A Turkish court on Tuesday placed Nurullah Efe Ankut, leader of the People’s Liberation Party (HKP), under house arrest on charges of insulting President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, the Evrensel daily reported.
The İstanbul 4th Criminal Magistrate of Peace rejected a prosecutor’s request for Ankut’s pretrial detention but imposed house arrest and a travel ban on the 81-year-old party leader.
Ankut attended a hearing at İstanbul’s Çağlayan Courthouse on Tuesday in a case in which he is charged with “insulting the president” in his 2023 book “The Despot of the Illegally Built Palace and His Associates.” He was detained at his home less than eight hours later, at 2:00 a.m., after remarks he made to the press outside the courthouse were deemed insulting to the president. He was reportedly held at İstanbul police headquarters for 10 hours before being referred to the prosecutor’s office and brought before a court, which imposed the house arrest.
Ankut broadcast the moment of his detention live on social media, bidding farewell to his wife before being taken away. Can Dündar, a Turkish journalist living in exile, shared Ankut’s post on X, pointing out the absence of public reaction to the late-night detention of the 81-year-old opposition leader.
Ankut had previously been put under house arrest in September 2025 on charges of “insulting the president” after claiming on X that Erdoğan and his inner circle were involved in a $1.4 billion oil smuggling scheme from northern Iraq.
Ankut has previously faced legal retaliation for his activism. In 2014, after revelations that trucks operated by Turkish intelligence agency MİT had been carrying weapons into Syria, the HKP filed a complaint with the International Criminal Court (ICC) accusing Erdoğan and senior officials of war crimes.
In response Turkish prosecutors charged Ankut with insulting the president and other officials, resulting in a conviction and a suspended 18-month sentence. Following the ruling, the chief prosecutor of Turkey’s Supreme Court of Appeals announced that Ankut’s party membership and leadership position had been terminated. HKP lawyers appealed the decision, arguing that the high court lacks the authority to intervene in the internal composition of political parties.
The HKP, a left-wing populist political party, has long been a vocal critic of Erdoğan. Ankut’s arrest marks the latest in a series of prosecutions targeting opposition figures in Turkey.
Turkey frequently invokes Article 299 of the Turkish Penal Code, which criminalizes “insulting the president,” in order to silence dissent. Thousands of journalists, academics, politicians and activists have faced investigations, prosecution and prison sentences under the broadly defined and widely criticized provision. Human rights organizations have condemned its use as a tool to stifle dissent and restrict freedom of expression.
