Turkey’s parliament has received requests seeking to lift the legislative immunity of 12 lawmakers, including Özgür Özel, leader of the country’s main opposition Republican People’s Party (CHP), according to parliamentary records.
The speaker’s office referred 14 files to a joint committee made up of members of parliament’s Constitution and Justice committees. The number of files exceeds the number of lawmakers, with Özel and CHP lawmaker Mustafa Sarıgül facing two separate requests each, while the other 10 lawmakers are subject to one each.
The move comes amid growing legal and political pressure on the CHP, Turkey’s main opposition party, which has faced court cases, arrests and investigations targeting some of its most prominent figures.
A Turkish court last month annulled the CHP congress that elected Özel as chairman in 2023, effectively removing him from the party leadership and reinstating his predecessor, Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu. The CHP denounced the ruling as a judicial coup and said it would challenge the decision through legal channels.
The party has also been under pressure over cases targeting Istanbul Mayor Ekrem İmamoğlu, one of the CHP’s most prominent politicians and a potential challenger to President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan. İmamoğlu has been jailed since 2025 on corruption-related charges that he and the party deny.
Lawmakers in Turkey have legislative immunity, which generally protects them from prosecution unless parliament votes to lift it in specific cases.
The other lawmakers named in the files are Turhan Çömez, deputy parliamentary group chair of the opposition İyi (Good) Party; CHP lawmakers İsmet Güneşhan, Eylem Ertuğ Ertuğrul, Ulaş Karasu, Süleyman Bülbül, Cemal Enginyurt and Cevdet Akay; İyi Party lawmaker Hakan Şeref Olgun; New Path Party lawmaker Mesut Doğan; and Workers’ Party of Turkey lawmaker Ahmet Şık.
The records did not specify the allegations behind the immunity requests.
