Turgut Öker, former Peoples' Democratic Party (HDP) MP and Honorary President of the Alevi Federation of Europe (AABK), has been taken into custody in Ankara. According to information available, a court in Adiyaman has issued a warrant for Öker on charges of membership of a terrorist organisation. Öker is to be brought before the judiciary after police interrogation.

Turgut Öker, who has held German citizenship for over two decades, was convicted of two counts of insulting the president in Istanbul in 2020. He was accused of making critical comments about the Turkish government and President Erdoğan as a speaker at the Neumarkt in Cologne and on social media, among other places. At the time, the Cologne resident was banned from leaving the country.

In May, Öker had turned himself in along with another 887 people in protest against the long prison sentences in the so-called "Gezi trial". Turkish philanthropist Osman Kavala was sentenced to life in prison in the trial. The seven co-defendants, Mücella Yapıcı, Çiğdem Mater, Mine Özerden, Ali Hakan Altınay, Can Atalay, Tayfun Kahraman and Yiğit Ekmekçi, each received 18-year sentences for their involvement in the Gezi protests. The self-declaration said: "Whatever they said or did during the Gezi protest, we said and did the same. If they are convicted, we must also be convicted. If they are guilty, so are we. We declare that we are in both spiritual and practical unity with the condemned and denounce ourselves."