal organization.

Prosecutors cited Kaya’s sale of Özata Denizcilik shares shortly before the decision to liquidate investment funds and alleged that she had access to nonpublic information. Kaya denies wrongdoing.

Former AKP deputy Ertan Aydın was remanded on Oct 26 after prosecutors appealed an earlier judicial-control decision.

The investigation has also reached state-controlled insurance companies. Former Türkiye Sigorta and Türkiye Hayat Emeklilik general manager Taha Çakmak was initially released under judicial supervision, resigned on Oct. 15 and was later detained again and remanded. Prosecutors alleged improper transfers of Türkiye Sigorta funds and benefits received from Tera Group.

Gürol Sami Özer, who was Türkiye Sigorta deputy general manager, was also detained and remanded in late October.

Former SPK chair İbrahim Ömer Gönül has been questioned as a suspect but was not detained. He was released under judicial supervision after a second round of questioning on Nov 5.

Justice Minister Akın Gürlek said on Nov 3 that the investigation covered 433 suspects, including 112 in pretrial detention and 186 under judicial supervision. Arrest warrants had been issued for another 38 people. Same-day reports following subsequent arrests gave differing totals for the number held in pretrial detention.

The investigation began after prosecutors requested information from the SPK on Aug 19 concerning unusual price movements in Borsa İstanbul-listed shares. Regulators moved on Sep. 17 to liquidate 131 investment funds after liquidity problems emerged.

Investigators are examining allegations that funds coordinated transactions to artificially inflate share prices. The probe also involves suspected market manipulation, insider trading, bribery, money laundering and organized criminal activity.

Gürlek has described the investigation as involving a broader criminal network reaching into the upper levels of the financial bureaucracy, including alleged bribery aimed at disabling regulatory oversight. He has also alleged links between market manipulators and parts of the media. The allegations have not been established at trial.

Journalists facing charges

Separately, at least five journalists have been detained in connection with reporting or commentary about the fund scandal.

Sözcü editor Mustafa Balcı and Bizim TV journalist Şaban Sevinç were detained on Oct 8 and remanded the following day on allegations of "publicly disseminating misleading information."

Their case concerns posts about AKP spokesperson Ömer Çelik and Osman Arıkan Nacar, whose name appeared in the fund investigation. Balcı shared a photograph of the two together, while Sevinç discussed the allegations on X and YouTube.

Prosecutors are seeking up to 10 years and 10 months in prison for Balcı and 18 years, 11 months and 15 days for Sevinç on combinations of charges including disseminating misleading information, defamation and insulting a public official. Both remain in pretrial detention, with their first hearing scheduled for Nov 27.

Journalists İsmail Saymaz and Murat Ağırel were also investigated following an Oct 7 Sözcü TV broadcast about Trade Minister Ömer Bolat’s investments. They were initially released with reporting requirements and travel bans before prosecutors appealed and both were placed under house arrest.

Prosecutors are seeking between five years, two months and 14 years, 10 months in prison for each journalist. The charges include publicly disseminating misleading information, defamation, insulting a public official, unlawfully disclosing personal data and revealing information alleged to constitute commercial, banking or customer secrets.

Prosecutors say their television discussion linked Bolat to the fund investigation without sufficient documentary support and disclosed information concerning his investments in Hedef Portföy. Saymaz and Ağırel reject the accusations.

Ağırel is currently imprisoned in a separate money-laundering investigation rather than the case concerning his reporting on the fund scandal. Saymaz remains under house arrest.

Journalist Bahadır Özgür, who had extensively covered the investigation, was detained on Oct 15 on suspicion of violating the confidentiality of the investigation. He was later released under judicial control, including a travel ban and regular reporting requirements.

COP31 approaches

As the UN Climate Cummit (COP31) is set to kick off on Nov 9,  asurvey found that 90% of respondents did not know Turkey would host COP31. Despite low awareness of the summit, 77% supported accelerating solar and wind investment, 78% opposed opening additional coal mines and 71% said they were worried about climate change.

Climate reporting also challenged the idea that the Black Sea will become a safe haven as Turkey warms. Climate scientist Murat Türkeş said future habitability will depend on water, employment, infrastructure and disaster exposure—not temperature alone—and warned that poorer people may be unable either to adapt or relocate.

Research on the İğneada Floodplain Forests found that the Erikli floodplain shrank by 16% between 1984 and 2014, while wetlands at Sakagöl disappeared or deteriorated. Average temperatures in the region rose 1.8°C over 44 years, and researchers warned that drought, water stress and human pressure were threatening biodiversity and carbon storage.

At the biodiversity COP17 in Yerevan, experts from Turkey and Armenia called for cooperation on shared rivers, water data and cross-border ecosystems. Their proposals showed how ecological interdependence persists despite the closed border and absence of formal diplomatic relations.

bianet faces investigation and censorship

A court ordered the removal of a bianet report concerning allegations of harassment, blackmail and exploitation targeting women students in Dersim. Bianet was instructed to comply within four hours but was not served with the underlying ruling, leaving the basis and origin of the request unclear.

Separately, bianet’s managing editor was questioned under “disinformation” provision over a report about the arrest of another journalist. He said the disputed allegations had been clearly attributed and that the article included both the authorities’ denial and the jailed reporter’s account.

These cases appeared alongside Turkey’s low placement in the 2026 World Justice Project index. The country ranked 117th of 143 overall, 135th in fundamental rights and 136th in constraints on government power.

Gender and LGBTI+ rights

Police detained 12 trans women during home raids in İzmir. The investigation cited alleged prostitution-related and organized-crime offenses, but its details remained unclear because prosecutors imposed a confidentiality order. Campaigners linked the raids to the broader anti-LGBTI+ crackdown, under which 82 people remained imprisoned.

Concerns about LGBTI+ expression also reached COP31. Speakers in the summit’s host-managed Green Zone were asked to pledge compliance with undefined standards of “public morality.” A lawyer interviewed by Bianet warned that the provision could encourage self-censorship around gender equality and LGBTI+ rights.

bianet’s October male violence monitoring report recorded at least 20 women killed by men, 45 women injured, nine children abused and seven women harassed. It brought the number of women killed during the first ten months of 2026 to 242, while another 32 women’s deaths in October were classified as suspicious.

Children and labor

A bianet feature examined the treatment of children enrolled in Vocational Education Centers, or MESEMs. Education Ministry figures showed 553,728 students in the system and 31,747 workplace accidents. A 16-year-old student described working five days a week until 10 or 10:30 p.m., going unpaid for two months and receiving only one workplace visit from a teacher in two years.

The sound of my typing fills the room. My fingers aren’t warm yet. It’s like they just came back from somewhere they shouldn’t have returned from.

Dad used to wake up at six in the morning, turn on the kettle, and make tea. From my room I could hear the gas lighter clicking and I’d go under the blanket. Early mornings he’d go to the market and buy fresh fruit and vegetables. With his tea he’d light a cigarette and drink and smoke slowly, with patience. Today, after God knows how long, I woke up at six. I made tea and went to the market and bought fresh cress and parsley. I set up a royal table and ate breakfast like a prince. Steam from the tea lands on my face and for a second everything becomes like before—then it stops being like before again.

The last time I told him I wake up in the morning thinking of him and go to sleep thinking of him, he shouted: immature sixteen, seventeen-year-old girl. He said our lifestyles are too different. I never asked him to become vegetarian. He chose not to eat meat himself and said it was the best thing. He started cooking lentils. Making eggplant stew. Stopped going to the Chaman restaurant near Niavaran Square—and even if he did go, he wouldn’t tell me, because I didn’t matter much to him, and he didn’t tell me things, important or unimportant.

His name was Iman. Someone from my past. He compared me in his mind to his ex-fiancée, Azi. Azi had a Cerato, an apartment in Zafaraniyeh, and a bottomless trust fund from her father, who was the CEO of a company full of power and connections. And me? I was paid 300,000 tomans per article for freelance work. 

He used to take me to the Book Garden and I would listen to his stories. They were masterpieces. He took magic mushrooms and in his good trips he saw dances of light and color and leaves, and SoundCloud would play incredible music for us, and I would kiss his hand because I loved him so much.

Colored lights march behind my eyelids, even now when there is no light.

I bled through three seasons trying to bring him back into the relationship. Not irrationally. Not like he said, like an immature 16–17-year-old girl. I believed we were soulmates and in another world we had promised to find each other here too, not to let each other go. Because my close friend from that time, Miss Khoshbayaan, had a daughter named Azi, and his ex-fiancée was also named Azi Khoshbayaan. Because on one of my hikes in Darabad, a 31-year-old man with his same name, Iman, at the foot of the rocks, started talking to me and said he wanted to commit suicide and I stopped him. All these signs couldn’t be random. Francesc Miralles once said, “Synchronicities are always mysterious. They try to tell you something only you can interpret.”

I had dreamed we were together. He wore glasses. He told me, “I know I’m not what you want, but I want to bring you something you like.” When I woke up I couldn’t remember what he gave me. My therapist said write your dreams in a dedicated notebook with dates. It strengthens intuition and later becomes a code to decipher.

I went to protests and chanted slogans and twice got bruises on my thigh from paintball. After a while it didn’t even matter to me if I died. Iman grew a beard and looked like the moon. Tonight is a full moon too. I used to say to him: is there anyone better than you? He liked it and thanked me. He said he’d take it as a 70/30 split and try his best to improve. Then he left me. I told him I didn’t lift you up so you could climb high and then throw me down from there.

I took three lorazepams so I could go to his house and leave a bag of his keepsakes at his door. I was pacing at the entrance. My heart was pounding in my chest. He had said his mother and sister were coming to stay with him.

I dreamed we were very good together. He told me, “I was too busy to ask how you were. Are you okay?”

I didn’t answer. I just looked at him.

Azi, his ex-fiancée, had started posting on Instagram. Flowers she got for Valentine’s Day, Nowruz Haft-Seen table, and a music video of herself dancing.

I told him, “You did to me exactly what Azi did to you.” He screamed, how dare I compare their love to what I felt. Last time I told him, if you had a ten-billion-toman car and a house in Elahiyeh, Azi would have married you two years ago and maybe you’d have a child by now. If Azi lived in Khani Abad or Shahr-e Rey, you wouldn’t want to marry her.That’s how much it has to do with everything except love. I typed it to him because on the phone he would just scream or hang up. And I wrote that you have a toxic, dominant masculinity in you, and thanks to your upbringing and your mother for that.

The big bag of books he had given me, Murakami’s short stories with a note on the first page that said, “In this meteor that was you, I hesitated for a brief moment, and you recurred a thousand years later.” the necklace and earrings he gave me for my birthday, the wooden tray, the films—all of it I left at his apartment door. Voices were coming from inside. Murmurs. Far away. My head was spinning. I was about to hit my head against the wall. I hid in the ruins at the end of his street so he wouldn’t come out and see me. A crescent moon above my head. Terrified like a dog. Two cats fighting over a piece of meat.

I went to the mountains. In rain, in heat, full moon, crescent moon. Three seasons passed and he didn’t come back. I never even knew whether he was with Azi, or had been with her and they broke up, or there was a third person, or whether he wanted the worst revenge on me.

Dad said, “I wish I would die. I wish I would wake up and see it was all a dream.”

I told Iman, “In sickness and in health, in poverty and wealth, let’s stay together.” He shouted again, “It’s too classical.” Then he said, “Like, I want to go to Paris, what can you do about that?” In the last conversation, I was the one who raised my voice a little and said, “Do you mean how much money I have in my account? How much money do I have?” And he screamed, “I should have blocked you from the beginning,” and I screamed back, “I’ll block you myself.”

Since Dad was diagnosed with lung cancer I don’t cry for Iman and my broken heart anymore. Today I didn’t cry. The night before and the night before that I did. Before that I don't remember.

I wanted to tell Iman that Dad was in intensive care and the doctor had said there was no cure, only that they could keep him alive a bit longer—and he would have talked to me about how his own father had died of the same cancer.

Early morning at six I went into the living room. I saw Dad sitting on the sofa, blood dripping from his nose. He said softly and innocently, “I dreamed that Grandma and I went on a trip together.” The ambulance came. Dad firmly said, “I wish I would die.” A few days later he died.

Iman never really loved me, even though he said, “During the period I hated women I was with you.”

He never wanted to know me. To him I was a boring, undesirable girl who he eventually left.

I used to wear my best clothes on dates with him. Mostly blouse and skirt. He rarely complimented me. After we started dating again after ten years, I began drinking chicory and barberry water so my skin would glow. I wore my hair the way he liked it ten years ago. Showered, perfume, lotion—but it didn’t seem to matter, or he acted like it didn't. He was consciously and unconsciously obsessed with Azi. Azi wasn’t even beautiful. Just rich and seductive and had monstera and pothos plants in her apartment. She painted and was CEO of her father’s company. Her last Instagram post was a painting titled “Regret.”

By late winter I had lost a few kilos and my pants kept falling off, but he didn’t notice. Dad had lost weight too. They were poking holes in his body everywhere, trying to find veins. Today they took him for an MRI and even under anesthesia his body kept shaking so badly they couldn't do it.

I once asked Iman on the phone what kind of girl he likes. I wanted to try to become that girl. In a terrifying tone full of pride he said, “Sorry, that’s too personal.” My heart shattered into a thousand pieces. I told him I experienced something you didn’t. He didn’t care. He just wanted to hang up. I cried and couldn’t say it, and I never told him I had experienced longing.

Before Dad went into ICU I hugged him and said, “Are you upset with me?” He said, “No, why would I be.” He talked to me again, looked into my face. When I talked about my job and writing to the man in the next bed, a documentary filmmaker, he listened eagerly and joined the conversation. His hand was warm, short, like something slowly disappearing.
I haven't smoked for days. I don't even crave it. Only once I went to the backyard and smoked one of dad’s cigarettes and didn’t inhale, like I was smoking in his place. Dad had dreamed he wanted to smoke and was looking for matches.

My therapist said don’t call it leaving, call it staying in another form.

The last day Dad was at home and unconscious he kept repeating like a mantra: “Shiva is a good girl. Shiva is a good girl. Shiva is a good girl.” His voice went in and out, from the walls.

My therapist said some names, if you repeat them enough, lose their meaning and become a distant sound without an owner anymore. The window was open and the curtain didn’t move.

He said nothing else. He looked out the window.

I told Iman, “Let’s hit the road. Let’s go somewhere new. Let’s make new beautiful memories. Let’s start over.” Iman stayed silent. His hands were locked together, like he was holding something he didn’t want to drop.

Tonight is a full moon too.

Even though it’s past eleven at night I put on clothes and go downstairs.

I dreamed dad was okay. We were at the ChaiBar Cafe. I asked him, “How are you?” He smiled and said, “Ooooh,” meaning absolutely wonderful. We held hands, as if after a long, long time, we had finally reached each other.

I keep holding the cigarette until it burns down to the end, as if something remains in my hand that no longer has an owner.

My phone rings. No number. I turn it off. Go back upstairs. Lock the door.

Autumn 2023

• The research showed that average temperatures in the İğneada Floodplain Forests region rose by 1.8°C over 44 years. According to the study, drought is expected to intensify in the near future.
• If global warming continues to worsen, a semi-arid climate is projected to prevail across 89 percent of the region by the end of the century.
• The researchers also warned that key species in the forests, such as ash and pedunculate oak, are declining.
• The scientists are calling for urgent conservation and adaptation measures.
  The main causes are thought to be drought and water stress, coupled with growing human pressure.

Study authors: Adaptation measures are needed

Modeling based on different climate scenarios suggests that the situation will become more severe in the near future:

Under a high-emissions scenario, a semi-arid climate is projected to prevail across 88 percent of the region, which is currently classified largely as semi-humid. According to the study’s authors, “this ecological pressure and increasing drought are causing sensitive tree species in the region to decline and weakening the wetlands’ capacity to act as carbon sinks.”

The scientists who conducted the study are calling for conservation and adaptation measures to protect endemic species and biodiversity in the İğneada Floodplain Forests:

“There should be no further interference with the streams that carry water from the Istranca Mountains to this ecosystem. It should be made mandatory for existing dams and ponds in the region to release enough environmental water during dry periods to prevent the floodplain forest from drying out. In fact, the entire watershed that supplies İğneada should be managed under a single conservation plan.”

Declared a national park in 2007

After the İğneada Floodplain Forests were declared a national park in 2007, a comprehensive management plan was prepared in 2014 covering the Erikli, Kocagöl and Sakagöl floodplain forests, as well as the area between Kocagöl and Sakagöl.

In the article published in Forests, researchers compared the management plan prepared in 1984 with the 2014 plan to identify changes in land use in the forests.

Key species at risk in the region

A comparison of the 1984 and 2014 plans showed that the total forested area remained almost unchanged. However, a closer examination revealed warning signs about the health of the ecosystem:

The presence of key species in the region that are relatively tolerant of dry and hot conditions, such as pedunculate oak and ash, has declined significantly.

The researchers say that under normal conditions, ash and hornbeam populations would be expected to increase. They attribute the decline to human pressure as well as increasingly severe and prolonged droughts driven by the climate crisis.

According to the scientists, this trend, which reflects the changes taking place in the area, could lead to these key species being gradually pushed out of the forest.

Drought periods have increased since 2014, disrupting seasonal groundwater flooding. The amount of saltwater entering the basin also appears to have increased. There has also been substantial development compared with those years, while ongoing industrial projects could further increase pressure on the region.

Study author 
Faculty member at İstanbul University Institute of Marine Sciences and Management
Dr. İrşad Bayırhan 

Bayırhan, meanwhile, said, “The General Directorate of Nature Conservation and National Parks (DKMP) appears to have strengthened field inspections and physical monitoring infrastructure to protect the area against poaching, uncontrolled access and environmental pollution. In addition, as the region has become a focus for ecotourism, local residents and visitors appear to have developed greater awareness of the need to protect the forest.”

Temperatures rose 1.8°C in 44 years

Other key findings from the research concern rising temperatures:

• Over the 54 years between 1970 and 2024, the region had an average temperature of 13.09°C and average annual precipitation of 817.7 millimeters.
• Although no significant change in annual precipitation was observed between 1981 and 2024, the analysis indicates that rainfall declined, particularly during the driest months, while temperatures increased. Average temperatures rose by about 1.8°C during this period.
• As climate-related stressors such as prolonged drought and rising temperatures become increasingly pronounced, human pressures such as agricultural expansion are further increasing the ecosystem’s vulnerability.

Semi-arid climate could prevail in the region by end of century

Using two different indices to assess how the region’s climate could change under various climate scenarios, the scientists found that under adverse scenarios, particularly those resulting from a failure to implement robust climate policies, the region’s climate, currently classified largely as humid or semi-humid, could become significantly drier by the end of the century.

Our findings show that under high-emissions scenarios, much of the region could shift into a semi-arid climate zone, putting its carbon sink capacity at risk.

To prevent this ecological collapse, human-induced pressure on the waterways that supply the region must be reduced, and a dynamic, climate-resilient and integrated water management plan must be implemented across the entire watershed.

Study author
İstanbul University Institute of Marine Sciences and Management
Prof. Dr. Gürcan Büyüksalih

(CA/VK)

Vocational Education Centers (MESEM), which the Education Ministry describes as a system rooted in the Ahilik tradition of master-apprentice training, are intended to help young people learn a trade on the job. In practice, however, they are contributing to the spread of child labor. There are currently 553,728 students in the system, while 31,747 have suffered workplace accidents, according to the ministry’s responses to parliamentary questions. Questions remain over the frequency and effectiveness of workplace inspections, while unpaid wages have also raised another issue: Has the government ended its financial support for MESEMs?

One of the students caught up in this system is 16-year-old Metin Yıldız. Yıldız, who has been working at a barbershop in Gebze for two years through MESEM, says that instead of learning the trade, he mostly does cleaning and service work. He has not been paid for two months, was slapped for forgetting to serve tea to a customer, and says only one teacher from his school has visited his workplace during his two years there.

Metin Yıldız and Deniz Çayan, speaking on behalf of the Student Union’s MESEM Assemblies, spoke to bianet about MESEM students’ working conditions, wage problems and the lack of oversight.

Work that never ends

Yıldız, 16, starts work at 9 am five days a week. He spends most of his day cleaning and serving customers:

“I open the shop. I sweep the floors, mop them and make the tea. Then the master comes in, the apprentices arrive, and I clean the windows.”

He says that when he asks to practice cutting hair at the barbershop, where he started working to learn the trade, his boss does not allow him to.

He usually leaves work at around 10-10.30 pm. By the time he gets home, it is 11 pm, sometimes 11.30 pm. He says he enjoys playing computer games, watching videos and going out with friends, but most days he has no energy left when he gets home:

“When I get home, I’m really tired, so I go straight to bed. But normally I like playing computer games and things like that. I like spending time on social media.”

Yıldız says he can also be required to work on Saturdays. There have been times when he was unable to take time off because the shop was busy, and the leave he missed was not granted later.

He has also not received his wages for the past two months, September and October. Yıldız says he previously earned 8,000-9,000 liras a month, but no explanation has been given for why he has not been paid. He says he has heard similar complaints from other MESEM students in his class:

“I think this system needs to change. Because as long as it stays like this, everyone is unhappy with it. My friend, for example, is also complaining about this. You haven’t been paid for two months, so you can’t do anything. And at the shop my hands are tied anyway, they don’t let me do anything.”

Asked whether there is anyone at school he can talk to about what he has experienced, his answer is brief:

“No. The teachers don’t listen anyway.”

15-year-old vocational student allegedly abused for nine months during internship

7 August 2026

‘I forgot to serve the customer tea and he slapped me’

Not being paid is not the only problem Yıldız has faced at work.

Yıldız says he is treated “very harshly” at the workplace and describes one incident:

“They treat you very harshly there. For example, a customer came in and I didn’t serve him tea. I forgot. He came over and hit me, slapped me. They get very angry there, they’re very harsh. And they don’t let me do anything either, it’s like my hands are tied.”

Yıldız has been at the same workplace for two years. During that time, he says, a teacher from his school has visited the shop only once. The teacher spoke to his employer, not to him:

“He talked to the boss. He probably asked whether I was working, how I was doing and things like that.”

Yıldız, who goes to the workplace five days a week, says no one asks why he is absent when he does not go to school:

“They never ask. They tell us to go to the shop.”

Survey: One in two vocational students suffer injuries while working

2 April 2026

‘They don’t get paid unless the boss pays them’

Deniz Çayan, speaking on behalf of the MESEM Assemblies, says Yıldız’s experience is not an isolated case. They have received widespread complaints about unpaid wages, particularly from students working in barbershops:

“Right now, it varies across different sectors, from factory to factory and workplace to workplace. It’s basically a situation where half are getting paid and half aren’t. But none of the barbershop students are getting paid at the moment. They don’t get paid unless the boss pays them.”

Çayan says delayed and incomplete payments had also been a problem before, and that wage issues have become more serious alongside problems involving leave and working conditions:

“Even before this, there were many friends who weren’t getting paid. Some were paid less than they should have been, or were paid a month late. If this continues, these students will end up unable to take any time off either. We had been imagining a scenario where they would work seven days a week and still not get paid, and slowly, that’s where things are heading.”

According to Çayan, the problem lies less with vocational education itself than with the conditions under which it is provided:

“MESEM should not be shut down, but it needs to be an environment where students do not suffer workplace accidents, do not die in workplace accidents, receive their wages regularly and actually learn a trade. Vocational education is necessary. But the conditions under which it is provided matter.”

Vocational Education Centers: The reproduction of class inequality through education

10 February 2026

‘They learn nothing about barbering’

Çayan says students in the barbering program often fail to learn the trade despite spending long hours at the workplace:

“These students get up in the morning, open the shop, clean the floors, and learn nothing about barbering. It really is exactly as Metin says, they don’t learn anything there.”

He says students are mostly assigned to washing hair, cleaning and other menial tasks:

“If the master is a good person, and I say ‘if’ because that matters, he’ll say, ‘Come and watch, see how I cut hair and observe what I’m doing.’ Otherwise, they’re either washing hair or doing other odd jobs. That’s basically what the students in the barbering program do.”

Çayan says students’ opportunities to gain practical experience often depend entirely on their employer’s attitude.

‘Bro, we go through this every day anyway’

Another issue Çayan highlights is how workplace accidents and dangerous working conditions are becoming increasingly normalized among students.

He recalls a conversation he had while working with MESEM students:

“I ask, ‘Have you ever had a workplace accident?’ They ask me, ‘What counts as a workplace accident?’ I give examples: ‘Maybe your arm was bleeding, maybe something happened to you, maybe you broke your arm.’ Then I get this answer: ‘Bro, we go through this every day anyway.’”

Çayan says that when students are not adequately informed about their rights and workplace safety, they can start to see these risks as “a natural part of the job”:

“These kinds of things start to feel normal to the children. Because they aren’t given any training, they accept it as normal. They think, ‘I guess this is how it’s supposed to be. I guess having a workplace accident is normal too.’”

Wages are part of the family budget

According to Çayan, economic conditions also play a major role in pushing students toward MESEM. Some contribute directly to their household budget with the wages they earn:

“I know a child who helps pay the rent with a MESEM wage. I also know students in Gaziantep whose MESEM wages go directly toward paying the rent.”

He says some families see having their children work as an economic alternative to keeping them in school:

“Their grades are bad. If this child isn’t going to continue studying anyway, they think, ‘At least let them go to MESEM and bring some money home.’”

Çayan says students need not only an income, but also support from adults who can help them make sense of the problems they face at work:

“These children are really looking for an adult. They’re looking for an older brother or an older sister. The children are already unhappy with this situation.”

For this reason, the MESEM Assemblies work with students around their rights to wages, leave, workplace safety and vocational training. Çayan says that as students learn more about their rights, they are less likely to see what they experience as “just part of the job” and become better able to articulate the problems they face. (NÖ/VK)

Kaya, who resigned as the deputy chair of the ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) after the crisis unfolded, was remanded in custody on charges of membership in a criminal organization and violating the Capital Markets Law.

Her husband, İlyas Kaya, and former Capital Markets Board (SPK) Chair İbrahim Ömer Gönül were released under judicial supervision, including travel bans and regular reporting requirements. All three had been summoned for a second round of questioning by prosecutors.

Probe into investment fund scandal reveals 214 people and firms made over 3.7 billion dollars in profits

9 October 2026

Accusations 

Prosecutors allege that Kaya used nonpublic information to sell shares in Özata Denizcilik on Sep 16, one day before regulators decided to liquidate the investment funds involved.

Kaya and her husband reportedly invested approximately 163 million liras in the company in April and sold their holdings for around 2.17 billion liras four months later.

According to prosecutors, Kaya transferred her shares directly to Tera Yatırım and received payment the same day, rather than following the usual two-business-day settlement process. Investigators also cited her contacts with Tera executives as evidence that she may have known about the impending liquidation decision.

The couple previously denied wrongdoing and said their transactions complied with regulations. They subsequently transferred approximately 1.86 billion liras in profits to an account designated by the Savings Deposit Insurance Fund (TMSF).

Background 

The wider investigation began after allegations that investment funds had coordinated trades to artificially inflate share prices. A liquidity crisis in September prompted regulators to order the liquidation of 131 funds after some struggled to meet investor withdrawal requests.

Investigators are examining suspected market manipulation, insider trading, bribery and organized criminal activity involving fund managers, financial executives and former regulators.

According to figures announced by Justice Minister Akın Gürlek on Nov 3, the investigation covers 433 suspects, including 112 held in pretrial detention and 186 under judicial supervision. Arrest warrants remain outstanding for another 38 suspects.

Authorities have also imposed asset freezes and other restrictions on 359 individuals and 111 legal entities.

Turkey’s investment fund crisis in 10 questions: Phantom returns and a market meltdown

21 September 2026

(VK)

The Aydın Chief Public Prosecutor’s Office launched the investigation following a complaint by Seda Sarıbaş, an MP from the ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) who was named in the report.

The report published in May covered developments regarding the arrest of Yelis Ayaz, a local journalist based in Aydın, who had reported on the allegations that MP Sarıbaş's son brought a gun to his high school. Ayaz was jailed on charges of "spreading disinformation" after authorities denied the allegations.

Journalist arrested over reporting on allegations of MP's son bringing weapon to school

18 May 2026

Cuzdan, accompanied by bianet's lawyer Deniz Yazgan, appeared at the Maltepe District Security Directorate. He was questioned over allegations of "publicly disseminating misleading information" under Article 217/A of the Turkish Penal Code and "disturbing the peace and tranquility of individuals" under Article 123.

Murat İnceoğlu, bianet's editor-in-chief, is also expected to be summoned for questioning as part of the investigation.

Cuzdan denies allegations

Cuzdan denied the allegations, saying the report concerned Ayaz’s arrest over her reporting and reactions from press organizations to the decision.

"The alleged incident at the school was included to explain which reports led to the arrest. The headline clearly stated that this was an allegation," he told the police. "The report included both the Aydın Chief Public Prosecutor’s Office statement saying the allegations did not reflect the truth and Ayaz’s statement from prison."

Cuzdan said accounts concerning complaints filed with the Presidential Communication Center (CİMER) and a photograph were attributed to their respective sources.

"The purpose of the report was to inform the public about the arrest of a journalist and the reactions to that decision," he said. "It is clear that there was no intention to cause concern, fear or panic among the public."

Cuzdan asked that the report be assessed as a whole and requested that prosecutors drop the investigation against him.

'Disinformation law' used against 83 journalists since 2022

10 April 2026

Lawyer cites public interest

Yazgan also stressed that the account concerning the school was presented as an allegation in both the headline and summary deck. He noted that the report included the Aydın Chief Public Prosecutor’s Office statement denying the allegations.

She said statements from an article Ayaz wrote in prison were also clearly attributed to her.

"Referring to CİMER complaints or a photograph and claiming that these prove the alleged incident at the school are separate matters," Yazgan said. "bianet.org did not present this allegation as its own factual finding."

BIA Media Monitoring Reports

13 December 2024

Yazgan said that if prosecutors believed otherwise, they should identify the specific wording in the report on which that assessment was based.

"The fact that the report concerns an arrest decision, includes the response to the allegations and reports the reactions of press organizations shows that it was published to inform the public," she said. "The arrest of a journalist over her reporting and the effects of a penal provision on the press are matters of public interest."

Yazgan also asked authorities to determine when the complaint was formally registered, citing the four-month deadline for filing a case under Article 26 of the Press Law.

He argued that there was insufficient suspicion to bring a public prosecution and requested that no charges be filed against Cuzdan. (HA/VK)

The Republicans played their usual cards on race, islamophobia, transgender and intolerance and fear of others; it was the Hitler calling card in all but name. As I’m writing, Abdul El-Sayed has taken Michigan, the first Muslim senator ever, a message of love over hate and bigotry. Kansas has just fallen to the Democrats for the first time in almost 100 years. In Turkish terms it would be like Konya falling to the communist party. James Talarico won for the Democrats in Texas for the first time since 1988. Portrayed as a ‘deviant’ by Trump, the soft-spoken Christian appealed to kindness and helping the people, not division. 

In a polarised country both socially and economically, he appealed to those who saw through Trump’s lies, they were not buying it anymore. Divisive politics does not put food on the table or gas in the car. The latter being pivotal; taking away Americans’ most valuable possession, the car and the freedom to ride the highway like their forefathers, worry free. He might have survived that but starting a war that caused this (Iran) is unthinkable. He, like a promising child set to get straight A’s but flunks them all, let them down and he won’t get them back. The Democrats now face one challenge go with the blue wave of progressives or stick in the slow lane with Netanyahu sympathisers and corporate backers. I know which wave I would like to ride on. 

Three people were found shot dead near Ayazini village and another three near Kıyır village, the governor's office announced. Two wounded women were found in Yukarıtandır village and taken to a hospital, where they died despite medical treatment.

Another person who was seriously injured remains under treatment.

Police are searching for the suspect or suspects in connection with the shootings.

"To clarify all aspects of the incident and ensure that the process is carried out properly, all relevant state institutions have been working in coordination since the first moments of the incident and are meticulously carrying out the necessary work," the governor’s office said. "The judicial process is being conducted with due care under the coordination of the Afyonkarahisar Chief Public Prosecutor’s Office." (VK)

The conference, which will focus on the climate crisis, sustainability and the green transition, is scheduled to take place in Antalya from Nov 9 to 20.

The requirement in question applies to speakers participating in events in the Green Zone, which is managed by the host country, according to the report. The Blue Zone, the UN-administered area where official negotiations take place, won't be affected.

No provision regarding "public morality" appears in the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) code of conduct, which applies to its events. The rules are based on principles including human rights, equality, participants' dignity and maintaining a safe environment.

The code explicitly prohibits discrimination, harassment and sexual harassment, as well as derogatory language based on sexual orientation or gender identity.

The declaration prepared for the Green Zone, however, does not explicitly include sexual orientation or gender identity among its listed grounds for discrimination.

COP31 must deliver beyond Antalya’s conference halls

28 October 2026

Self-censorship concerns

Lawyer Özlem Altıparmak, who will attend the conference, confirmed to Spot Basın Kooperatifi that she had also received the document. She said she had not encountered such a requirement at previous COP conferences she attended.

"The inclusion of the undefined condition of 'public morality' creates legitimate uncertainty over how statements concerning gender equality and LGBTI+ rights will be treated," she said. "We cannot say that the text explicitly prohibits them, but it does not provide sufficient safeguards against arbitrary interpretation."

'Staggering hypocrisy': Activists condemn Sinpaş Holding's 'climate supporter' role at COP31

14 October 2026

Altıparmak expressed concern that those provisions could allow speeches to be interrupted on "public morality" or "propaganda" grounds. "As a lawyer and civil society representative, I find this practice disturbing," she said.

"Criticizing climate policies and rights violations is a fundamental function of civil society. Meaningful and effective participation at COP31 requires not only being present in the room, but also being able to voice criticism freely," she noted.

COP31 and Climate Justice

27 October 2026

(VK)

The article, published on Jun 9, covered recent developments in the investigation into the disappearance of university student Gülistan Doku, who went missing in Dersim in 2020 and has never been found. The investigation was reopened this year, and public officials, including the city's former governor, were arrested as part of the case.

Expanding Gülistan Doku murder investigation reveals network spanning state institutions

28 July 2026

Kepenek examined claims that similar networks may have resurfaced in the city, based on interviews with women students.

The Erzincan Penal Judgeship of Peace today ordered that the article titled "New allegations emerge in Dersim as Gülistan Doku investigation continues" be removed from publication. 

The Cyber Security Presidency notified bianet of the decision by email, saying it had been issued under Article 8/A of Turkey's Internet Law No. 5651. The provision allows access restrictions and content removal in urgent cases involving "the protection of the right to life and the security of persons and property, the protection of national security and public order, the prevention of crime or the protection of public health."

The presidency instructed bianet to comply with the order "immediately and within four hours at the latest."

However, the court ruling itself was not served on bianet. It therefore remains unclear whether the restriction was imposed by the court on its own initiative or following a request.

bianet complied with the order.

Article included accounts from women

Kepenek's article included allegations of harassment, threats, blackmail and pressure raised by university students, women's rights advocates and women living in Dersim.

It also reported on meetings held by women who traveled to the city at the call of the "I Need Peace Initiative" with university students, members of the Dersim Women's Platform and union representatives.

One student, describing the atmosphere at the university, said, "We don't feel safe," and alleged that the presence of military personnel on campus had increased. The student also said disciplinary investigations had been opened against students who objected to the situation.

Another student said specialist sergeants were particularly visible around women's dormitories in the evenings after some public buildings and military units had been moved onto the university campus on the grounds of earthquake risks.

The article also included allegations that some students who spoke about the Gülistan Doku case had faced pressure at the university and had been subjected to disciplinary investigations.

Former governor's son arrested as primary suspect in Gülistan Doku murder case

20 April 2026

Harassment and blackmail allegations

Kepenek also reported claims that a network allegedly involving some public employees had harassed and threatened women students.

According to accounts included in the article, students were threatened that their relationships would be disclosed to their families, blackmailed with photographs and subjected to the sharing of their contact information with others.

Human rights advocate Gönül S. said female students had described allegations involving a group they referred to as a "sex work gang."

She said students had spoken about threats and blackmail, adding, "The students who came to us were saying, 'We don't know what to do.' We are trying to stand by them, but the fear continues." (HA/VK)

Only 10% of respondents said they had heard that COP31 would be held in Turkey, while just 5% said they knew what it was.

The summit will be held in Antalya between Nov 9 and 20.

The "COP31 and Energy" survey was conducted through phone interviews with 2,568 people who voluntarily participated in KONDA's panel between Sep 10 and 14.

Agricultural land in Antalya paved to make parking lots for COP31 summit

17 August 2026

Support for renewable energy

The findings showed broad public support for renewable energy. Some 77% of respondents said Turkey should prioritize and accelerate investments in solar and wind power, while 78% said no additional coal mines should be opened.

Half of respondents said the construction of new coal-fired power plants would conflict with Turkey's goal of demonstrating leadership at COP31.

Asked which energy sources they preferred for electricity generation, 80% chose solar and 63% chose wind. Only 3% favored coal-fired electricity.

Solar and wind facilities also received the highest levels of support when respondents were asked which types of power plants they would accept near where they live. Nuclear plants faced the strongest opposition, at 68%, followed by coal-fired plants at 56%.

'Staggering hypocrisy': Activists condemn Sinpaş Holding's 'climate supporter' role at COP31

14 October 2026

Views on climate crisis

The survey found that 79% of respondents believed climate change was caused by human activity, while 17% described it as a natural process.

Some 71% said they were worried or very worried about climate change, up 7 percentage points from a survey conducted in November 2025. However, the share describing themselves as "very worried" fell from 21% to 16% over the same period.

Respondents most commonly associated climate change with air pollution, cited by 72%, followed by an increase in disasters at 69% and more unusual seasonal events at 56%.

COP31 and Climate Justice

27 October 2026

Risk perception

Asked about risks they considered most likely over the next two years, 44% cited harm from disasters such as wildfires, floods and drought. Water shortages were cited by 37%, health problems by 34%, and unusual rainfall, snow or hail by 30%.

Scientists were the most trusted group on climate action, cited by 54% of respondents. Trust in scientists was about 2 percentage points higher than in 2022. Research institutions ranked second at 11%.

'Climate crisis will not turn Black Sea region into paradise'

4 November 2026

Confidence in government policies

The survey also found limited confidence in Turkey's climate policies. Only 13% said the country was making "sufficient effort" to address climate change. Some 43% described its efforts as insufficient, while 44% said Turkey was making no effort at all.

The share saying Turkey was making no effort fell from 56% in 2023 to 44% in 2026. Over the same period, the proportion saying the country was taking action but not doing enough rose from 33% to 43%.

Towards COP31: Right to cooling under the shadow of energy poverty

26 September 2026

When asked what outcomes would make them more likely to support Turkey's climate policies, 57% cited cleaner air and public health benefits. Lower energy bills were cited by 36%, reduced dependence on foreign energy by 30%, new jobs by 23% and greater foreign policy influence by 11%.

On priorities for COP31, 45% said Turkey should focus on accelerating the transition to renewable energy. Another 35% prioritized stronger capacity to adapt to floods, drought and wildfires.

A timetable for phasing out fossil fuels was cited by 12%, while 8% said access to and support for climate finance should be a priority. (VK)

Mustafa Balcı, a reporter for the daily Sözcü, and Şaban Sevinç were taken into custody and subsequently placed in pretrial detention on Oct 9.

The İstanbul Chief Public Prosecutor’s Office charged both journalists with "publicly disseminating misleading information," "slander" and "publicly insulting a public official because of their duties."

The indictment centers on posts from the journalists’ X accounts and reporting about an August concert organized by the Limak Philharmonic Orchestra in Muğla.

Turkey’s investment fund crisis in 10 questions: Phantom returns and a market meltdown

21 September 2026

The journalists shared a photograph showing Justice and Development Party's (AKP) and Çelik with Osman Arıkan Nacar, one of the suspects named in the fund investigation.

Prosecutors alleged that posts about Çelik’s attendance at the concert and its cost contained misleading information and accused him of wrongdoing.

The indictment cited the wording of the posts, videos and photographs published by the journalists, as well as the content of their reporting, alleging that the posts affected Çelik’s public reputation.

The İstanbul 43rd Penal Court of First Instance accepted the indictment and scheduled the first hearing for Nov 27.

Turkey blocks access to dozens of news reports, social media accounts amid investment fund probe

25 September 2026

Nacar's links to the fund scandal

Previous reports said Nacar was allegedly linked to fund transactions worth about 20 billion liras and had left the country during the investigation. Another company partner, Ali Göl, was arrested.

Nacar appeared in a photograph from the Bodrum concert alongside Çelik, Limak Holding honorary chair Nihat Özdemir and businessperson Yıldırım Demirören.

The main opposition New (Yeni) Party's spokesperson Zeynel Emre had previously asked Çelik whether he had vacationed with Nacar in Bodrum and whether they had returned to Ankara together.

The fund investigation began after prosecutors detected unusual transactions involving certain funds and stocks. The İstanbul Chief Public Prosecutor’s Office requested information and documents from the Capital Markets Board (SPK) on Aug 19.

The board decided on Sep 17 to liquidate 131 funds.

The investigation expanded in September and October, with detentions of businesspeople and former officials.

Authorities have determined that more than 200 people made about 3.7 billion dollars in profits from investment funds whose value was artificially inflated in what has been described as a "Fonzi" scheme, a play on the term Ponzi scheme.

Probe into investment fund scandal reveals 214 people and firms made over 3.7 billion dollars in profits

9 October 2026

(HA/VK)

The overall score for Turkey fell by 0.4 points compared to the previous year. Despite that the country rose one spot in the global overall rankings.

Score below regional average

The WJP evaluates Turkey within the Eastern Europe and Central Asia region, where the average score was calculated at 0.50. Turkey's score of 0.41 remained below the regional average. The country maintained its position at 14th out of 15 countries in its region.

The index measures the rule of law across eight categories: constraints on government powers, absence of corruption, open government, fundamental rights, order and security, regulatory enforcement, civil justice, and criminal justice. The WJP assesses these eight categories through 44 sub-factors.

Representing 95% of the global population, the index compiles data from over 215,000 household surveys and 3,400 surveys conducted with lawyers and experts.

Scores in the index range from 0 to 1, with 1 representing the highest level of adherence to the rule of law and 0 representing the lowest.

'Order and security' improves

Turkey showed varied changes in global sub-category rankings. It rose from 79th to 67th place in order and security. Conversely, the country fell from 110th to 116th in open government and from 106th to 110th in criminal justice.

It dropped from 79th to 80th in absence of corruption, from 134th to 135th in fundamental rights, and from 118th to 120th in regulatory enforcement. Its rankings in constraints on government powers and civil justice remained unchanged at 136th and 127th, respectively.

Decline in freedom of expression

AnHaving recorded no decline in freedom of expression and opinion in the 2025 index, Turkey joined the countries experiencing a decline in this area in 2026. The opposite occurred in freedom of assembly and association, where Turkey recorded a decline in 2025 but avoided a drop in 2026. The civic participation indicator declined for two consecutive years.

The WJP also recorded a decline in 2026 regarding the judiciary's capacity to limit government powers. In contrast, Turkey recorded an improvement in the indicator for access to civil justice and its affordability. However, it failed to achieve progress in preventing discrimination within the civil justice system.

Global decline continues

European nations and New Zealand occupied all of the top 10 spots in the 2026 index.

Denmark ranked first with a score of 0.90, followed by Norway in second with 0.89 and Finland in third with 0.87. Sweden, Luxembourg, Germany, New Zealand, Ireland, the Netherlands, and Estonia followed.

The bottom five places in the list were occupied by Venezuela (0.26), Afghanistan (0.31), Haiti (0.31), Cambodia (0.31), and Nicaragua (0.32).

According to the global results of the index, the rule of law declined in 62% of countries in 2026 and improved in 38%. The number of countries experiencing declines exceeded those showing improvements for the ninth consecutive year. (HA/VK)

Prof. Dr. Murat Türkeş, who conducts studies at the Boğaziçi University Center for Climate Change and Policy Studies and the Department of Physics, says, "The relatively abundant rainfall of the Eastern Black Sea does not automatically make it a safe migration region," and paints a striking picture of future Turkey.

The map of future: Poverty

However, according to Prof. Dr. Murat Türkeş, reading this future solely through temperature maps is a major misconception.

Türkeş emphasizes that water availability, sources of livelihood, disaster risks, housing, and infrastructure services must be evaluated as a whole along with temperature in future settlements.

Stating that cool weather alone will not constitute a security guarantee, the scientist predicts that the climate crisis in Turkey will directly determine where and under what conditions people can live.

Noting that temperature is not the sole cause of climate crisis-related migration, Türkeş recalls that drought, crop loss, and water scarcity collapse rural life, while floods and fires lead to sudden displacement.

According to Prof. Dr. Türkeş, this process will further deepen social inequalities when combined with loss of income, unemployment, indebtedness, and problems in accessing public services. High-income families will be able to adapt to their current locations, while the poorest segments may be trapped in risky areas without even finding the means to move.

Migrants and 'cool' havens

According to projections by Prof. Dr. Murat Türkeş and his team, a distinct internal migration wave will form toward the Aegean, Marmara, Mediterranean, and Black Sea regions, originating not only from Eastern and Southeastern Anatolia, but also from Central Anatolia and Inner Western Anatolia.

However, Türkeş points out that this movement will occur not purely in search of cool weather, but through efforts to access jobs and services. Stating that the economic attractiveness of a recipient city does not mean it is exempt from climate hazards, the famous climate scientist says people may also flock to cities experiencing floods, extreme temperatures, or water shortages for the sake of a livelihood.

Clarifying the concept of 'relative suitability,' Türkeş states that suitable parts of Northeastern Anatolia, inland and high-altitude districts of Muğla, the plateaus of Aydın, and the surroundings of Çanakkale can be seen as more suitable compared to coastal plains.

Yet, according to Türkeş, the biggest risk begins right here: Opening a plateau or green area that is cool today to uncontrolled construction will exhaust water resources to the point of depletion, rapidly destroying that region's climate advantage.

Speaking specifically about the Eastern Black Sea, Türkeş also notes that steep slopes, flood beds, deforestation, and high humidity levels will prevent sweating and put the human body under oppressive stress, meaning the region is not an 'automatic haven' as believed.

Mayor offers Mohamed Salah ‘climate change-proof’ land in Trabzon

6 August 2026

Collapse in agriculture and urban crisis risk

Projecting into the future of water and food security, Prof. Dr. Türkeş stresses that the water deficit will reach a vital level in the Konya Closed Basin, Central and Southeastern Anatolia, and the Aegean-Mediterranean plains.

Türkeş says, "In particular, the high-altitude and inland sections of the Muğla region and the high plateaus of Aydın may be more favorable options in terms of thermal comfort in the future compared to hot coastal plains. Our 2025 study with Yurtseven shows that semi-arid steppe and summer-dry, very hot Mediterranean climates are expanding. The 2041–2070 and 2071–2099 projections foresee the elevation of climate zones under very high emissions through warming and drying."

He also reminds that the severe evaporation demand created by warming is enough to dry out the soil even if precipitation does not decrease.

According to Türkeş, small producers being crushed by rising irrigation costs and indebtedness will bring the food chain to a breaking point, while shifting production to the north or to higher altitudes will not always suffice to create new agricultural areas.

In parallel, predicting that recipient cities will face infrastructure crises, Prof. Dr. Türkeş notes that inadequacies in drinking water, transportation, health, and social housing will trigger unplanned growth. Emphasizing that municipalities must urgently match zoning plans with basin water budgets, Türkeş underlines that heat action plans, green infrastructure, and urban transformation are essential.

COP31 and Turkey

Stating that the way to protect future living spaces goes through concrete steps to be taken today, Türkeş points to the COP31 Climate Summit to be held in Antalya.

According to Prof. Dr. Murat Türkeş, Turkey urgently needs to implement a just transition program that does not create new fossil fuel dependencies and clarifies a coal phase-out schedule.

For Türkeş, real success will be measured not by the grandeur of summits, but by how much emissions are reduced and to what extent human vulnerability is lessened.

Emphasizing that the purpose in the climate crisis is not to drive people into forced migrations, but to ensure they lead a safe, healthy, and dignified life where they live, Türkeş calls on Turkey to act in the light of scientific data without losing time.

(EMK/CA/VK)

The 33-year border closure between Turkey and Armenia has historically made collaboration difficult across a variety of sectors, including environmental protections, where both countries share similar interests due to shared geography. 

Scientists from both countries spoke at a COP17 panel in Yerevan, Armenia, titled “Regional cooperation on biodiversity protection and restoration: Possibilities in the South Caucasus and Central Asia.”

The talk discussed opportunities for joint collaboration among countries such as Turkey, Armenia and Georgia for the goal of biodiversity protection. Panelists noted opportunities for partnership on topics such as river management, data sharing and the study of shared biodiversity hotspots. 

Human activites' impact over groundwater

The Hrant Dink Foundation sponsored several environmental experts from Turkey to attend COP17. 

One of these experts, who also spoke on the panel, was conservation scientist and conservation policy expert Itri Levent Erkol. Erkol said he attended in hopes of understanding how we can achieve a transboundary conservation scheme between Armenia and Turkey. 

Erkol told bianet that river systems are among the most vulnerable in terms of climate change, thus necessitating that both Turkey and Armenia institute better transboundary management of the river system, including its subbasins and watersheds. 

There is not much data sharing on water extraction from the Aras and Arpaçay rivers between the two countries and historically the rivers have been a cause of both diplomacy and tension between the two countries. They do hold some watersharing agreements inherited from the Soviet era. However, some critics have argued that Turkey has pursued a relatively unilateral water policy, ignoring the needs of downstream countries. 

“We need to better understand how these human activities have an impact over the groundwater, because the river systems are also supporting the groundwater systems, and if they collapse we lose all the resilience of the landscape at the regional level,” Erkol said.  

Erkol believes a better monitoring and evaluation scheme is needed to understand future risks posed by climate change and changes in land use. Scientists need to understand the needs of the rivers, their carrying capacities and how much water is being extracted from both the Armenian and Turkish sides, he said. 

Call for collaboration

Another Hrant Dink Foundation COP17 attendee, İstanbul Technical University doctoral student Yeliz Ergöl, also noted the importance of information sharing between researchers across the border. 

“We have joint programs with other countries to do collaborative research, so why not have one with Armenia and Turkey,” Ergöl said.  

Ergöl also noted the need for government support in this regard. 

“I think the academia, the researchers, in the university are already doing something together but I think that there has to be support from the government as well … of course the border [is] one of the biggest problems,” she said. “The collaborations between two countries are limited, but also more funding and more support is needed for researchers to do their analysis and research in the area together.” 

Shared biodiversity

Garabet Kazanjian, professor at the American University of Armenia, said that Turkey and Armenia share significant overlap in species and climate, thus there could be significant exchange and lessons learned from each side of the borders. He said that scientists could replicate pilot projects done on one side of the border on the other. 

Shared biodiversity hotspots were also a key point in the panel. Turkey and Armenia share the Caucasus and Irano-Anatolian hotspots. According to Erkol, the Caucasus hotspot simultaneously consists of many endemic plant species, but is one of the most degraded areas in the world.

Erkol believes that a good starting point for collaboration would be on biodiversity hotspots to better understand the shared species between the two countries. He said that nowadays species-by-species action plans are not as effective. Landscape and habitat level approaches provide a stronger understanding of the environment. 

Ultimately, in addition to the opportunity to tackle global biodiversity concerns, the summit presented a unique opportunity for Turkish scientists to meet and collaborate with their Armenian counterparts. Istanbul University-Cerrahpaşa Professor Simay Kırca said that she enjoyed the opportunity to connect with Armenian colleagues

“It's been great because the more we communicate the more we understand that we are dealing with similar demons, but also we share the same values, share very interesting and diverse cultural backgrounds as well … It's incredibly easy to communicate actually because we understand each other,” Kırca said.  

“Biodiversity knows no borders … it's incredibly fluent and connected,” said Kırca. “Coming together makes it easy to connect the dots between the countries.” (İK/VK)

In October, men injured at least 45 women, abused nine girls and boys, and harassed seven women. Men forced 45 women into sex work.

Men killed 242 women in the first ten months of 2026.

The deaths of at least 32 women and nine children reported in the media in October were “suspicious” cases, as it could not be definitively determined whether they were gender-based.

Femicide 

Men killed 20 women in October. Last year, the number was 22 for the same month.

Men killed ten women because they wanted to break up or refused to reconcile. They also killed one woman because she rejected a proposal to become his girlfriend.

The pretexts for the men’s killings of nine women were not reported in the media.

Fifteen women were killed by their husbands, boyfriends, or former fiancés; one woman was killed by a neighbor; and four women were killed by men such as their fathers or sons.

Men killed 10 women inside their homes and 10 women outside their homes.

Men killed 14 women with firearms and 2 women with bladed weapons. They killed 2 women by burning them and 2 women by beating them to death.

Harassment

In October, men harassed at least seven women. This number was 14 in the same month last year.

Men harassed six women outside the home and one woman inside the home. Three women were harassed by men who were passengers, teachers, or hospital employees. The nature of the relationship between the man who harassed three of the women and the victims was not reported in the media.

Child abuse

Men abused at least 9 girls and boys in October. During the same 14-month period last year, this number was 18.

One child was abused by his father, one by a public official, one by a relative, one by a Quran class instructor, one by a grocery store clerk, and two by hospital staff. The identity of the man who abused one child was not reported in the media.

Sexual assault/rape

According to information reported in the media, men raped a woman in October. Last year, the number of such cases in the same month was two.

A man raped a woman who was his relative.

Men raped a woman inside her home. The woman had an intellectual disability.

Violence/injury

Men injured at least 45 women in October. Last year, the number was 79 for the same month.

At least six women were taken to the hospital with injuries.

At least 37 women were injured by their husbands, ex-husbands, partners, boyfriends, or ex-boyfriends. One woman was injured by her son-in-law, one by her brother, one by a friend, one by a customer, and one by her boss. The relationship status of the men who injured at least three women was not reported in the press.

Men injured at least five women because they “did not want to reconcile or wanted to break up.” The “pretext” for the men’s attacks on 39 women was not reported in the media.

Men injured 34 women outside the home and 11 women inside the home.

Men injured 36 women by beating them, eight women with sharp objects, and one woman by throwing her off a balcony.

Forced sex work

In October, men forced 45 women into sex work. Last year, the number was 150 for the same month. Children were also among those forced into sex work. Ten of the women were not Turkish citizens.

(EMK/VK)

The campaign said the women were detained as part of an investigation into alleged “encouraging, facilitating or coercing prostitution” and “forming an organization to commit crimes.”

Details of the allegations against the women remain unclear because prosecutors have imposed a confidentiality order on the investigation.

The İzmir Chief Public Prosecutor’s Office said the investigation was launched following numerous complaints.

The campaign described the raids as a continuation of the “My Family Is Safe” operations in September Eighty-two people arrested in those operations remain in prison.

“Following the Sep 12 ‘My Family Is Safe’ operation, these attacks against trans women have once again shown that trans identity itself is directly being targeted by the state,” the campaign said, also pointing to the Oct 23 raids targeting trans women in seven cities.

Explained: Turkey's 'My Family Is Safe' operations

1 October 2026

The group also said the operations were targeting trans people’s rights to work and live freely.

“Sex work is a profession that is not prohibited by law in Turkey, is not a crime and, like all other professions, requires safeguards that protect its workers,” it said.

Calling for the release of the 12 women, the group said, “We will continue to resist together against these attacks on LGBTI+s. We will not leave any trans woman alone. We are following the process. Bornova Street belongs to trans people! Everywhere is a prison, we want freedom!” (NÖ/VK)

Those detained include former SPK Deputy Chair Enver Usca, former board member Bülent Murat Haholu, former Corporate Finance Department head Kürşat Sait Babuçcu and former Market Surveillance and Supervision Department head Ercan Urkan.

Mustafa Alper Taş, head of the Banking Regulation and Supervision Agency’s Fourth Implementation Department, and Ümit Sincanlı, administrative affairs director at Tera Holding, were also detained.

Probe into investment fund scandal reveals 214 people and firms made over 3.7 billion dollars in profits

9 October 2026

Background

The investigation began after prosecutors detected unusual movements in certain funds and stocks. The İstanbul Chief Public Prosecutor’s Office requested information and documents from the SPK on Aug 19, 2026.

The SPK decided on Sep 17 to liquidate 131 funds.

The investigation expanded in September and October, with detention and arrest orders issued for executives at portfolio management companies, investment firms and several holding companies.

In operations carried out on Oct 22, suspects including former Justice and Development Party (AKP), ruling party, lawmaker Ertan Aydın were detained.

Turkey’s investment fund crisis in 10 questions: Phantom returns and a market meltdown

21 September 2026

Of 22 people referred to court on Oct 24, 15 were arrested. They included Taha Çakmak, former general manager of Türkiye Sigorta and Türkiye Hayat Emeklilik, and Altınbaş Holding executive İnan Altınbaş.

Borsa İstanbul General Manager Korkmaz Enes Ergun was detained on Oct 31 as part of the same investigation.

Ergun was arrested on Nov 3 on a charge of “taking bribes.” The number of people held in pretrial detention in the investigation was reported to have risen to 121.

Ergun was appointed general manager of Borsa İstanbul in 2021. He had previously served as deputy general manager responsible for listings. (FY/VK)

Consumer prices rose 2.58% from the previous month and 27.52% from Dec 2025, the data showed.

The 12-month average inflation rate, which is used to calculate rent increases, stood at 31.23%.

Despite the decline, Turkey remained among the five countries with the highest annual inflation rates worldwide. Venezuela recorded inflation of 466%, followed by Iran at 87.9%, South Sudan at 58.21% and Argentina at 33.4%. Cuba stood at 28.44%, Syria at 24.8% and Rwanda at 20%.

Highest inflation in education and housing

Education recorded the highest annual price increase among the main spending categories, at 48.86%. It was followed by health at 43.29% and housing, water, electricity, gas and other fuels at 40.24%.

Transportation prices rose 36.39% year-on-year, while insurance and financial services increased 31.41%. Food and non-alcoholic beverages were 27.73% more expensive than a year earlier.

Among the three categories with the largest weights in the index, food and non-alcoholic beverages contributed 6.81 percentage points to annual inflation. Transportation contributed 6.10 points and housing, water, electricity, gas and other fuels contributed 4.71 points.

Clothing and footwear posted the largest monthly increase among the main spending categories, rising 12.58% in October.

Food inflation

Food and non-alcoholic beverage prices increased 3.50% from September. Housing, water, electricity, gas and other fuels rose 2.84%, while transportation prices increased 2.02%.

Food contributed 0.84 percentage points to monthly inflation, compared with 0.36 points from transportation and 0.34 points from housing.

Fresh produce was a major driver of the monthly increase in food prices. Fresh fruit and vegetable prices jumped 14.66%, while unprocessed food rose 6.04% and processed food increased 1.66%.

Prices for fresh or chilled leafy and stem vegetables surged 71.79% from September. Vegetables grown for their fruit, including tomatoes, peppers, cucumbers and zucchini, rose 26.77%, while other fresh fruit increased 27.82%.

Turkey ranks fourth globally in food inflation

15 May 2026

Prices for information and communication rose 1.15% month-on-month. Furnishings, household equipment and routine household maintenance increased 0.82%.

Of the 174 subclasses tracked by TurkStat, prices rose in 134 in October. Prices declined in 29 subclasses and were unchanged in 11.

Energy prices rose 4.92% from the previous month and 51.37% year-on-year. Diesel prices increased 76.59% from a year earlier, gasoline rose 54.30% and natural gas and related subscription fees increased 60.62%. (HA/VK)

That day started with a celebration, bunting covered the square, bagels and tea were passed around, beaming smiles were on every face except mine. Then chubby leader took to the stage with respectful applause and holding it in his hand declared: “We now have bus cards, no need to carry money, it’s all in here!” thrusting it in the air, whoops and yippies ensued.   They queued all day to get their shiny cards and slipped back home obediently, lights out at 10, tucked up by the almighty.

Old Aytekin woke up nice and early with his bus card next to his bed. Getting changed he thought something is missing, he then noticed his thighs weren’t there anymore. “Oh dear, that is unfortunate.” There was a noticeable gap between the waist and the knees and foot.

He could still walk so trotted out to the tea house, he steered the conversation. “Did any of you notice anything this morning?” “We all have bus cards now.” Smiles ringing round. “I mean anything missing?” “No.” “I have a problem with my thighs they…” “Hurt,” butted in a know-it-all. “Doctor Bademci is the man you need to see.” He sent a child to see if he was in. “Yes, you can go now.”

“Doctor, it’s my thighs.” “Yes, are they hurting?” “No.” He looked astonished. “I see.” “They are not there.” He inspected passing his hand through the gap. “Can you walk?” “Yes.” “Well, they will probably grow back, take some of these.” “But… But…” Too late he was at the door. “You haven’t said anything have you?” His eyes seemed to freeze in his face. “Never mind, never mind. Next.”

Don’t get me wrong, there followed some funny things. The local thug lost his fists, the town folk roared with laughter. “How you’re going to rob me know, with your teeth?” The drunkard lost his nose. “You stink of beer,” they would shout. “No, I don’t,” leading to belly splinting laughter. The local gossiper lost her ears and I lost my mouth. “The complainer.” Nobody thought that was funny, least of all me.

On the face of it nothing much had changed; travel outside of town was understandably restricted due to the happening, as they liked to call it. The visible ones had just minor missing limbs if any, but horror stories were rife, of people losing eyes and even their whole faces. The tea house was rife with gossip again. “Now how I see it, if you’re good and righteous…” nodding to the place of worship across the street, “and do what you’re told nothing will happen.” He swayed, his fat belly following. “My thighs still haven’t grown.” “Pray more then, you idiot.” Nervous laughter filled the air. 

“Meydan! Meydan! Meydan!” The tannoy blared out. Meet in the square for the grand opening now. It filled up with a few notable exceptions. The chubby leader took to the podium arms crossed again. He addressed head-on the unfortunates. “Look brothers and sisters, look what we have done!” The crowd waved their pathetic bus passes. “But to those who cannot see our vision,” visually embracing the crowd, “they lose that right, you and we are the chosen ones.” Cheers rang in the air. “Now it is the grand opening of the Lux Hotel Complex.” (It covered the whole beach.) Flags waved in the air as he cut the ribbon. “Urm,” said a lonely voice. “Isn’t that bad for the environment, where are those protesters?” The doctor with the cold eyes and his white jacked entourage surrounded him. “You’ve said something, haven’t you?” He was whisked away, some say he literally disappeared.

As the weeks and months dragged on, those who had lost their faces completely disappeared. My articles for the local paper were rejected as not patriotic and for questioning. It is now October 29th. 

Limbs have been disappearing at a rapid rate. My hand pushing this pen is receding, only some god ordained will is pushing it on I am almost at the end, my warning, come on damn you. 

Don’t give in to stu….pid…idi…otl..y

The room went cold and settled into emptiness.              

Özge Akyüz, the Women in Prison thematic area representative at the Civil Society in the Penal System Association (CİSST), described problems ranging from prison conditions to decisions by administrative and observation boards in an Oct 29 interview with Mezopotamya Agency (MA).

According to Oct 1, 2026 data from the General Directorate of Prisons and Detention Houses, Turkey’s prisons held 434,337 people, including 21,179 adult women and 266 girls.

World Prison Brief data from Birkbeck, University of London, show that the number of women in prison in Turkey rose from 1,802 in 2005 to 21,445 in 2026, an increase of about 11.9 times over 21 years.

Akyüz said the increase in Turkey reflected a broader global trend.

The World Female Imprisonment List, published by World Prison Brief in 2025, found that about 733,000 women and girls were imprisoned worldwide, accounting for 6.8 percent of the global prison population. Since 2000, the number of imprisoned women has increased by 57 percent, compared with about 22 percent for men.

“Therefore, we see that women are being imprisoned at a faster rate. There is a similar situation in Turkey,” Akyüz said.

'The patriarchy of things' in women's prisons in Turkey

26 June 2023

Prisons designed around men’s needs

Akyüz said many problems faced by women stem from a penal system designed primarily around the needs of male prisoners.

“Turkey’s prison system is structured according to a binary gender system based on women and men,” she said. “However, when we look at its spatial arrangements, legal regulations and the way the texts are drafted, we see that it is organized according to men’s needs.”

Women face difficulties accessing common areas, educational programs, social activities and products sold in prison canteens, according to Akyüz. She said women’s needs can be pushed aside particularly in facilities where men make up most of the prison population.

Newer prison designs that restrict access to outdoor areas, sunlight and social interaction also affect women’s physical and mental health, she said.

Women prisoners lack access to sanitary pads and wax

25 May 2022

Complaints over conditional release decisions

Akyüz also raised concerns about decisions by prison administrative and observation boards, which assess prisoners for conditional release.

According to complaints received by CİSST, some women have been denied conditional release because of circumstances outside their control.

“For example, a woman held in a men’s prison may be unable to participate in an activity because of problems arising from the prison’s organization,” Akyüz said. “This has nothing to do with the woman herself, but with how the prison is organized. Yet we receive complaints that the Administrative and Observation Board issued an unfavorable decision because the woman had not participated in activities.”

Akyüz said women imprisoned on political charges in particular face severe restrictions concerning transfers to open prisons, supervised release and conditional release.

The legal grounds and individual circumstances differ from case to case. Complaints submitted to CİSST, however, have raised questions over whether assessments of good conduct are based on objective criteria.

Deaths and alleged suicide attempts

Akyüz said CİSST received a large number of complaints in July concerning Sincan Women’s Closed Prison, which has previously been the subject of rights violation allegations.

She said CİSST visited the prison with lawyers from the Lawyers for Freedom Association (ÖHD) and the Progressive Lawyers Association (ÇHD).

During interviews with women imprisoned on nonpolitical charges, they heard accounts of numerous suicide attempts and deaths over the previous year, Akyüz said.

CİSST also received a complaint involving a woman who had been prevented from speaking with her child by phone and was allowed to do so only after harming herself, according to Akyüz.

“We are therefore talking about a situation in which access to a right depends on a person harming herself,” she said.

Akyüz said reviews of the deaths were continuing and reports would be made public.

'Women prisoners work 12 hours a day for 600 lira'

16 November 2022

The allegations concerning deaths at Sincan had previously been raised in parliament.

Peoples’ Equality and Democracy (DEM) Party, pro-Kurdish, Şanlıurfa MP Dilan Kunt Ayan said in a Jul 28 speech to parliament that four women imprisoned on nonpolitical charges had died over the previous four months and that their deaths had been recorded as suicides. She also said lawyers had confirmed that seven women had harmed themselves.

Following the allegations, DEM Party MPs Beritan Güneş Altın and Meral Danış Beştaş submitted written parliamentary questions to the Justice Ministry in September and October.

No ministry responses to those questions appear in publicly accessible parliamentary records.

No findings independently establishing the causes of the Sincan deaths, responsibility or alleged negligence have yet been made public.

Overcrowding, limited psychological support

Problems at Sincan Women’s Closed Prison were also documented in a 2024 inspection report by the Human Rights and Equality Institution of Turkey (TİHEK).

During an unannounced visit on Jul 25-26, 2024, TİHEK found that 624 prisoners were being held in the facility, which had a capacity of 400.

The prison had one psychologist and five social workers.

The report also said prison officials were monitoring 19 prisoners considered at risk of suicide at the time. It recorded complaints about disruptions in transfers to hospitals.

CİSST calls for broader independent monitoring

Akyüz said civil society organizations should be given greater access to prisons to conduct independent monitoring as part of efforts to prevent rights violations.

“First of all, the opportunities for civil society organizations to conduct monitoring in prisons need to be expanded,” she said.

She called for cooperation among lawmakers, MPs, academics, professional organizations and prison administrations.

Akyüz also said women should be protected from violence, supported economically and guaranteed access to health care and social rights while imprisoned. She added that they should receive support in preparing for life after release.

She said the issues surrounding women in prison should be addressed as part of a comprehensive approach. (AEK/VK)

Bendeli announced her release in a social media port: “I have been released. For those who were wondering, don’t worry, I’m fine.”

She was formally arrested on Sep 6 after being detained in simultaneous police operations across five provinces a day earlier. The investigation targeted seven people on "obscenity" allegations.

Five people, including Bendeli and singer Tuğba Ekinci, were detained. A judge ordered four of them jailed pending trial, while one was released under judicial supervision.

Prosecutors accused the suspects of sharing allegedly “obscene” images for payment through subscription-based features on social media platforms.

How Turkey’s vague obscenity law is becoming a tool to criminalize LGBTI+ visibility

18 September 2026

During questioning, Bendeli confirmed that photographs shown to her belonged to her and said she personally manages her social media accounts.

She denied that her posts were "obscene," saying they showed aspects of her daily life. “I do not have any content in which my sexual organs are visible,” she said.

She told prosecutors that discrimination in the acting industry had forced her to rely on social media for income, noting that she was using social media income to cover the cost of surgery needed to complete her gender transition process. (VK)

During the workshop, participants discussed the fundamental principles of child-focused journalism, the legal framework for children's rights and how children are represented in the media. Throughout the day, practical exercises assessed the language, headlines, leads and visuals used in news stories from a children's rights perspective.

‘When interviewing a child, we must first create a safe environment’

In the workshop's first session, bianet editor Nalin Öztekin discussed the fundamental principles of child-focused journalism and how children are represented in the media.

Öztekin stressed that children should be regarded as individuals with rights and freedoms. She said the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child provides important guidance for journalists. She emphasized the need to prioritize the best interests of the child, protect their right to participation and avoid subjecting them to further harm through reporting.

Highlighting the importance of including children's own views in news coverage, Öztekin said:

Journalists fundamentally need to consider the risk of harming the child. We avoid narratives that use children to evoke sympathy or may lead to stigmatizing language. At the same time, we prefer to see children not as objects of a news story but as subjects, as individuals who hold rights. While it is important not to overlook their right to participation, interviews with children must also take place in a safe environment and with informed consent to ensure that participation is meaningful and appropriate.

Öztekin also stressed that reports involving children pushed into crime should focus on the broader social context and root causes, while also scrutinizing the responsibilities of institutions:

Which institutions could have fulfilled which responsibilities before the child reached this point?

Social responsibility in the juvenile justice system

In the workshop's second session, Kardelen Ateşci, head of the İstanbul Bar Association Children's Rights Center, discussed the legal framework for children's rights and the juvenile justice system.

Referring to the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child, Ateşci emphasized that children are rights holders. She discussed the importance of the best interests of the child, participation, privacy and protection from violence in journalism.

Noting that the juvenile justice system differs from the adult justice system, Ateşci said, "Our primary goal should be to reintegrate the child into society."

Ateşci also discussed the terms "child drawn into crime" and "child involved in judicial proceedings," addressing the problems associated with both. She stressed that social conditions such as poverty, neglect, abuse and exclusion should not be overlooked when examining why children become involved in crime.

The session also addressed the protection of children's identities, the presumption of innocence and the risk that news coverage may retraumatize children. Ateşci said journalists should avoid stigmatizing language in their efforts to produce fast and attention-grabbing stories.

Applied exercise: Identify the violations

The workshop's third session consisted of a practical exercise led by Nalin Öztekin. Participants were divided into groups and examined stories published by different media outlets from a children's rights perspective.

Using reports on child marriage, sexual abuse and violence among children, participants assessed the language and visuals used as well as potential rights violations. They identified problematic wording and rewrote the stories in line with the principles of child-focused journalism.

Öztekin stressed that news reports should not normalize violations of children's rights and should provide information about available avenues for seeking redress:

When information about ways to seek redress is included in news reports, it can also show others how and where they can pursue their rights. An important part of rights-based journalism is to move readers out of a passive position, inform them about available mechanisms and tell them, 'You can apply to these institutions in response to this rights violation.'

Later in the session, participants examined more comprehensive news reports and worked on how they could be restructured.

Rewriting news from a children's rights perspective

In the workshop's final session, a second practical exercise was held under the guidance of Nalin Öztekin. Participants assessed the headlines, leads, content and visuals of stories published by different media outlets from a children's rights perspective.

They worked on reports involving sexual abuse of children, school attacks, child labor and children drawn into crime. Participants revised problematic language and selected visuals that would protect children's rights.

Öztekin emphasized the importance of protecting children's identities, making perpetrators' responsibility visible and including information on avenues for seeking redress.

The workshop concluded with participants reviewing the news stories they had prepared and discussing editorial responsibilities in child-focused journalism.

(EG/VK)

Downhill from Ani’s Menucihr mosque, built by the Seljuk Turks, lie the remains of the Ani bridge, where two large slabs of volcanic rock sit across from each other on each side of the Arpaçay River bank, surrounded by miles of rolling hills. On one side of the river lies Turkey, on the other Armenia. Despite this, those who wish to simply wade across the border cannot and instead have to endure the long, ill paved road through Georgia. Turkey closed the land border in 1993 during the first Nagorno-Karabakh war in support of Azerbaijan and the border has remained closed to this day. 

Now after three decades, the border opening looms closer than ever. Officials confirm that it could happen any day now. 

As one traverses the cities of eastern Turkey and western Armenia, the memories of this shared history remain among older folks on each side of the border. Elders spoke of joint memories, business leaders of commercial opportunities and locals about much needed economic growth for cities like Kars, Van and Diyarbakir in Turkey, and Gyrumri in Armenia. 

'Open roads are better in any case'

Artyon Mkrtchy, a 64-year-old potato farmer in Gyumri on the Armenian side of the border remembers life prior to the closure. His home is only a short walk from the historic Kars-Gyumri railway, now out of service. He didn’t interact with Turks, although his distant ancestors descend from Diyarbakir, but he remembers goods flowing between the two countries, specifically wheat, animals, agricultural machines and cement. 

“In any case closed roads are not good, open roads are good, even if we don’t make our own business we will give workers to train stations, to the custom service — it will create jobs in any case,” Mkrtchy said. 

Mkrtchy sells potatoes to Kazakhstan and Georgia by truck. If the border opens he said he will sell to Turkey as well. 

He’s not the only one who shares these memories. One Armenian worker at a textile and hosiery factory in Gyumri said that although she is too young to remember meeting any Turks, her parents used to work in a factory with Turkish coworkers. They would sometimes sit and enjoy tea or coffee together.   

These shared memories lie on the Turkish side of the border too. Born-and-raised Kars resident and journalist Olcay Okan Avşar remembers that, when he was a child, a bazaar selling Armenian products shipped via the Kars-Gyumri railway would come to town twice a week. He even still owns an organ mini piano he bought from an Armenian seller to this day. 

Avşar was young in the days before the border closure, but he described it as a loss of the “color from our lives,” referring to a rich former diversity. 

“The cities on the west side of Kars are not actually aware … but for regional cities closer to the border, we used to have this interaction with Armenian people both person-to-person and trade, that’s why we remember this and why we remember the culture — which is why for us it’s important,” Avşar said. 

He said that the normalization process especially makes sense for people in eastern cities like Kars as they would be the ones who see the most benefit. He also noted many cultural similarities and memories with Armenians. 

“Ordinary people [in Kars and Armenia] already have so much in common, music, dances and food, they’re not strangers to each other, they used to live together so they’re not very different,” Avşar said. 

MASİS KÜRKÇÜGİL ON TURKEY-ARMENIA RAPPROACHMENT

'Armenia is looking for ways to breathe'

16 May 2026

Turkey has faced major economic crises and inflation over the years. The issue is even more pronounced in many of Turkey’s eastern cities. Locals hope that the opening will provide much needed economic relief. 

In a press meeting with Turkish and Armenian journalists, including bianet, President of the Diyarbakir Chamber of Commerce Mehmet Kaya said that Armenian tourism could pose a special opportunity for Diyarbakir given the shared history between the two peoples. Additionally, easier travel will improve trade and business prospects. 

“Given the strength of Turkey’s business community, if such a crossing were kept open and good neighborly relations were developed, we could quite easily reach an annual trade volume of up to $10 billion,” said Kaya. “That is why there should be no border between us.” 

According to Kaya, Armenian tourists do visit Diyarbakir to see historical Armenian sites, such as the Church of St. Giragos. However, the Chamber does not have any specific statistics on the number of visitors from Armenia. Kaya said that most tourists must travel by plane due to the closed land border, and thus are concentrated in Ankara or Istanbul. 

“I can say that we have considerable potential for tourism in both directions, and we need to work on it,” said Kaya. “Such cooperation would not only develop tourism; it would also contribute to social peace. 

“It could help our countries recognize the benefits of cooperation and encourage them to adopt more peaceful policies; that is why we are promoting tourism,” he added. 

Some Armenians have expressed concern about the ability of domestic businesses to compete with the larger Turkish market. Several Armenian business leaders brushed off this risk though, noting significant cost savings on logistics. 

Turkey, Armenia set to resume direct trade

13 May 2026

Vachagan Karapetyan, General Director of Artashat Cannery, a preserved food company based in Armenia, said that the majority of Armenian business people are in support of opening the border. 

According to Karapetyan, one Turkish truck through Georgia costs about $4,000. He estimates that costs could be reduced by about 30 to 40 percent if the border were open. An open border would also grant the business direct access to the Mersin port and thus the Mediterranean. For now, shipments must go from Poti, Georgia, to Istanbul in order to access the Mediterranean. 

Karapetyan said that Turkish companies could also benefit from partnerships with Armenian companies like his, as they could help better access Russian markets. 

M. Hakan Mestandoğan, the export manager of Seramiksan, a Turkish ceramic business based in İzmir, has already been shipping to Armenia for over 15 years despite the closed border, but always through Georgia. Mestandoğan believes that Seramiksan may be the first Turkish company to export directly to Armenia, but this only refers to the tax code, rather than the actual path the goods cross. Prior to May 2026, there was no way for Turkish business to list Armenia as the final destination on tax codes.  

Ultimately though, the roundabout system through Georgia proves needlessly expensive for both Turkish and Armenian exporters, with Armenians having to navigate the additional barrier of accessing the Mediterranean as a landlocked country.

'We could see the headline "Armenia-Turkey border has opened" tomorrow'

According to Dr. Stepan Grigoryan, political analyst and Chairman of the Board of the Analytical Centre on Globalization and Regional Cooperation (ACGRC), Turkey’s relationship with Azerbaijan has long posed a significant obstacle in the normalization process. 

Turkey has historically operated off of what some call an “Azerbaijan first” policy where Ankara consults Baku in its negotiations with Yerevan. However, Grigoryan believes that the original justifications for the border closure are now moot. 

Turkey closed the border due to Azerbaijan and Armenia’s dispute over the Nagorno-Karabakh territory. However, an Azerbaijan military victory in 2024 led to the dissolution of the majority-Armenian unrecognized Republic of Artsakh (Nagorno-Karabakh) and the mass exodus of Armenians from the region. Some international human rights groups have called the exodus an ethnic cleansing. 

Grigoryan said that now that Armenia has recognized Nagorno-Karabakh as part of Azerbaijan following its defeat, the issue of the Turkish border should be put to rest.

“Now the Karabakh issue is resolved, our leaders reached an agreement so the conflict is resolved, even no single Armenian stayed in Karabakh, so I cannot understand what is the reason to keep the border closed in this case,” Grigoryan said. 

He added that the current rift between Turkey and Azerbaijan over the hijab bans in Azerbaijani schools could also influence Turkey to move ahead in the normalization process without Azerbaijani consultation. 

'Pashinyan's election win shows Armenian voters want peace with Turkey'

11 June 2026

Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan has expressed a desire to expand relationships with the European Union and Turkey to move beyond Russian dependence. His re-election in June despite the lost Nagorno-Karabakh war could be viewed as a referendum on the normalization process.  

Armenian officials have also hinted at the nearing of normal relations. In an Oct. 13 Warsaw Security Forum panel, Armenian Minister of Foreign Affairs and International Trade Ararat Mirzoyan spoke optimistically about the border. 

“The border is still closed, but I think the process has now matured considerably,” said Mirzoyan. "So much so that it is entirely possible that we could wake up tomorrow morning and see the headline ‘Armenia-Turkey border has opened’ in the news,”

In a meeting with journalists from Turkey and Armenia, including bianet, The European Union ambassador to Armenia Vassilis Maragos called a normalization of relations between Armenia and Turkey a “win-win.”

“I think that there is a dimension of economic cooperation, but there is also a dimension which is more human,” said Maragos. “It's about people to people contacts, people want to get to know each other, they want to get to know better their neighbors, and they feel actually this, that this is also an investment in their security.” 

In the latest update on normalization this past weekend, the Turkish Transport and Infrastructure Minister Abdulkadir Uraloğlu announced the completion of the tender process for the restoration of the Ani bridge — a joint project between Turkey and Armenia. This joint restoration could mark a symbolic next step in relations between the two countries. 

Years ago Hrant Dink, the Turkish-Armenian journalist and Editor-in-Chief of the Turkish-Armenian bilingual weekly Agos, wrote his only book titled “Two Close People, Two Distant Neighbors" about Turkey-Armenia relations. Now, a decade later it looks like those two distant neighbors could become much closer very soon. (İK/VK)

When Turkey hosts COP31 in Antalya on Nov 9–20, 2026, the most revealing questions will concern what happens afterwards. Will emissions fall? Will farmers and outdoor workers be better protected? Will budgets and investment decisions change? Attendance, exhibition stands, and declarations cannot answer those questions.

After COP29 and before COP30, I warned in media interviews that the summits were increasingly resembling climate trade fairs. Corporate promotion and networking risk displacing their purpose: turning scientific knowledge into decisions that reduce emissions and protect people. Travelling to a summit, usually by fossil-fuelled aircraft, is not in itself climate action. The contribution should justify the carbon cost. Meaningful representation for negotiators, scientists, labour organisations, and affected communities must be protected while unnecessary promotional travel is reduced.

This criticism does not dismiss climate diplomacy. The Paris Agreement is legally binding, but obligations to submit and update national contributions differ from an enforceable duty to achieve every numerical target. There is no automatic global penalty for missing one. The task is to connect international commitments with domestic law, budgets, responsible institutions, and public scrutiny.

Public accountability

Turkey holds the presidency and hosts COP31, while Australia leads the negotiations. Hosting cannot give Turkey authority to impose obligations on every country. It can, however, demonstrate what implementation means at home. Every initiative should identify what will change, by when, with whose money, and under whose responsibility. It should also explain who measures progress and what happens when delivery falls short.

The need is clear. UNEP’s Emissions Gap Report 2025 projected around 2.8 °C of warming this century under policies then in place, and 2.3–2.5 °C even with full implementation of national contributions. These are conditional projections, not certain futures. They nevertheless expose the distance between promises and the Paris goals. Each additional increment of warming prevented still matters.

Climate policy in Turkey must reach beyond the carbon costs facing exporters. Drinking water, food production, public health, and rural livelihoods are already central concerns. Vulnerability is unequal: a seasonal farmworker, a smallholder, and a low-income urban resident do not have the protection available to someone working in an air-conditioned office.

Our research on drought across Turkey shows why rainfall totals alone are insufficient. A drought index incorporating atmospheric evaporative demand revealed drying more clearly over many periods than one based only on precipitation. This does not mean rainfall has declined everywhere. It means warming can worsen the water balance. Even when dry soils constrain actual evaporation, plants can face growing water stress. Our 2025 study also found that semi-arid steppe climates and Mediterranean climates with dry, very hot summers covered larger areas in 1991–2020 than in 1961–1990. The scale of future change depends on the scenario and period considered.

Adaptation should therefore be judged through outcomes: fewer water interruptions, less heat-related illness, reduced crop losses, and fewer people left unprotected. Reservoir storage must be monitored alongside groundwater, soil moisture, snow accumulation, and withdrawals. A few wet months do not establish that a multiyear water deficit has been eliminated.

Shared protection

River basin planning must reconcile drinking water, ecosystems, agriculture, industry, and tourism within a finite water budget. More efficient irrigation is useful, but expanding irrigated land or switching to thirstier crops can cancel the expected savings. Technology needs enforceable withdrawal limits. Ecosystems cannot be left with whatever water remains after other users have taken their share.

Nor is telling farmers to change crops an adequate adaptation policy. Transition costs, indebtedness, market access, and purchasing arrangements matter. Without public support, adaptation transfers risk onto those least able to carry it. Municipalities, irrigation associations, and smallholders need simpler funding applications and technical advice, alongside social support for vulnerable producers. Urban heat plans likewise need health services, accessible cooling, and protection for outdoor workers, rather than benefits confined to affluent neighbourhoods.

I have proposed a Turkey-led Mediterranean initiative on climate-resilient food and water security. Its value would lie in shared drought data, pilot basins, agricultural early warning, healthier soils, accessible support for smallholders, and regular assessment of results. A series of meetings would not be enough. Countries with greater historical responsibility and financial capacity should provide stronger support, but Turkey’s legitimate demand for finance should not postpone domestic action.

Turkey’s own emissions commitments also deserve clear accounting. Its second national contribution aims to limit emissions to 643 million tonnes of carbon dioxide equivalent (CO₂e) in 2035, 466 million tonnes below a business-as-usual scenario. This does not mean cutting today’s emissions by 466 million tonnes. On the document’s consistent accounting basis, including land use, land-use change, and forestry, the target stands about 40 percent above its reported 2018 net emissions of 458.8 million tonnes.

A stronger contribution would specify absolute reductions from a historical year and near-term sectoral milestones. The current contribution provides no explicit, dated coal phase-out timetable. A credible roadmap must prevent new fossil fuel capacity while coordinating closures with grids, storage, efficiency, and lower fossil fuel demand across transport, buildings, and industry.

Lasting responsibility

Workers’ rights belong at the centre of that roadmap. Wages, social security, job quality, training, and local revenues in coal regions must be addressed from the outset. Renewable capacity is important, but its growth does not by itself demonstrate falling fossil fuel consumption. Energy projects also require scrutiny of their effects on farmland, pastures, forests, and local communities.

Net zero cannot excuse postponement. Research on credible net zero stresses early, deep emissions cuts and cautious use of removals. Forests support water, biodiversity, local climates, and livelihoods as well as carbon storage. Their ecological integrity cannot be replaced by sapling counts or used to justify continued fossil fuel emissions. Carbon markets, similarly, should be assessed by verified emissions reductions and fair use of revenues, rather than trading volumes.

I propose an annual public climate implementation review showing each target’s starting point, allocated funding, actual spending, outcomes, and reasons for shortfalls. Universities and research centres should independently test the results, supported by open data, research freedom, and sustained funding. Farmers, workers, women, and local communities must be able to influence decisions as well as attend consultations.

Antalya’s legacy should extend to its water use, heat protection, tourism, food supply, transport, and waste systems. An improvement that shifts pollution or insecure work onto another neighbourhood or group of workers is no overall success. Before and after COP31, the test is scientifically informed public planning, measurable delivery, and decisions that citizens can scrutinise. Turkey’s responsibility will continue long after the delegates leave. (MT/VK)

Over the past year, we have seen AI become increasingly integrated into warfare, surveillance, border regimes, and intelligence systems. You have linked Palantir to the construction of what you call an “ontology layer of fascism.” As this infrastructure expands beyond US borders, how do you see the new political connections it is creating?

I borrowed the expression “ontology layer of fascism” from the critical media scholar Jathan Sadowski, who was playing on the fact that “ontology layer” is a term of art in data analytics and AI, where it refers to the formal specification of the entities, relations and rules in a particular domain that provide the semantic context for the processing of information and the production of knowledge and action – whether that domain be supply-chain logistics, medical science or the lethal targeting of civilian populations. 

Palantir advertises its “decision-centric Ontology” as the “digital twin of the organization, containing both the semantic elements (objects, properties, links) and kinetic elements (actions, functions, dynamic security) needed to enable use cases of all types”. In Sadowski’s formulation, as in Moira Weigel’s reflections on Palantir’s “ontological power”, I see a welcome attention to the way in which tech companies are building software to cognitively map and logistically integrate apparatuses of domination. But I also see talk of ontology as directing us toward the materiality of the infrastructure and the fixed capital that is critical to this effort to “build to dominate” (to cite Palantir’s motto). 

I think we need both to distinguish and to articulate two elements here: the first is the overt and often cartoonishly fascistic philosophy of domination voiced by the likes of Karp or Anduril’s Palmer Luckey (who recently defended Pete Hegseth’s announcement of the live-streamed execution of Nidal Hasan, the former Army psychiatrist who carried out a mass shooting at Fort Hood in 2009, by saying it was “aligned with our natural and national order”); the second is the systematic integration of this infrastructure of domination across all of our social relations, and not solely in the “repressive state apparatus.” Even if the cheerleaders of supremacy and human obsolescence fall by the wayside, self-described liberals and centrists are perfectly primed to implement and integrate this “ontology layer” into their governance.

For a long time, AI companies presented themselves as relatively independent from states. Today, however, they are becoming increasingly intertwined with defense and security apparatuses. How do you understand this transformation of technology companies?

The role of the Cold War military-industrial complex in creating the social, material and financial conditions for the emergence of a Silicon Valley tech sector permeated by a cult of individual genius and disruptive innovation has long been a leitmotif in critique of the “California ideology”. Today, it’s the founders and venture capitalists who wax nostalgic about the virtuous dynamic triggered by the belligerent nationalisation of technology. This turnabout to a sui generis statism and an open advocacy for monopolies (as in the case of Peter Thiel) could be regarded as the effort to fuse a cynical recognition of the underlying conditions for profitability with a ploy to leverage an openly imperialist nationalism to secure some legitimacy, if not among the general populace at least among governing elites. My sense is that there is a dawning awareness that the prospects for realizing the gargantuan outlays and valuations of these companies with future private and commercial consumers of AI are highly dubious. 

The Economist recently reported on the nearly $1 trillion expenditure of the big US tech firms on AI infrastructure (chips, data centres, energy sources, etc.); their analysis concluded that “covering AI capex through identifiable AI income requires revenue on the order of $2.5trn per year, more than tech’s entire combined revenue today”, while the kind of productivity gains that would make AI adoption commensurate with “the largest investment surge in history” have yet to materialise (and perhaps never will). The problematic horizon for realizing this astronomical buildout of fixed capital in actual revenues, as well as the experience of successful capture of government contracts by the likes of SpaceX, makes the turn to the state eminently rational – to which we need to add the fact that as these technologies and their effects are profoundly unpopular (witness a broad-based movement against data centre construction in the US), it is not just the contracts with the government that become a matter of financial life-and-death, so does the state’s capacity through (de)regulation and repression to keep anti-Big Tech opposition at bay. 

As the repressive state apparatus becomes the prized customer-of-last-resort it is also crucial to secure land, water and energy, and to quash any resistance to their appropriation for the benefit of the tech industry. The refrain of the looming China threat to US AI dominance means all of this can easily and eventually be treated as a matter of national security or as a “national emergency,” and therefore any opposition as tantamount to terrorism. Last but not least, since the telos of “superintelligence” has as its only measurable content mass unemployment and human obsolescence (when it’s not a likelihood of extinction), which perhaps suggests a limit on profitability, a kind of radically anti-democratic statism seems to be an inevitable ideological outcome.

'For now, fascism remains electoral'

In Alex Karp’s The Technological Republic, competition with China is framed in terms of restoring the West’s technological superiority. Today, policies such as “sovereign AI” initiatives and chip export controls are justified through a similar discourse. How should we think about technological nationalism in relation to contemporary forms of fascism?

I think Jamie Merchant put it pithily in his book Endgame: Economic Nationalism and Global Decline: “As growth slows it increasingly becomes a zero-sum affair, with the gains of the few only coming at the expense of the many, and in a capitalist economy this means sacrificing the livelihood of the vast majority to the need for continuing profitability.” In other words, there are underlying systemic tendencies that operate to exacerbate interstate antagonisms and discourses of national power whether those holding the levers of governmental power have fascist proclivities or not. What I think is notable is that this nationalisation of tech supremacy has little if any traction with late fascism’s mass or electoral constituency. Techno-fascism à la Musk and Bannonite nativist “populism” (with its jeremiads against AI and tech elites) are currently precariously held together by Trump’s MAGA coalition. 

JD Vance embodies the desire to bring together far-Right anti-democratic tech venture capital (Thiel) and race-baiting xenophobic nationalism, but he’s unlikely to rally the troops. The hitch is that, for now, fascism remains electoral, and technological nationalism is difficult to campaign on when it relishes the idea of automating away jobs and displacing communal and natural spaces for massive data centres, all the while advertising its contempt for everyday social life. 

James William Gibson’s concept of “technowar” described the redefinition of warfare through technology and expertise. Looking at the use of AI on the battlefield today, do you still find this concept useful?

Gibson’s study, The Perfect War, was especially focused on US aerial bombing during the Vietnam war. Notwithstanding the important transformations in technology in the intervening period, I think that a number of the elements of technowar he anatomised with reference to Operation Rolling Thunder remain significant and illuminating in a context where AI technologies have been linked to the Israeli genocide in Gaza and to the Minab school massacre perpetrated by the US in its war against Iran. 

Gibson saw technowar as a centralisation and managerialisation of warfare that treated soldiering as peripheral. As he put it: “United States military officers conceived of themselves as business managers rather than combat leaders. Enlisted men were seen as a kind of migrant labor force of only marginal importance.” Technowar approaches bombing as a form of communication: “Air war, then, was seen as a form of psychological warfare: the vast technocapital of air power had power far beyond physical destruction; its mere appearance was a form of power.” Its logic is one of absolute (and racialised) supremacy: “Communicative bombing is a logic of domination or torture: the foreign Other can only recognize its subordination to superior American Technowar. Within the theory, no other response is imaginable.” 

And lastly, perhaps most importantly, technowar introduces a novel register of fetishism: “Whereas Marx saw the locus of fetishism and naturalization as structurally situated in the system of commodity production, this new fetishism involved rationalized capitalist production as it was organized for war production. Political and social power became conceptualized and practiced solely in terms of how high societies ranked in their ability to produce high-technology warfare. … To appropriate Marx’s phrasing, in this new fetishism definite social relationships among men assume the fantastic form of relationships among high-technology production systems for producing warfare. And when relationships appear as warfare systems, then social relationships disappear from view just as they do with the system of simple commodity production.” 

I think AI has added another “layer” to a process, both real and imaginary, that transmuted human relations into “the fantastic form of relationships among high-technology production systems for producing warfare.”

From Césaire and Du Bois onward, there has been a strong tradition of thought connecting fascism to colonialism and racialized violence. How should we rethink the relationship between colonialism and fascism in “the age of AI”?

I think we could start with that ghastly crystallization of the fusion of colonial racial capitalism and techno-fascism that is evidenced by the various “reconstruction” plans for Gaza that predated the establishment of that legal and institutional abomination that is the “Gaza Board of Peace.” Particularly instructive is the Power-Point deck for one of these plans against Palestine, namely the GREAT (Gaza Reconstitution, Economic Acceleration and Transformation) Trust. I have written at greater length about these plans elsewhere (along with Brenna Bhandar), but here we can foreground that this dystopian vision for a “New Gaza,” predicated on the genocide and politicide of the Palestinian people (allowing the transition from “demolished Iranian proxy” to “prosperous Abrahamic ally”), depicts the Strip as a regional hub for trade, tourism and data. 

Among the 10 mega-projects that will constellate the “Gaza-Arish-Sderot Special Economic Zone” (which include the MBS Ring Highway, The Elon Musk Smart Manufacturing Zone, and the Gaza Trump Riviera & Islands) is The American Data Safe Heaven, described as “Regional Datacenters with special US AI regulation Protected by the GREAT Trust and serving Israel and GCC through Abrahamic Infrastructure Corridor’s Fiber”. What’s more, the New Gaza’s component planned cities, designed to update the Baron Haussmann’s pioneering nineteenth-century idea of urban planning as counter-insurgency, will be based on the principle that “All services and economy … will be done through ID-based powered digital systems”. 

Coupled with the use of AI in new forms of colonial and imperial warfare, I think the GREAT plan and its ilk show how seamlessly AI’s “ontology layer” is being integrated into colonial fascist rule – which toggles between the depoliticization, pacification, subordination, expulsion and the elimination of the native, depending on the twin needs of the settler’s absolute security and impunity, on the one hand, and profitable returns on (real estate, tech and fossil) capital, on the other.

We are seeing the expansion of surveillance, facial recognition, and data systems from Palestine to the US border. How do you understand the reappearance in metropolitan centers of techniques developed in colonial settings?

Following the research of critical scholars of policing like Stuart Schrader in the US or Mathieu Rigouste in France, I am sceptical of an overly linear notion of the “colonial boomerang” in which repressive techniques first tried out in the colonies are now returning to the metropole. I think the historical and political record suggests far greater multidirectionality and entanglement. As Jeanne Morefield put it in her review of Schrader’s Badges without Borders (‘Beyond Boomerang’), in the US case ‘policing was already racialized, already violent, already corrupted, and that these preexisting practices worked their way into counterinsurgency abroad and then back again.’ 

We should also not ignore the forms of endo-colonialism and racialization of class warfare that pervade European history (as well as histories of non-European countries). Without neglecting the specific effects of “the Palestine laboratory” on the militarization of policing and surveillance in the US or Europe, we should also not forget that the states of the Global North or West have a long history (including a pre-colonial one) of war against their own populations. The US was doing apartheid, surveillance and racial policing long before the Nakba and the foundation of the Israeli state. 

Having said that, it is also clear that the more that what Alliez and Lazzarato in their Wars and Capital call “wars against populations” become an open rationale of governance (as they do in the wars against migrants but also those against protesters and dissenters across erstwhile liberal capitalist democracies), the more obvious is the fascist reduction of politics to open and permanent counterinsurgency, and thus the continuity with colonial practices past and present.

'Fascism can often advance better with analog and rudimentary tools'

Many of the fears surrounding AI are increasingly articulated around migrants, China, and technological competition. What kind of relationship do you see between the production of fear and the defense of existing property relations in “the age of AI”?

To begin with, I wonder if perhaps we shouldn’t be cautious about treating ours as “the age of AI”, which seems to concede too much to the epochal discourse of inevitability that dominates the tech industry’s relationship to public and industrial policy. I think the production of fear and enmity is critical for the projection of fascism as the preventive counter-revolution of property (a definition fuses Angela Davis and W.E.B. Du Bois). While AI, and what scholar Donatella Della Ratta calls, writing of the political use of AI-powered visualisation, its “speculative violence,” is an important tool in cementing the nexus of fear and property, I’m not sure it has made particularly great innovations in that domain. Fascism can often advance better with analog and rudimentary tools (syntactically incoherent and crassly provocative interminable rally speeches by Trump, say) than with enormous and expensive technological refinement.

A significant part of the digital infrastructure of fascism has been built by governments and companies that are not explicitly fascist. Does this require us to think of fascism not only as an ideology or political movement, but also as a question of infrastructure?

Certainly. I understand late fascism very much as a particular use and affective politicisation of the infrastructures of accumulation, dispossession, surveillance and repression created under “neoliberal” conditions. The explicit affirmation of these infrastructures for the purposes of domination marks a phase-shift, but it should not allow us to forget the enormous violence – physical, structural, symbolic – produced and reproduced by self-described liberals, centrists or classic conservatives. Fighting overt fascism is not enough unless these infrastructures themselves are dismantled, torn up from the roots, abolished.

Behind AI lies a vast chain of labor, stretching from data workers and software engineers to data center workers and those working on public and military systems. The experiences of workers at different points in this chain are very different. Do you see a basis for the formation of a common political subject among them?

Many commentators have noted that among the several reasons for Big Tech elites’ turn to the far Right is the umbrage that they took at their employees advancing social justice issues but especially questioning their bosses’ collusion with repression and warmaking (including the Tech Workers’ Coalition protests against Palantir in 2017 and Google employees’ protests against the corporation’s work with the Pentagon’s Project Maven in 2018). But the most salient form of opposition to the power of Big Tech today originates from communities affected by data centres, not from workers within the tech sector. 

The question of effective alliances across different experiences of extraction, exploitation, dispossession or disposability is an eminently political one. Can some coalitions be birthed that would span coders being made redundant by AI, the invisibilised and marginalised workers tweaking AI to appear entirely seamless (“fauxtomation”), high-level tech workers with ethical qualms at colluding with repression and state murder, and people rising up against data centres polluting, depleting or displacing their communities? I think that’s a question that can only be answered in the political practice of constructing common interests, solidarities and imaginaries. 

"'Super Intelligence' is being sold as a kind of moonshot to dispel the spectre of American decline"

Palantir’s technologies are no longer being used only in the context of the United States and Israel. States across Europe and the Gulf are acquiring similar technologies of data processing, surveillance, and warfare, or developing their own versions. How does the global spread of these technologies alter the relationship between the center and the periphery in the technological infrastructure of fascism?

At the level of political economy, the dominance of Big Tech seems to be a factor that exacerbates the disjunctions and inequalities between “centre” and “periphery”. Of the ten top companies worldwide by market capitalization only two (Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company and Saudi Aramco, the only non-tech company in the list) are not US-based. The CEOs of these companies have clearly decided that their present and future dominance demands embarrassing shows of fealty to Trump and increasing integration into the MAGA White Houses project for perpetuating American domination (now without hegemony) ad infinitum. 

AI, or rather “Super Intelligence” is being coded and sold as a kind of moonshot to dispel the spectre of American decline. And of course, this is being framed by a new AI-centred economic and geopolitical cold war with China, and its alternative “nationalisation” of AI in a more classically developmentalist and “biopolitical” key. As Cédric Durand narrates in his recent book How Silicon Valley Unleashed Techno-Feudalism, the European Union (unlike the US) drank the Kool Aid of neoliberal market fundamentalism and pre-emptively stripped itself of the planning and state capacities to compete in the AI “race”. As with the platform economies, I think we need to distinguish between the spread and use of these technologies and the kinds of economic and political power they channel and consolidate. 

The Italian scholar Dario Guarascio has in this respect written of a “digital imperialism” that combines the enormous concentration of technological power, the pervasive digitalisation of the capitalist economy and an increasing centrality of warmaking both as a domain of R&D and as a geopolitical reality and horizon. As he puts it: “The militarisation of the digital industries diverts resources and knowledge from applications that could improve the human condition and enable international cooperation. The convergence between digital monopolies and the imperialist strategies of states increases inequalities, hollows out democracy and augments the risk of global conflict.” 

Finally, as AI becomes increasingly integrated with the state, capital, and the apparatuses of war, which areas of struggle should anti-fascist movements prioritize?

As anti-fascist organizing and opinion becomes increasingly illegalized and subject to what Lisa Bhungalia has called the “asphyxiatory violence” of targeted economic warfare (a practice long levelled against Palestinian solidarity activism and most recently evidenced in the proscribing and debanking of the Italian anti-fascist media collective Autistici/Inventati by the US state), it is inevitable that movements will have to mobilise to defend or create the political, institutional and juridical spaces for association, inquiry and oppositional speech. But I think there is an urgent need for addressing, at multiple levels and sites, the infrastructural and “ontological” power of the fusion of tech capital with external imperialism and the internal fascisation of everyday politics. 

The mass disposition to reject tech dominance evidenced by the movement against data centres is an important sign and starting point, at least in the US context. Ultimately, the socialisation and collective control of the facets or potentials of these technologies that answer to genuine social needs or contribute to human flourishing will need to be put on the agenda, which will mean breaking the power of a tech oligopoly currently being held together by state patronage, regulatory indulgence and circular financing. 

Nothing short of expropriation or confiscation will be required in the face of companies whose absurd accumulation of power and wealth is predicated on the unchecked exploitation of the dead intellectual labour of centuries of human culture, the incessant and omnipresent predatory surveillance and extraction of data about our collective behaviour, and the state-enabled commandeering and abuse of the environmental and energetic resources that make the earth habitable. Perhaps the euthanasia of the rentier will need to be reinvented as the euthanasia of the founder. (DS/VC/VK)

Editor-in-chief Ercüment İşleyen and managing editor Tuğba Nur Çelik were taken to the İstanbul Security Directorate and released later in the night after giving statements.

The report concerns the detention of two students over a banner protesting the education minister. The university students had hung the banner at an İstanbul high school ahead of the scheduled visit from Minister Yusuf Tekin. On Oct 25, they were jailed pending trial for "threatening" him.

In its initial reporting of the incident, Sözcü misendified the studetns as high schoolers. This was the reason for the journalists' detention, according to the outlet.

Two students jailed over banner calling on education minister to resign

26 October 2026

Use of disinformation charges against journalists

Article 217/A of the Turkish Penal Code, introduced under legislation widely known as the "disinformation law," took effect in Oct 2022.

The provision carries a prison sentence of one to three years for anyone who "publicly disseminates false information concerning the country's internal or external security, public order or public health, solely with the intention of creating anxiety, fear or panic among the public, in a manner capable of disturbing public peace."

An allegation that information is false or inaccurate is not sufficient on its own to constitute an offense. All the elements specified in the law must be present.

The information must be false, and the person disseminating it must know it is false. It must concern the country's internal or external security, public order or public health, be disseminated publicly and be capable of disturbing public peace. The person must also act solely with the intention of creating anxiety, fear or panic among the public.

The requirement that the information be "capable of disturbing public peace" must also be established through concrete evidence or facts.

In the face of widespread criticism from journalism groups and political opposition, government officials at the time maintained that the law would not be used against journalists.

Then-Justice Minister Bekir Bozdağ assured in Jan 2023 that the offense was subject to "very strict conditions."

Bozdağ said the mere act of writing an article did not mean that a person had disturbed public peace. He also said he did not expect the provision to lead to a large number of investigations.

'Disinformation law' used against 83 journalists since 2022

10 April 2026

However, at least 113 investigations were launched against 88 journalists between Oct 2022, when the law took effect, and Apr 1, according to figures documented by the Journalists' Union of Turkey (TGS).

During that period, 29 journalists were detained by police and six were jailed pending trial. Another journalist was placed under house arrest as a judicial supervision measure.

The union also reported that no convictions under Article 217/A had become final by Apr 1.

However, journalists continued to face pretrial detention under the same provision after the report's cutoff date.

Yelis Ayaz, publisher of Aydınpost, was arrested on May 15, followed by Evrensel reporter Doğa Baskan on Jun 25, journalist Ali Çağatay on Jun 26, Cem Küçük on Jul 31 and journalist Ali Tarakcı on Sep 26.

Most recently, journalists Şaban Sevinç and Mustafa Balcı were arrested on Oct 9 under the same provision.

BIA Media Monitoring Reports

13 December 2024

(HA/VK)

The İstanbul-based operation targeted a criminal organization known as the "Daltons," which is active in Turkey and abroad, according to the state-run Anadolu Agency (AA).

The group was connected to the investigation into a Sep 23 fire at a Starlink ground station near Warsaw.

The facility is known to be actively used in the war in Ukraine and is a major asset for Ukrainian forces against Russia.

The Daltons are among several criminal groups that have emerged in Turkey in recent years and are commonly described as “new-generation criminal organizations.”

These groups, some of which use names drawn from cartoons such as the Daltons and the Caspers, make extensive use of social media to promote themselves and recruit new members. 

Such groups' activities have also expanded beyond Turkey into Europe. The alleged leader of the Daltons is wanted under an Interpol Red Notice.

The Starlink facility fire

A fire broke out at the Starlink ground facility in Wola Krobowska on the evening of Sep 23, damaging its electrical system and backup generator.

Polish Deputy Prime Minister Krzysztof Gawkowski said the incident was an act of sabotage intended to disrupt internet access for several institutions, including the Ukrainian military. The station resumed normal operations the following day. Authorities did not disclose whether the fire caused any disruption to communications in Ukraine.

As part of the investigation, two Turkish nationals suspected of setting the fire were detained in Germany and another was arrested in Poland.

Polish authorities alleged that the attack was carried out at the direction of Russian intelligence. Tomasz Siemoniak, the minister responsible for intelligence services, described the incident as part of what he called Russia’s “hybrid war” against European countries.

Russia has repeatedly denied accusations that it has been involved in sabotage operations in Europe. (VK)

Within the framework of transitional justice, interim constitutions are expected to include provisions addressing how past injustices will be redressed, how a culture of coexistence can be established among conflicting parties, and how to approach the past—including how to deal with perpetrators, potentially through measures such as amnesties.

Today, transitional justice has moved beyond the exclusive domain of academia, receiving increasing attention from policymakers and civil society. It is now widely discussed across various political and legal spheres—most notably in societies undergoing transition—providing an opportunity to address past human rights violations and mass atrocities as these nations move toward a democratic order following periods of conflict.

A 2004 report by the United Nations, titled “The Rule of Law and Transitional Justice in Conflict and Post-Conflict Societies,” defines transitional justice as the process of addressing past gross human rights violations through both judicial and non-judicial mechanisms. According to the International Center for Transitional Justice (ICTJ), transitional justice is the response of societies to mass-scale, gross human rights violations. Furthermore, the ICTJ notes that it places victims at the center, paving the way for accountability regarding the harm they have suffered and introducing various reparation programs to address the suffering experienced. (International Center for Transitional Justice, “What is Transitional Justice?”)

Another report dated Jan 9, 2025, prepared by the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR), examines best practices and highlights the lessons learned about transitional justice processes within the context of sustaining peace and achieving sustainable development. The report also underlines, in particular, examples of good practice that are applicable in difficult cases. Moreover, drawing upon these best practices and lessons learned, the report offers recommendations for expanding the scope and ensuring the sustainability of such practices, within a holistic transitional justice framework that promotes truth, justice, reparation, and guarantees of non-recurrence. 

Interim constitutions

In the context of transitional justice—processes aimed at transitioning toward a period of social peace and rebuilding social trust—interim constitutions are also used, alongside the more commonly known truth commissions, to ensure the effective functioning of transitional justice mechanisms.

Interim constitutions establish a framework for institutional structures and negotiations, remaining in effect for a specified duration. In other words, interim constitutions define specific principles and concepts for a final constitution and encompass foundational articles for the reconstruction of the state. Such constitutions are crafted with the objective of ending violence and conflict and transitioning to a period of peace and a new constitutional order.

It is reported that since 1990—a period following the Cold War when the use of interim constitutions became more widespread—approximately 30 interim constitutions have been drafted and have to a great extent achieved their intended aims. (Kimana Zulueta-Fülscher, Interim Constitutions, International IDEA, Stockholm, 2015, p. 5.) 

While interim constitutions lay the ground for setting up the general framework of a well-designed constitution, they also cover the comprehensive arrangements needed to provide enough facilitating details to reach a consensus on fundamental principles acceptable to all conflicting parties.

Whereas peace agreements typically address issues concerning immediate and high-priority concerns, interim constitutions focus on the principles and values that will guide a system into the future. In such processes, the involvement of the UN or regional organizations—whether through mediation, advisory roles, or acting as guarantors—can be beneficial, depending on the specific circumstances.

A key point in ensuring success and legitimacy in this process is the necessity to form inclusive negotiation forums structured with the broadest possible representation. (Kimana Zulueta-Fülscher, Interim Constitutions, p. 6.)

In order to address the historical realities that have fueled mass outrage and trauma following prolonged periods of conflict, truth commissions may also be established alongside interim constitutions as part of the transitional justice process.

In this regard, Nepal, South Africa, and Rwanda serve as notable examples, as their interim constitutions explicitly state the objectives behind their drafting and the functions they are intended to fulfill within their respective preambles.

The Interim Constitution of Nepal (2007–2015)

The Interim Constitution of Nepal, established in 2007, was initiated with the aim of ending a decade-long armed conflict. As a result of negotiations, the structure of governance was transformed from a unitary monarchy into a federal republic, and it was decided that a new constitution would be drafted by an elected Constituent Assembly.

The preamble to the 2007 Interim Constitution of Nepal highlights the fundamental principles of agreed reconciliation as follows: "We, the people of Nepal, in the exercise of our sovereign powers and state authority; building upon the determination of the Nepali people—expressed since 1951 through the pursuit of democracy, peace, and development, as well as through historical struggles and popular movements—and having decided to restructure the state in a progressive manner to address issues related to class, caste, religion, and gender; and affirming our full commitment to democratic norms and values—such as a competitive multi-party democratic system, civil liberties, fundamental rights, human rights, the right to vote, periodic elections, freedom of the press, an independent judiciary, and the rule of law— hereby promulgate this Interim Constitution of Nepal (2007), which shall remain in effect until a new Constitution, formulated through a process of political reconciliation and enacted by the Constituent Assembly." (Winluck Wahiu, A Practical Guide to Constitution Building, p. 15)

South Africa’s 1994 Interim Constitution

South Africa’s 1994 interim constitution, drafted as part of a reconciliation process, remained in force following the first general elections until it was replaced by the constitution adopted in 1996. It serves as a significant example of a foundational law that established the rules for ending conflicts, abolishing discrimination against Black people, and transitioning toward a peaceful order. Drafted during a period of ongoing conflict, this interim constitution defined the structure and principles of the new era through measures such as the dismantling of "Apartheid"—the system that upheld racial segregation—the restructuring of the state, the inclusion of a bill of rights to ensure oversight of laws and government actions, and the establishment of a Constitutional Court vested with broad supervisory powers.

The preamble to South Africa’s 1994 Interim Constitution reads, in summary: "In humble submission to Almighty God, we, the people of South Africa, declare that... as there is a need to create a new order in which all South Africans—men and women of all races—are entitled to a common South African citizenship within a sovereign and democratic constitutional state, and are able to enjoy and exercise their fundamental rights and freedoms; and in order to achieve this objective, the elected representatives of all the people of South Africa shall be empowered to adopt a new Constitution, in accordance with an agreement set forth as Constitutional Principles." 

Rwanda’s Transitional Process and Interim Constitution (1993–2003)

Rwanda—which was first under German control, then became a Belgian colony under a League of Nations (later UN) mandate in 1922, and has a history marked by ethnic conflicts and uprisings—adopted its first constitution during the independence process in 1961. The evolution of its constitutional system, culminating in the 2003 Constitution that brought an end to the conflicts, serves as a notable example of transitional justice in a conflict-ridden multicultural society.

The nine-year transitional period in Rwanda was governed by rules set out in a collection of documents known as "fundamental laws," which included the 1991 Constitution, the Arusha Peace Agreement, the Rwandan Patriotic Front Declaration, and various protocols signed among political parties.

The peace and reconciliation negotiations—known as the Arusha Accords, which began in 1990 and concluded in 1993—are referred to by some authors in the literature as an "interim constitution," as they were the primary documents shaping the fundamental principles and structure of the 2003 Constitution. The Arusha Accords established a framework for broad-based power-sharing, intended to guide the new constitution that would govern the post-transition era. Alongside an interim assembly, a constitutional commission was established with a three-year mandate, tasked with addressing the expectations of the Rwandan people and defining a participatory process. Its primary duties and objectives were defined as: informing the public about the constitution-making process, fostering greater interest in the subject, organizing the referendum process for the constitution following its adoption by parliament, and fulfilling the necessary work to align all existing laws with the new constitution.

The transitional period in Rwanda and the negotiations for the Arusha Accords took place in a political climate dominated by ongoing ethnic conflict, so they were not as effective as anticipated in bringing an end to the hostilities. Between Oct 1990 and Jul 1992, the Rwandan Patriotic Front (RPF) waged a bloody civil war against Rwandan government forces, a conflict that concluded with a ceasefire in Jul 1992. Meanwhile, as the Arusha negotiations reached an agreement on Aug 4, 1993, a severe conflict—known as the "Rwandan Genocide"—erupted following the assassination of the Rwandan president in 1994. As a result of attacks by Hutu forces, approximately 800,000 people—Tutsis and moderate Hutus—were killed.

A significant step in drafting the 2003 Constitution of Rwanda was setting up the National Unity and Reconciliation Commission (NURC) in 1999, which aimed to reconcile the parties involved in the Rwandan Civil War and the genocide. The key reconciliation principles of the agreement can be summarized as follows: “Respect for the principles of democracy, national unity, pluralism, and the rule of law—which upholds the fundamental rights and freedoms of individuals—is affirmed, recognizing that these principles were considered essential to ensure a lasting peace for the benefit of both present and future generations. The parties accepted the principle of power-sharing within the framework of a broad-based transitional government. They further acknowledged that the Constitution of July 10, 1991, and this Arusha Peace Agreement together constitute the fundamental law that will govern the country during the transitional period.” (NT/VK)

While appeals against pre-trial detentions have been rejected, rights violations have been reported in prisons regarding access to healthcare, living conditions, and treatment of trans prisoners.

İdil Arslanbaş, a lawyer for the 17 May Association, spoke about the current stage of the investigations in İstanbul, Ankara, İzmir, Mersin, and Kuşadası, the delays in indictments, rights violations during detention and in prison, and the accusations against LGBTI+ organizing.

Explained: Turkey's 'My Family Is Safe' operations

1 October 2026

At least 80 people detained across five cities

According to current information provided by Arslanbaş, at least 80 people remain detained in investigations across different cities:

• In İstanbul, 20 people, including nine activists, are in pre-trial detention. Appeals against their detention were rejected. Indictments may be delayed due to waiting to take statements from individuals who have not yet given their statements.
• In Ankara, eight people, including seven people serving in organs of Kaos GL and journalist Tuğba Tekerek, are detained. An indictment was also prepared in a separate file involving five detained trans women. The first hearing will take place on Nov 12.
• In İzmir, 18 trans women are in custody. One person was released during the appeal process.
• In Mersin, one person was released following an appeal against pre-trial detention, and four people were released at the detention review stage. Twenty-three trans women remain detained.
• In Kuşadası, detention orders were issued for four people. With one person who was released but then detained as part of another file, the total number stands at five.

Arslanbaş said it remains uncertain when the indictments will be prepared for the investigations in İstanbul, Ankara, İzmir, Mersin, and Kuşadası.

Over 80 formally arrested in anti-LGBTI+ crackdown as ministry orders action over ‘desexualization’

17 September 2026

'Evidence collection was left until after detention'

About the delay in filing indictments, Arslanbaş argued that the investigations had been launched with an operation-first approach, before sufficient evidence was gathered:

"These files are not based on investigations with sufficient depth prior to detention. They are files created very quickly, with an operation-driven mindset, which is why the evidence collection phase was left until after the detentions.

"In fact, there is a situation where individuals were targeted first, then crimes were searched for, and then evidence was sought. Therefore, there is no concrete evidence. In fact, because there is no concrete evidence, we believe that some of the obtained information was disseminated on social media through judicial authorities."

Arslanbaş described the continued pre-trial detention as a form of punishment:

"The delay in indictments and the continuation of detentions show us that throughout this process, pre-trial detention is being applied directly as a form of punishment rather than an exceptional measure.

"Therefore, our friends have essentially been taken hostage because they are disliked by the government. The legal foundation for this was created in the background, and we are fighting against it."

Lawyers say prolonged detention of LGBTI+ activists has become 'de facto hostage-taking'

22 October 2026

Attorney restrictions in custody, discriminatory practices in prison

Arslanbaş stated that numerous rights violations have occurred since the initial days of the operations.

They said people were detained during midnight home raids, their phones and computers were seized, and some were placed into police vehicles with their hands cuffed behind their backs while being recorded on video.

LGBTI+ detainees in Mersin prison report difficulties in accessing clothing, medication

1 October 2026

Arslanbaş noted that following poor detention conditions and restrictions on lawyer consultations in custody, discriminatory practices continued in prison.

According to Arslanbaş, LGBTI+s whose official records list their gender as male were sent for communicable disease tests in a stigmatizing manner and kept in cells until the results came out. Despite court orders and medical reports, procedures regarding the placement of trans prisoners were left unresolved for a long time. Inter-prison transfers, strip searches, and delays in access to healthcare services were also among the violations they detailed.

'They wrote petitions every day for weeks to go to the infirmary'

Stating that drinking water in prisons could only be accessed for a fee and external medication was not permitted, Arslanbaş said some prisoners had to write petitions every day for weeks just to visit the infirmary.

They noted that corrections of dosage errors in prescribed medications were delayed, and some prisoners still could not access their eyeglasses.

Detained queer rights advocate sends message from prison: ‘This is a badge of honor’

18 September 2026

Arslanbaş mentioned examples where 40 people stayed in 24-person wards, and four people stayed in two-person rooms. They added that prisoners transferred to the hospital could spend the entire day in hospital detention rooms, and arbitrary restrictions were imposed on clothing.

Thw lawyer emphasized that they must also consider the risk of retaliation in applications made against rights violations:

"In applications regarding these issues, we must also consider the risk of retaliation so that the applications made do not negatively affect our friends' situation even further."

'LGBTI+ existence is treated as if it were a crime'

Arslanbaş argued that LGBTI+ visibility is treated under the scope of obscenity, while the activities of legally operating associations are viewed as crimes:

"From one night onward, any activity regarding LGBTI+ existence and visibility was treated as if it constituted the crime of obscenity on the grounds that it could negatively affect child development. LGBTI+ existence was directly targeted.

"We are actually facing a strange construct where LGBTI+ visibility itself constitutes an obscenity offense, which is evaluated as sharing obscene content where children can see it; where the routine activities of associations established under freedom of association and subject to continuous audits are seen as the organization of this crime, and where income and expenses, all reported to the Interior Ministry, are seen as the financing of this crime.

"Because there was no change in the law on this matter either. Despite this, prosecutors are acting as if there is something called LGBTI+ promotion and as if it has been accepted as a crime."

Jailed trans rights activist Janset Kalan: Remember trans prisoners

2 October 2026

Arslanbaş said the operations were targeting LGBTI+s' freedom of association, pointing to access restrictions as well as judicial and administrative proceedings against associations:

"The existence of LGBTI+s was also made possible by their ability to come together, raise their voices, and organize.

"We are in a process where all of these are sought to be prevented—both through access blocks, by depriving people working in this field of their freedom, and through judicial and administrative actions against associations working in this field."

Lawyer says private messages cited as 'obscenity' evidence against detained LGBTI+s

15 September 2026

'Future violation rulings do not change today's detention'

Arslanbaş said that due to ongoing problems in Turkey regarding freedom of expression, freedom of association, and the prohibition of discrimination, their expectations from judicial processes are low.

They drew attention to the importance of social solidarity alongside the legal struggle:

"Since issues such as freedom of expression, freedom of association, and the prohibition of discrimination have become very grave in our country beyond just LGBTI+s—and are becoming increasingly graver—it can be said that our legal expectations are not high. Ultimately, these are political operations.

"Only to the extent that society and social opposition oppose them and we raise our voices will we be able to achieve results. Otherwise, since the process so far has not functioned on the basis of law, violation decisions we might receive regarding this process in the future do not change the fact that our friends are currently still deprived of their freedom."

(NÖ/VK)

Nevin Tekin and Nehir Dizdar, members of the party's student branch, had hung the banner on the fences of Kadıköy High School in İstanbul, where the minister was scheduled to visit.

The banner read, “If there is no future for us, there will be no peace for you. Yusuf Tekin, resign.”

The students, aged 19 and 20, were taken into custody during late-night raids on their homes and spent the night in detention, TİP deputy Sera Kadıgil said.

After police procedures were completed, the students were sent to a courthouse today. Kadıgil said court records showed that the prosecutor sought their arrest without first taking their statements.

A penal judgeship of peace ordered the students jailed on the grounds that they had “threatened" the minister.

Kadıgil shared the relevant section of the judge's decision, noting that the students had been jailed solely because of the banner.

“There's no need to beat around the bush. This is called fascism," she wrotre.

15-year-old vocational student allegedly abused for nine months during internship

7 August 2026

The Education and Science Workers' Union (Eğitim Sen) also criticized the arrests, saying freedom of expression and the right to peaceful protest are constitutionally protected.

The union said students have the right to criticize education policies and express their opposition through democratic means, adding that peaceful protest cannot be treated as a crime. (NÖ/VK)

The raids were carried out in Ankara, Diyarbakır, Mardin, Çankırı, İstanbul, Bolu and Antalya by the vice units of the respective police organizations.

The prosecutor’s office said social media posts by those detained contained material that was “contrary to public morality, targeting families, children and young people or harming their development, encouraging gender-neutralization and disrupting public order.”

Those detained were primarily accused of “obscenity.”

Explained: Turkey's 'My Family Is Safe' operations

1 October 2026

Lawyers from the Pembe Hayat, Red Umbrella, Kaos GL and ÜniKuir associations are monitoring the legal proceedings.

The raids follow a widespread crackdown against the LBGTI+ movement last month dubbed as "My Family Is Safe" operations. The crackdown resulted in detentions and the blocking on hundreds of social media accounts and websites belonging to LGBTI+ groups and activists. Eighty-two individuals were jailed pending trial, most of them facing obscenity charges.

While obscenity law has historically applied to explicit content, it has recently become grounds to investigate LGBTI+ activists.

Lawyers say prolonged detention of LGBTI+ activists has become 'de facto hostage-taking'

22 October 2026

How Turkey’s vague obscenity law is becoming a tool to criminalize LGBTI+ visibility

18 September 2026

'Stop inventing crimes'

The We Want Freedom Campaign, formed after last month's crackdown, condemned the raids in a written statement, demanding the release of all detainees:

Trans women targeted in new Ankara-led operation: Stop inventing crimes!

As we continue demanding freedom for our friends imprisoned during the “My Family Is Safe” operations carried out on the dark anniversary of September 12, we woke up today to another operation coordinated from Ankara.

In simultaneous operations coordinated from Ankara and extending to Diyarbakır, Mardin, Çankırı, İstanbul, Bolu and Antalya, 45 people, most of them trans women, were detained.

The language used in the statement issued by the Ankara Chief Public Prosecutor’s Office regarding this operation, which is also being monitored by lawyers from the Pembe Hayat, Red Umbrella, Kaos GL and ÜniKuir associations in Ankara, clearly reveals the intention behind it.

The Ankara Chief Public Prosecutor’s Office claimed that the operation, conducted by the Morality Bureau of the Public Order Branch of the Ankara Provincial Police Department, was justified by the social media posts of those detained, alleging that these posts contained material that was “contrary to public morality, targeting families, children and young people or harming their development, encouraging gender-neutralization and disrupting public order.”

The phrase “encouraging gender-neutralization” in this statement refers to a non-existent crime. Just as in the “My Family Is Safe” operation, trans women are being targeted on the basis of an offence that does not exist.

The Chief Public Prosecutor’s Office statement makes clear that those detained are being accused of “obscenity,” an allegation that has now become a pretext for repressing and imprisoning society as a whole, particularly LGBTI+ people.

As in previous operations, we suspect that the virtual patrol practice was also used in this operation. However, we would like to remind everyone: The virtual patrol practice is unlawful!

In its ruling dated February 19, 2020, the Constitutional Court annulled the provision granting police the authority to conduct virtual patrols, finding that the provision allowing police to carry out general “virtual patrol” activities online was unconstitutional.

In its ruling, the Court emphasized that the regulation was incompatible with the requirements of a democratic society, that personal data is protected under the Constitution, and that police may conduct investigations into specific individuals only upon instructions from prosecutors.

We will continue reporting developments concerning the operation and demanding freedom…

Our trans existence, which they seek to criminalize, is not a crime! Everywhere is a prison; we want freedom!

(EMK/VK)

Judicial and digital pressure on independent media continues with arrests, access restrictions and blocked reports.

The third quarterly edition of bianet's Media Monitoring Report was published. The report highlights the increase in online censorship and imprisonment of journalists over three months. According to the report, at least 17 journalists faced investigations due to their work, 13 were taken into custody and seven were jailed pending trial. Also, access to dozens of news reports and social media accounts belonging o journalists was blocked by authorities.

BİA MEDIA MONITORING REPORT JULY-AUGUST-SEPTEMBER 2026

Government steps up censorship and imprisonment of journalists

21 October 2026

BirGün reporter İsmail Arı was detained after responding to a police summons and jailed pending trial the following day on a charge of "publicly disseminating misleading information."

Halk TV's X account with over three million followers was blocked in Turkey, a week after state-appointed trustees took over the pro-opposition broadcaster.

In a separate case against former bianet editor was dropped after the statutory deadline for filing charges had expired. The case concerned Yılmaz's interview with Turkey's Armenian people. She faced charges of "insulting the Turkish nation and state."

Journalist İsmail Arı formally arrested on ‘disinformation’ charges

21 October 2026

Halk TV's X account with 3 million followers blocked after state takeover

21 October 2026

Court drops case against journalist Tuğçe Yılmaz over interview with Armenian youths

20 October 2026

After the İstanbul floods

Seven people died and around 3,000 homes and businesses were affected by floods that struck İstanbul on Oct 14 and 15. Thousands of damage claims were filed as the destruction renewed scrutiny of construction in streambeds and inadequate infrastructure.

Speaking to bianet, climate scientist Barış Önol warned that extreme rainfall was expected to become more frequent and intense. He also stressed that population growth and expanding construction increase exposure to flooding, regardless of changes in the climate.

Meanwhile, he rainfall raised the city's reservoir fill rate from 38.06% to 52.43%, its highest level since 2018. 

'Flood risk grows in İstanbul amid climate crisis'

21 October 2026

LGBTI+ detainees remain without an indictment

MP Özgül Saki reported some improvements in prison conditions after visiting nine detained LGBTI+ activists. Eighty-two people have been in prison for over 40 days now, after being arrested during operations dubbed by authorities as "My Family Is Safe."

DEM Party deputy visits jailed LGBTI+ activists in İstanbul

19 October 2026

Lawyers representing executives of the Kaos GL association, an LGBTI+ rights group targeted in the operations, described their continued detention as "hostage-taking." They also reported alleged mistreatment, including isolation, restricted access to health care and strip searches.

The investigation into the LGBTI+ movement centers on allegations of "obscenity," an offense historically associated with sexually explicit and pornographic material.

Lawyers say prolonged detention of LGBTI+ activists has become 'de facto hostage-taking'

22 October 2026

Opposition municipalities change hands

Gökhan Günaydın of the main opposition New Party announced a tally of municipalities changing hands after the 2024 local elections. Accordingly, 106 mayors elected from opposition parties in 2024 had since joined the ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP). Meanwhile, 32 mayors remain in pretrial detention as part of corruption investigations.

Günaydın accused the government of using a combination of political incentives and legal pressure to draw mayors to its side. 

Over 100 opposition mayors have switched to Erdoğan's party since 2024 election as 32 remain jailed

21 October 2026

Azerbaijan tensions and Yemen conflict

Azerbaijan issued arrest warrants for seven people living in Turkey over protests and social media posts opposing restrictions on religious clothing in Azerbaijani schools. Azerbaijani authorities said judicial cooperation with Turkey was underway.

Azerbaijan seeks arrest of seven people in Turkey over criticism against school headscarf ban

20 October 2026

Meanwhile, renewed conflict in Yemen raised questions about Turkey's obligations under the Mecca defense pact, as Ankara seeks to limit Iranian influence while avoiding involvement in offensive military operations.

Turkey navigates regional tensions as Yemen conflict tests Mecca defense pact

19 October 2026

Migrant children

Two children from an Iraqi Kurdish family died after an overcrowded inflatable boat capsized in the Meriç River during an attempted crossing into Greece. A third child remained missing.

In a separate development, 13 unaccompanied migrant children who had gone missing from a reception center were found in Edirne and İstanbul and returned to the facility. Authorities did not explain the circumstances of their disappearance.

Two Kurdish children die, third missing after boat capsizes on Turkey-Greece border

20 October 2026

All 13 migrant children who went missing in Edirne found by police

19 October 2026

(VK)

I went on a break because I couldn't go any farther. Many of my colleagues also stopped working by selecting the equipment or accident issue option in the app.

But according to Kaan, stopping work cost him more than just the deliveries he missed that day: His score on the app, which automatically evaluates riders' work consistency and delivery performance, had dropped. As a result, he says he will be unable to choose his working hours for the following week.

Climate justice starts from the recognition that the climate crisis does not affect everyone equally. Kaan's experience shows how this inequality extends into ": When people whose jobs keep them on the streets stop working to protect their lives during extreme weather, can they also protect their livelihoods?

Working during the rain on Oct 14

According to İstanbul Metropolitan Municipality's Disaster Coordination Center (AKOM), some parts of the city received between 130 and 277.1 kilograms of rainfall per square meter on Oct 14.

This was the highest rainfall recorded by monitoring stations since 1942. The amount of rain recorded in the city over a short period reached four times the long-term average rainfall for the entire month of October.  –AKOM, Oct 15

İstanbul'a yeni sağanak uyarısı

15 Ekim 2026

Yet the risk of torrential rain had been announced in advance. In a warning issued at 2.15 pm on Oct 13, the Turkish State Meteorological Service (MGM) forecast heavy rainfall in İstanbul the following morning. The warning also cited possible flooding, landslides and transportation disruptions.

The İstanbul Governor's Office, however, did not announce its decision to ban motorcycles from the roads until 6.35 pm on Oct 14:

All motorcycles and other two-wheeled vehicles are banned from the roads starting at 9 pm on Wednesday until further notice.

"By then, everywhere was already flooded," Kaan says of the time the ban took effect.

At least seven people died in floods across İstanbul. Among them was Murat Babacanov, a 30-year-old delivery rider.

We learn that Babacanov went missing around the time the ban was announced from a statement his friend, who was following the search efforts, gave to the press. His body was found in the Golden Horn on Oct 18.

He disappeared at 6.50 pm on the first day of the rain (...) He last spoke to our friend on the phone (...) When the flood came, he was swept away. Nobody saw him, and nobody knew what had happened. There was no information that he was here, but his phone's last signal came from Ayazağa Square.” – Babacanov's friend Artur Seydullayev, Oct 18, 2026

Who gets to decide when to stop working?

Kaan says he continued to receive delivery assignments even after the ban took effect:

Even though the ban started at 9 pm, the algorithm kept assigning orders, and our scores took an additional hit because we didn't make the deliveries.

He says the scores were never adjusted afterward. "We won't be able to choose our hours for next week," he explains.

Ogün*, another platform delivery rider, worked in and around Kadıköy until 8 pm that day. He says he can decide when to start and stop working. According to Ogün, the platform sent warnings about the weather conditions and the ban, and extended the time riders could spend on breaks. Once the ban took effect, the platform closed off working hours, and he faced no penalties.

Still, stopping work means earning less that day. Like Kaan, Ogün is paid per delivery.

If we don't work, we don't earn anything. We only make money when we work.

Hakan*, a restaurant delivery rider working in and around Tuzla, had a different experience. He says he was made to keep working despite the ban, until his shift ended at 2 am.

I didn't lose any income because I'm a formally employed worker with social insurance, but I was forced to work that day.

According to Hakan, the business he works for issued no warnings, and deliveries continued until the end of his shift.

Is there anywhere to take shelter in the city?

The risks posed by heavy rainfall also depend on how the city is built. Impermeable surfaces such as asphalt and concrete prevent rainwater from soaking into the ground. When more water flows into streams at a faster rate, the risk of flooding can increase.

İstanbul's streams overflow during rainfall: How has urban development reshaped the city's waterways?

15 October 2026

For delivery riders, the challenge is finding out which roads have been closed by flooding in time and finding somewhere safe to take shelter when necessary.

Ogün says he learned about road closures through social media. There are no designated waiting areas for riders. When the rain gets heavier, they take shelter at gas stations or cafes. Sometimes they have no choice but to wait by the roadside, although he says this is unsafe.

Asked how he finds out which roads are dangerous, Hakan gives a two-word answer: "By going."

There is a place where he can wait at the business he works for. But he says the constant flow of orders keeps him on his motorcycle. In other words, having an indoor space available does not necessarily mean he can use it to wait out dangerous weather.

Köstebek yuvası şehirler: Belediye ihmalleri kuryeleri öldürüyor

2 Nisan 2026

*Kaan, Ogün and Hakan are pseudonyms used to protect the identities of the delivery riders interviewed.

(VC/VK) 

Two of the injured workers are in critical condition and have been intubated at a hospital, local media reported.

Two workers were initially confirmed dead following the explosion. Rescuers later recovered the body of a third worker who had been trapped under the debris.

Justice Minister Akın Gürlek announced that an investigation had been launched into the explosion.

Eight workers were inside the mine at the time of the explosion, according to local media reports.

The mine in the Kilimli district of Turkey's coal capital is operated by a private company.

Forty-five workers injured in mine collapse after firedamp explosion in İzmir

20 December 2021

(VK)

The lawyers held a press conference today at the Ankara branch of the Human Rights Association (İHD), addressing the investigation launched under an operation named "My Family Is Safe" on Sep 12.

Explained: Turkey's 'My Family Is Safe' operations

1 October 2026

Reading a statement on behalf of Kaos GL's legal team, lawyer Kerem Dikmen said the continued detention of his clients had ceased to serve as a legal precaution and had effectively become a form of punishment.

'Journalistic activities used as grounds for prosecution'

Police raided Kaos GL's Ankara office in the early hours of Sep 13, seizing computers and detaining regular and alternate members of the association's executive and supervisory boards.

While alternate board members were released under judicial supervision, the serving members of both boards were placed in pretrial detention.

LGBTI+ rights advocates Janset Kalan, Nedime Erdoğan, Umut Derin, Selin Berghan, Burçin and Metin, along with journalist Tuğba Tekerek, have been held at Sincan Prison for more than a month.

According to their lawyers, news articles and other content published on Kaos GL's social media accounts were cited as grounds for the arrests.

Lawyer says private messages cited as 'obscenity' evidence against detained LGBTI+s

15 September 2026

During police questioning, the detainees were asked about the association's Instagram posts, its lawful funding sources and journalistic activities, the lawyers said.

They also noted that the digital platforms containing the material cited in the investigation had been inaccessible from Turkey for more than a year and a half. This restriction was acknowledged in an investigative report included in the case file, they said.

The lawyers suggested that law enforcement officers had accessed the material using virtual private networks (VPNs).

"We are facing the criminalization of LGBTI+ existence under the guise of obscenity," the statement said.

How Turkey’s vague obscenity law is becoming a tool to criminalize LGBTI+ visibility

18 September 2026

'Detained despite legal restrictions on pretrial detention'

The lawyers argued that the charges against their clients did not meet the legal requirements for pretrial detention.

They pointed to Article 226 of the Turkish Penal Code (TCK), which provides prison sentences ranging from six months to two years for obscenity offenses. They maintained that the applicable sentencing range legally precluded pretrial detention.

Jailed trans rights activist Janset Kalan: Remember trans prisoners

2 October 2026

Citing Article 32 of the Associations Law and the principle of individual criminal responsibility, the lawyers also argued that membership on an association's executive or supervisory board did not, in itself, establish criminal liability:

"Pretrial detention is not a punishment. Despite the absence of any evidence of a crime, our clients are being subjected in advance to a deprivation of liberty that they might not even face in practice if convicted.

"This is not a preventive measure, but punishment under the guise of pretrial detention. This prolonged detention without an indictment has turned into a de facto hostage-taking practice."

Allegations of isolation, strip searches and mistreatment

The lawyers also raised allegations of rights violations at the Sincan Prison Complex, including solitary confinement, restrictions on access to medical care and mistreatment.

They said requests by the detainees to be housed together had been rejected and that some had been held in isolation for days.

Transgender activists had also faced restrictions or delays in accessing hormone therapy and essential health care, according to the statement.

Three detainees were transferred to another prison within the same complex because their safety could not be guaranteed, the lawyers said.

LGBTI+ detainees in Mersin prison report difficulties in accessing clothing, medication

1 October 2026

They further alleged that one client had been subjected to a strip search under medical supervision at the prison where they were initially held. Three others were allegedly threatened and verbally abused by prison officers.

The lawyers also reported violations during the investigation, saying their clients had been forcibly taken for blood and urine tests without their attorneys being notified.

They argued that the examination of their clients' phone contents and personal photographs constituted violations of their right to privacy.

Lawyers call for charges to be dropped

The legal team emphasized that Kaos GL has worked in the field of human rights for 32 years and argued that treating its lawful activities as criminal conduct violated freedom of association.

Describing the operation as politically motivated, the lawyers said the arrests had resulted in violations of the rights to liberty and security, freedom of expression and the press, freedom of association and the presumption of innocence.

They called on prosecutors to drop the allegations and issue a decision not to prosecute. Alternatively, they demanded that an indictment be prepared immediately to allow their clients to exercise their right to a defense, and that the detainees be released.

The statement concluded:

"Where the law recognizes no limits, no one's freedom is guaranteed. We demand that these baseless allegations be dropped immediately and that the prosecutor's office issue a decision not to prosecute. Failing that, we demand, at the very least, that an indictment be prepared immediately, that our clients be granted the right to defend themselves and that they be released."

(NÖ/VK)

The bank announced the decision following a meeting of its Monetary Policy Committee (MPC), which sets the benchmark one-week repo auction rate.

The bank also lowered its overnight lending rate from 40% to 39% and its overnight borrowing rate from 35.5% to 34.5%.

At its previous meeting in September, the committee had kept the benchmark rate unchanged at 37%.

In a statement accompanying the decision, the central bank said recent inflation data pointed to a continued slowdown in underlying price pressures.

"Despite monthly fluctuations, recent inflation figures and leading indicators confirm the deceleration in the underlying trend of inflation," the statement said. "Data on economic activity as well as the limited pass-through of supply shocks to domestic prices indicate that domestic demand remains weak."

The committee also warned that elevated energy prices could put upward pressure on inflation. It said it was closely monitoring the effects of geopolitical developments on costs, economic activity and expectations.

Limited immediate impact expected on loan rates

The one-percentage-point reduction in the benchmark rate does not automatically translate into an equivalent decline in the interest rates banks offer customers.

Lending and deposit rates depend on several factors, including banks' funding costs, liquidity conditions, risk assessments, loan maturities and market expectations.

As a result, the decision is not expected to bring a significant immediate reduction in interest rates on consumer, auto or mortgage loans. (HA/VK)

Speaking at a press conference today in parliament, Günaydın accused the government of using legal pressure and political incentives to bring opposition mayors into the AKP in what he called a "carrot and stick approach."

Forty-one mayors switched from the Islamist New Welfare (Yeniden Refah) Party, 36 from the Republican People's Party (CHP), 11 from the nationalist Good (İYİ) Party and 18 from other political parties.

Additionally, AKP gained 11 municipalities in acting mayor elections by municipal councils following the detention of mayors. These included the Bursa Metropolitan Municipality, municipalities of İstanbul's Gaziosmanpaşa, Bayrampaşa, Beykoz, Şile, Üsküdar, Adalar and Ataşehir districts, Derecik in Hakkari and Menderes in İzmir.

Most of the 32 mayors were detained in corruption investigations targeting municipalities run by the CHP, which emerged as the most popular party after the 2024 elections, surpassing the ruling party.

Opposition concerned over İstanbul takeover as council member resigns

18 September 2026

The crackdown began with the detention of Ekrem İmamoğlu, who was the mayor of İstanbul and declared by the CHP as their presidential candidate for the 2028 elections. İmamoğlu has been in jail since Mar 2025, facing hundreds of years in prison on corruption-related charges.

"Two and a half years ago, voters clearly chose mayors from parties other than the AKP, most of them from what was then the CHP and is now the New Party," Günaydın said. "But by arresting those mayors and installing acting mayors, you have transferred these municipalities to the AKP."

Opposition leader claims İzmir mayor joined Erdoğan’s party under jail threat

8 October 2026

The New Party was founded in July by Özgür Özel after he was removed as the CHP leader by a court ruling in May. The court had concluded that the CHP's 2023 leadership election, in which Özel was elected, was marred by irregularities including vote buying. It reinstated Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu, the party's longtime former leader.

Following its foundation, 91 of the 135 CHP deputies joined the New Party, making it the main opposition party. While dozens of mayors also joined them, a significant portion of local administrations remained with the Kılıçdaroğlu leadership and some joined the AKP.

The CHP had won 420 of Turkey's more than 1,400 municipalities, including 35 of the 81 provinces, in the 2024 vote.

A brief history of politician transfers in Turkey

19 September 2025

(VK)

Arı was detained yesterday and spent the night in custody at the Ankara Security Directorate.

He was transferred to the courthouse at around 10 am today. Prosecutors questioned him for about an hour and referred him to a penal judgeship of peace with a request for his arrest. The judge complied with the request.

Arı had previously been detained on Mar 21 on the same charge and spent 75 days in pretrial detention before being released after his first hearing on Jun 5. He was investigated due to his reporting and social media posts.

Court orders release of journalist İsmail Arı after 75 days in pretrial detention

5 June 2026

Use of disinformation charges against journalists

Article 217/A of the Turkish Penal Code, introduced under legislation widely known as the "disinformation law," took effect in Oct 2022.

The provision carries a prison sentence of one to three years for anyone who "publicly disseminates false information concerning the country's internal or external security, public order or public health, solely with the intention of creating anxiety, fear or panic among the public, in a manner capable of disturbing public peace."

An allegation that information is false or inaccurate is not sufficient on its own to constitute an offense. All the elements specified in the law must be present.

The information must be false, and the person disseminating it must know it is false. It must concern the country's internal or external security, public order or public health, be disseminated publicly and be capable of disturbing public peace. The person must also act solely with the intention of creating anxiety, fear or panic among the public.

The requirement that the information be "capable of disturbing public peace" must also be established through concrete evidence or facts.

In the face of widespread criticism from journalism groups and political opposition, government officials at the time maintained that the law would not be used against journalists.

Then-Justice Minister Bekir Bozdağ assured in Jan 2023 that the offense was subject to "very strict conditions."

Bozdağ said the mere act of writing an article did not mean that a person had disturbed public peace. He also said he did not expect the provision to lead to a large number of investigations.

'Disinformation law' used against 83 journalists since 2022

10 April 2026

However, at least 113 investigations were launched against 88 journalists between Oct 2022, when the law took effect, and Apr 1, according to figures documented by the Journalists' Union of Turkey (TGS).

During that period, 29 journalists were detained by police and six were jailed pending trial. Another journalist was placed under house arrest as a judicial supervision measure.

The union also reported that no convictions under Article 217/A had become final by Apr 1.

However, journalists continued to face pretrial detention under the same provision after the report's cutoff date.

Yelis Ayaz, publisher of Aydınpost, was arrested on May 15, followed by Evrensel reporter Doğa Baskan on Jun 25, journalist Ali Çağatay on Jun 26, Cem Küçük on Jul 31 and journalist Ali Tarakcı on Sep 26.

Most recently, journalists Şaban Sevinç and Mustafa Balcı were arrested on Oct 9 under the same provision.

BIA Media Monitoring Reports

13 December 2024

(HA/VK)

According to the latest figures released after the flooding, seven people died in İstanbul. The İstanbul Governor's Office reported that nearly 3,000 homes and businesses sustained serious damage.

The collapse of buildings along a streambed in Ayazağa, Sarıyer, following the heavy rainfall has also reignited debate over İstanbul's urban development policies and construction in flood-prone areas.

Speaking to bianet, Prof. Barış Önol, a faculty member at İstanbul Technical University's (İTÜ) Department of Meteorological Engineering, discussed the impact of the climate crisis on extreme weather events, İstanbul's growing population and the measures needed to make cities more resilient to disasters.

Torrential rains trigger flooding across İstanbul; child dies after electrocution in puddle

14 October 2026

'Extreme rainfall will become more frequent and intense'

Önol said climate change would lead to an increase in extreme rainfall and heat waves, warning that these events would not only occur more frequently but also become more intense.

He emphasized the need for cities to prepare for these changes:

We know that extreme rainfall and heat waves will increase with climate change. Both their intensity and frequency will increase. That's why cities need infrastructure that can cope with these conditions.

Önol noted that migration from rural areas to cities continues worldwide, while infrastructure investment can be neglected during periods of rapid urbanization.

According to Önol, the dangers posed by the climate crisis become greater risks to society as cities expand and populations become concentrated in particular areas.

'Even if the climate doesn't change, more people are affected'

Önol said the impact of floods cannot be explained by rainfall alone and the number of people exposed to hazards and the extent of urban development are also critical factors.

As cities expand, he explained, extreme weather events of the same intensity can affect more people:

A larger population means a larger urban area. Exposure to these kinds of extreme weather events increases. And as exposure increases, so does the impact. Even if the same hazard occurs twice, at exactly the same intensity, more people are affected because the city has grown. There is greater loss of life and property.

Önol stressed that urbanization itself can worsen the consequences of disasters, regardless of climate change:

Even if the climate doesn't change at all, the same events affect more people and larger areas because the city has grown.

He said disaster risk assessments must therefore account not only for weather events but also for population growth, land use and patterns of urban development.

'Cities must be planned through a multidisciplinary approach'

Önol called for a reassessment of urban planning to create cities capable of withstanding the effects of the climate crisis, emphasizing the importance of cooperation across scientific disciplines:

Cities need to be designed accordingly, and urban development plans must reflect these conditions. This requires a multidisciplinary approach. Meteorological engineers, urban and regional planners, hydrologists and scientists working in hydrology must work together to plan more livable cities.

Rapid urban growth is not a problem unique to Turkey, Önol said, noting that cities around the world face similar risks.

He added that European cities also struggle to cope with extreme weather because of aging infrastructure, making planned urban development an increasingly urgent necessity:

We need to move toward more carefully planned urbanization. Otherwise, these events will continue.

'İstanbul's topography and population pose serious risks'

Önol pointed to İstanbul's geography, noting that construction along streambeds has been a longstanding problem in the city.

He explained that İstanbul's terrain is shaped by valleys and natural drainage channels, with dense development in these areas increasing the risk of flooding:

Construction in streambeds has been a known problem for years, both in İstanbul and in our other cities. In an area with İstanbul's topography, valleys extend toward the Bosphorus. Having a population of around 15 million in such an area creates serious risks.

Önol said İstanbul's population and built-up areas have expanded substantially over time, identifying population pressure as one of the city's main challenges.

He warned that this pressure, combined with the effects of the climate crisis, was creating even greater risks.

Önol's climate models suggest more intense rainfall in the future

Climate simulations published by Prof. Barış Önol on Oct 15 showed that maximum daily rainfall in the TR10 region, which includes İstanbul, reached approximately 210 millimeters in historical model results. Under a future scenario covering 2061–2070, the figure could reach 437.44 millimeters.

Önol said it was highly likely that human-induced climate change had intensified the rainfall. However, he stressed that scientific analysis was necessary to establish a definitive link between climate change and any particular weather event.

Professional organizations call for protecting streambeds and upgrading infrastructure

In an Oct 16 statement, the Chamber of Civil Engineers of the Union of Chambers of Turkish Engineers and Architects (TMMOB/UCTEA) called for an end to the narrowing of streambeds and obstruction of natural waterways.

The chamber recommended updating flood risk maps, reassessing the capacity of stormwater drainage systems and adopting preventive policies that go beyond emergency response after disasters.

The İstanbul branch of TMMOB's Chamber of Environmental Engineers also highlighted excessive urban development, inadequate stormwater infrastructure and the loss of natural water catchment areas in a statement on Oct 15.

Environmental engineers called for separating stormwater and wastewater networks, protecting streambeds and expanding the use of "sponge city" measures that allow rainwater to soak into the ground.

Levent Kurnaz: Climate change and urbanization must be considered together

In an assessment published on Oct 17, Prof. Levent Kurnaz of Boğaziçi University said no single extreme rainfall event could be directly attributed to climate change. However, he noted that a warmer atmosphere can hold more water vapor.

Kurnaz explained that the spread of concrete and asphalt surfaces prevents rainwater from soaking into the ground. Alterations to natural streambeds and infrastructure designed for past climate conditions also increase flood risks, he said.

He emphasized that climate risks should be assessed not only in terms of infrastructure but also their implications for housing rights, economic losses and social inequalities.

Turkey's resilient cities summit

Ahead of COP31, which Turkey is set to host, the Environment, Urbanization and Climate Change Ministry organized an event in Hatay titled "Turkey's Road to COP31: Resilient Cities." The program focused on strengthening urban resilience to climate change and disasters.

"Climate-friendly resilient cities" is also among the priorities of the COP31 action agenda announced by Environment, Urbanization and Climate Change Minister Murat Kurum ahead of the summit.

In a statement on June 8, Kurum said, "We all know that the effects of climate change are felt most visibly in cities, neighborhoods and people's daily lives."

İstanbul, İzmir, Maraş, Manisa and Tekirdağ are among the pilot provinces selected under the ministry's climate- and disaster-resilient cities policy.

The World Bank-financed project aims to strengthen vulnerable buildings, develop urban renewal strategies and support municipal investments in disaster-resilient infrastructure.

The ministry's National Climate Change Adaptation Strategy and Action Plan for 2024–2030 includes 40 strategies and 129 actions across 11 sectors.

Following the Oct 14 floods in İstanbul, renewed attention has turned to how these policies will strengthen infrastructure against extreme rainfall, protect streambeds and integrate climate risks into urban planning.

Parliamentary inquiry sought into flooding

Cengiz Çiçek, an İstanbul lawmaker from the pro-Kurdish Peoples' Equality and Democracy (DEM) Party, submitted a parliamentary inquiry motion to the Grand National Assembly of Turkey (TBMM) to investigate the causes of the Oct 14–15 floods in İstanbul and Kocaeli, which killed 10 people, as well as the urban development policies that may have contributed to the disaster.

The motion argued that the destruction caused by extreme rainfall could not be explained by weather conditions alone. It identified construction in streambeds, unplanned urban development, zoning amnesties and inadequate infrastructure investment as factors that worsened the consequences.

Çiçek noted that the Cendere Valley, where construction had reportedly been prohibited because of flood risks, was opened to development in 2011.

Citing data from TMMOB's İstanbul Provincial Coordination Board, the motion stated that nine shopping malls, 16 university campuses, Başakşehir Çam and Sakura City Hospital and numerous industrial facilities had been built in streambeds across the city.

The motion also called for an investigation into how the destruction of the Northern Forests, plans for Kanal İstanbul and construction in water catchment areas may have affected flood risks.

Çiçek further demanded a ban on construction in streambeds and the restoration of natural water flow in streams that had been covered over. He also called for protecting the right to safe housing for residents of high-risk areas, including tenants, without dispossessing them.

The motion urged scrutiny of zoning, permitting and investment decisions made by central and local authorities, as well as public accountability for the consequences of the disaster.

What should İstanbul do to become more climate-resilient?

The latest flooding in İstanbul has renewed debate over the need for disaster preparedness measures that go beyond weather warnings and emergency response.

Experts and professional organizations have recommended protecting streambeds, restricting construction in high-risk areas, upgrading stormwater infrastructure, expanding permeable surfaces and designing urban development plans around future climate conditions.

Prof. Barış Önol's assessment for bianet adds another dimension to the debate: As cities grow in population and built-up area, even weather events of the same intensity can affect more people.

(FY/CA/VK)