Kurdish politician Yılmaz Şalan arrested at the end of last year in Van province at the instigation of the Turkish Ministry of the Interior has been released from prison and placed under house arrest following a decision made by a court in Van on Monday. The trial will continue on March 10, 2021 at the 7th Heavy Penal Court in Van. 

Yılmaz Şalan is the suspended co-mayor of the district of Muradiye. He was arrested on December 6, 2019, and one day later the Ministry of the Interior appointed an AKP official as trustee in place of the HDP politician. His arrest followed on December 9. An investigation is underway against Şalan for alleged "membership in a terrorist organization".

According to a report published by the HDP's Local Government Commission in early November, HDP now has only six of the 65 local governments in which the party had won the March 2019 election. Trustees have been appointed to 48 municipalities, three of them metropolitan cities. 84 city council members and nine provincial council members were also deposed. Of the 37 mayors arrested, 17 are still in prison.