Turkey: 9 opposition newspaper staff formally arrested[Ynet] Opposition Cumhuriyet newspaper says a court has ordered that its chief editor and eight senior staff be jailed pending trial.
Editor-in-chief Murat Sabuncu, cartoonist Musa Kart and other staff were detained for questioning earlier this week -- some following raids at their homes -- for allegedly supporting Kurdish militants as well as a movement led by Fethullah Gulen, the US-based Muslim cleric whom Turkey accuses of masterminding the failed coup in July.
The court ruled for their formal arrests on Saturday.
Turkey detains 9 more officials of pro-Kurdish HDP party
[Ynet] Turkish authorities detained nine officials from the country's main pro-Kurdish opposition party on Saturday, a party official said, a day after the party's leaders were formally arrested. The nine officials included the provincial and district heads of the pro-Kurdish opposition Peoples' Democratic Party (HDP) in the southeastern province of Adana, the official said.
HDP co-leaders Selahattin Demirtas and Figen Yuksekdag were arrested on Friday as part of a terrorism investigation, prompting strong international condemnation of a widening crackdown on dissent under President Tayyip Erdogan.
Head of Turkey's pro-Kurdish opposition taken to prison
[Ynet] Turkey's state-run news agency says the leader of the pro-Kurdish opposition party has been taken to a maximum security prison in the northwestern city of Edirne.
The Anadolou agency said Saturday that Selahattin Demirtas, co-chair of the People's Democratic Party or HDP, was among the 12 party legislators detained overnight for refusal to testify on terror-related charges.
Demirtas, along with fellow co-chair Figen Yuksekdag and seven other lawmakers were formally put under arrest pending trial. The courts released three others on condition they report regularly to authorities.
The private Dogan News Agency said Yuksekdag was taken to a maximum security prison in the northwestern city of Kocaeli.
Istanbul police break up protest with tear gas, plastic bullets
[AlAhram] Istanbul police on Saturday used tear gas, water cannon and plastic bullets to break up a protest by hundreds of people against the arrest of pro-Kurdish Turkish deputies. The protestors demonstrated outside the main mosque in the Sisli district on the European side of the city shouting slogans denouncing the "fascist" state and vowing "we will not be silent".
But police rapidly moved in, dispersing the crowds by spraying torrents of freezing water from trucks, using tear gas and firing plastic bullets, AFP correspondents said.
The protest came after nine MPs from the pro-Kurdish Peoples' Democratic Party (HDP), including its two co-leaders, were jailed on Friday ahead of trial on terror charges.