A total of 119 German citizens are not able to return to Germany from Turkey either due to travel bans or because they are under arrest, the German Federal Foreign Office said in response to a parliamentary question.
According to Deutsche Welle Turkish service, the Foreign Office said 61 German citizens are currently under arrest in Turkey and 58 cannot leave the country due to travel bans imposed by the Turkish government. Four German citizens were denied entry to Turkey this year, the Foreign Office said. No details about the nature of the allegations against those under travel bans were provided.
The parliamentary question was posed by Gökay Akbulut, a lawmaker from the Left Party. The Foreign Office said they didn’t have information on how many Turkish citizens who have permanent residence in Germany were not allowed to return to the country.
In recent years German citizens of Turkish origin have faced an increasing number of investigations for their social media posts under Turkey’s overbroad terrorism laws or for allegedly insulting President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan.
Some of the high-profile arrests, including journalists Deniz Yücel and Meşale Tolu, had caused problems between Turkey and Germany.
