AMY GOODMAN: This is Democracy Now!, democracynow.org, The War and Peace Report. I’m Amy Goodman.

In Turkey, mass nationwide protests took place on Monday for a sixth night following the arrest and jailing of the Istanbul Mayor Ekrem İmamoğlu, who is seen as the biggest political rival to Turkey’s authoritarian President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan ahead of the 2028 presidential elections. Over the past week, Turkish authorities have detained more than 1,100 protesters. On Monday, at least eight reporters and photojournalists were arrested in what the Turkish media union called “an attack on press freedoms and the people’s right to learn the truth.”

We are joined right now by the Turkish political scientist Dr. Ezgi Başaran. She is an associate faculty member at Oxford University, a former journalist who gained recognition for her coverage of Turkey’s Kurdish conflict. Ezgi Başaran runs the Substack, Angle, Anchor, and Voice.

Thank you so much for being with us, Ezgi. If you can start off by just explaining to a global audience what is happening in Turkey?

EZGI BAŞARAN: Yeah. Thanks for having me Amy.

I think I’m going to just revert back a decade ago, just very briefly, so that — I think it’s important for Western audiences to understand that this hasn’t happened all of a sudden. It was a gradual and incremental process that started in 2010. I’m going to tell you the story of a state capture, which started with the capture of the judiciary, the weaponization of judiciary, which nowadays I think my American friends are getting to know quite well.

So, it was in 2010, AKP pushed a constitutional referendum, claiming that would democratize the judiciary. And the EU backed that, those reform packages. What it did was it opened the door for loyalists, Erdoğan’s loyalists, and loyalists of the Gülen movement, back then an ally, a secretive organization, Islamic organization, whose exiled cleric died in Pennsylvania last year and who was accused of orchestrating the 2016 coup. So, in between the referendum and the coup attempt, there were also sham trials, with huge, fabricated — you know, 40,000-page of indictments full of fabricated documents that aimed to curtail the military and the secular establishments. And most of them are purged, and, you know, loyalist cadres were put in place. And then came the coup attempt in 2016. And then, again, 4,000 judges and prosecutors were, you know, sacked, and the body overseeing the judicial appointments was restructured to answer directly to the president and his parliamentary bloc.

The final lock clicked into place in 2017 with another referendum, a constitutional referendum, which took Turkey from a parliamentary system to a hyper-presidentialism. So, it’s not like the American system. In political science terms, it can be called, like I said, hyper-presidentialism or delegative presidentialism, because it’s a — I mean, they said it would strengthen the democracy, because it’s going to remove the bureaucratic gridlocks. All it did was to weaken the democratic institutions, most of which were already on life support in 2017.

In 2018, Erdoğan became the first hyper-presidential president of Turkey without any meaningful institutional brakes on his power. Since then, we’ve seen journalists being jailed, people prosecuted just by insulting the president. The civil society, the syndicates are totally silenced. And, you know, Turkey now ignores its own Constitutional Court or also the European Court of Human Rights. So, this is a judiciary under command. Courts follow orders of the executive branch and a legal system designed not to protect rights, but crush dissent.

So, this is the story that brought what we’ve been witnessing in the last couple of — in the last few days, which took another — I mean, another threshold was, I think, broken, another barrier is broken, and which made Turkey at the same level of Russia and Belarus, because Erdoğan just imprisoned his political opponent, his most formidable challenger.

AMY GOODMAN: So, let’s talk more about what’s happening right now and what led to this six days of massive protest. The opposition party CHP said Ekrem İmamoğlu received overwhelming support during Sunday’s election to select a primary candidate, including from millions of voters who are not party members. This is the CHP leader, Özgür Özel.

ÖZGÜR ÖZEL: [translated] By keeping him in prison for four days, sending him to court while Turkey was going to the polls for him, and sending him to Silivri prison while Turkey was electing him, Erdoğan defied not only him, but millions, and attempted to stage a coup.

AMY GOODMAN: So, talk about the arrest of the Istanbul mayor, the response, the massive number of people who have been arrested now, as well, 1,100, the attack on journalists.

EZGI BAŞARAN: So, Ekrem İmamoğlu won the election. He became the mayor of Istanbul in a landmark victory in 2019 and took Istanbul from the grips of the ruling party, first time ever. As you might remember, Erdoğan’s rise to power started with the Istanbul mayorship. And he once said that “One who rules Istanbul rules Turkey.” So, Istanbul has always a big — I mean, his most precious, you know, gift. And losing Istanbul to Ekrem İmamoğlu in 2019 made him extremely angry. That’s why the first election was annulled by, you know, charges of irregularities. But it angered many people, so a rerun happened, and then Ekrem İmamoğlu won with a bigger margin.

But a relentless, protracted, you know, legal warfare happened. And, you know, he’s been accused by calling the Supreme Electoral Council fools, the council that annulled the first vote. And so, he actually — the court sentenced him to over two years, which would, you know, lead into a political ban, but it’s pending appeal. And then several terror charges have been thrown at him since 2021.

And this year — I mean, the last year autumn, 2024 autumn, things have escalated. Pro-government talking heads started saying that Ekrem İmamoğlu is corrupt to his core, and there’s going to be this really patriotic, heroic prosecutor who’s going to take him down and make him pay. And suddenly, people around Ekrem İmamoğlu — this is happening like two weeks ago — campaign staff, contractors, media consultants, suddenly they were slapped with travel bans.

And then came the absurdity last week, beginning of last week. Ekrem İmamoğlu’s 35-year-old university diploma was canceled on bureaucratic grounds, which would disqualify him to run against Erdoğan in a presidential campaign, because —

AMY GOODMAN: Because you have to be a college graduate to run for president?

EZGI BAŞARAN: Exactly, exactly, which is ironic, and I think this is kind of a — now in the playbook of the authoritarians. There’s gaslighting, because, you know, there is also an enigma about Erdoğan’s himself, Erdoğan’s own diploma. I mean, we have never seen his diploma, and many people think that he only has a two-year-old — I mean, two-year, kind of a in-between diploma, not a university diploma. So, now he’s accused of — Ekrem İmamoğlu — not having a diploma.

Two days later, he’s arrested. A 121-page of interrogation report was published, leaked, whatever you say. I read it. And the questions — I mean, the allegations are based on three anonymous witnesses, no concrete evidence, no, you know, chief prosecutor filing showing any financial crime documents or anything, just rumors through these witnesses. And now Ekrem İmamoğlu is both accused of running an organized crime, being a leader of an organized crime, that — you know, financial crime, and also a simultaneous investigation is also underway that he’s also supporting the outlawed Kurdish militant group PKK. And now he’s —

AMY GOODMAN: So, let me go to that issue. Turkish President Tayyip Erdoğan has accused the opposition CHP party of fueling terrorism, referring to the massive protests that have erupted since the arrest and detention of the Istanbul mayor last week. This is the president.

PRESIDENT RECEP TAYYIP ERDOĞAN: [translated] The opposition, the Republican People’s Party, attempted to provoke our nation over this corruption operation. They have been doing everything they can for four days to disturb the peace of the nation and polarize our people, from insulting anyone they encounter to attacking our police officers, who are only doing their jobs, from intimidating our members of the judiciary who are investigating corruption reports to suppressing the national will with street terrorism. They have done it all.

AMY GOODMAN: Your response to this, Ezgi Başaran, to the president of Turkey?

EZGI BAŞARAN: I really don’t want to be in the position to respond to him, but I will try. I mean, it is terrifying to be a person with integrity and intellect in Turkey, because, look, we’re seeing the arbitrariness, the breakdown of seriousness in the judicial system. We are seeing a system where hearsay is enough to arrest a politician who won reelection just a year ago, with 4.5 million votes, 51% of Istanbul’s electorate. And, you know, if that happens to Ekrem İmamoğlu, what could happen to anyone else who voice dissent or challenge the status quo?

But same thing, this is terrifying, yes, but also the fear of a — the wall of fear, that we say in Turkey, it has cracked, that kept people in. And, you know, students, octogenarians, they all fled to the streets to ask for — I mean, to protest what has happened, because everyone knows that this is politically motivated and that Erdoğan is scared that he’s not going to win against Ekrem İmamoğlu. So, the political motives are just very conspicuous. But, you know, people are on the street. The mottos are really sweet. The youth are just finding all kinds of ways of presenting their contentions.

But the Turkish government is what is called a high-capacity undemocratic state, in political science parlance, which means strong on repression, weak on rights. So, they are doing what they know — that they know best: water cannons, tear gas, plastic bullets. And like you said at the beginning, a thousand are being detained. And we just learned just now that more than 250 are arrested.

And he’s not going to back down, Erdoğan, because that will be detrimental to his rule. I mean, he’s just going to ramp up its repression of the streets and this legal warfare that would — what we hear, would, you know, encompass more students, journalists, politicians, businessmen, academics and artists, actually, in the coming weeks.

AMY GOODMAN: How does the imprisoned leader of the Kurdistan Workers’ Party calling on his organization to disarm and dissolve as part of an effort to end 40 years of fighting between the state and the banned militant group play into this? This is Abdullah Öcalan. Talk about where he is and how this fits into the political picture of Turkey.

EZGI BAŞARAN: So, Abdullah Öcalan is imprisoned in an island in the Marmara Sea called İmralı. He called his, you know, armed militant group, the PKK, to disarm and disband, after a negotiation, I think, which lasted several months between the Turkish intelligence and him. The reason that I think he had a motive of — I mean, Öcalan had a motive of — you know, his own motive would be to have a better conditions, freer conditions, that would allow him to communicate with outside. But more than that, he would like to have his Syrian offshoot, SDF/YPG/PYD, to be seen as a legitimate force that has a say over the new Syrian, you know, panorama of political voices. And because Turkey came out victorious from Assad’s fall, I think that was the clever move for the Kurdish movement to act.

As for Erdoğan, this is — obviously, it would ease the quagmire within Syria, which is his top-of-the-agenda issue, and also would peel off one segment of the Turkish opposition, that is the Kurds, the Kurdish party, which would — because while there’s ongoing negotiations with İmralı, the PKK, I mean, with Öcalan, the Kurdish political party would refrain from joining full force in this, in an oppositional protest. That is Erdoğan’s calculation. But you’ll never know, you know, when contentious politics are triggered.

AMY GOODMAN: And can you talk about the detention of journalists, the arrests? And we talked about 1,100 people arrested so far. Also, 10 journalists, at least, detained both in Istanbul and İzmir: one of the journalists detained covering the protests outside Istanbul City Hall, nine others detained in dawn raids. And what this means for press freedom in Turkey?

EZGI BAŞARAN: Amy, there’s no press freedom in Turkey. I mean, whatever’s left of, you know, several news outlets who are trying very hard to financially survive is also, you know, becoming moot in a way, because, I mean, news is costly, and you can end up in jail. But also, you can’t really survive, you know, do your work or do your reporting. And my colleagues are still trying to do their best, but, you know, every day there’s something, a terrorism charge or insulting, you know, the nationals — I mean, a public official or, you know, jeopardizing national security, are those charges that’s thrown at my colleagues, will end up in jail, at least lose their job or lose their license to, you know, operate as journalists. Those 11 journalists were just doing their jobs.

But, you know, at the peak of the protests, while we were waiting the decision of the courts, all of a sudden, the board of, you know, broadcasting in Turkey just all of a sudden tweeted that if they continue to go live from the field, from, you know, just — you know, if you continue the — anyone continuing the live stream of the protest will lose their license. And just like that, we lost the live stream from, you know, Saraçhane or Taksim from Istanbul.

So, this is how — this is the environment that Turkish media is operating. I mean, this is — I mean, this is exactly the kind of, you know, voice that is allowed in an authoritarian system. You cannot go over a limit. You can do the small stuff, but you cannot go over a certain limit, just like Albert Hirschman’s Exit, Loyal, and Voice. You are allowed so little, and that little voice actually used to legitimate the authoritarianism. That is the conundrum.

AMY GOODMAN: The talk about voices being shut out, I wanted to ask you about the richest man in the world, about Elon Musk and his social media platform X, which has reportedly suspended hundreds of accounts belonging to opposition activists and others in Turkey. Can you talk about the significance of this?

EZGI BAŞARAN: I mean, like I said, the gaslighting part is just tremendous. They’re actually seriously playing with our nerves at some point. I mean, we know that, I mean, Elon Musk is detested among liberals and pro-democracy people in Turkey because of his sleazy meetings with Erdoğan and, you know, its covert or overt negotiations in terms of, you know, giving names or providing data of certain individuals that Turkish intelligence or Turkish — any Turkish state official asks for. So nobody’s surprised how, you know, Elon Musk operated, because they are in such a good relationship. And Musk has always something in the game. You know, maybe he’s just thinking of coming and having a Starlink over Turkey. So, he’s just — he doesn’t have any principle, and that’s why he gets along well with a very problematic, powerful leader like Erdoğan.

AMY GOODMAN: I wanted to end by asking you, as you cover world politics from Oxford in the U.K., your thoughts on what you see across the pond here in the United States, your reflections over the past two months. And do you see similarities with what’s happening in Turkey?

EZGI BAŞARAN: Shall I say the truth?

AMY GOODMAN: Please.

EZGI BAŞARAN: OK. So, I think what allowed Erdoğan to do what he did was, you know, the environment, the climate of impunity. There’s a war in Europe. Turkey’s military might be needed. Erdoğan could play a role in EU’s new defense plans. He has drones. He has troops. The geography is behind him. Netanyahu just broke another ceasefire. He kills and kills. There is no — I mean, there is no impunity, and he’s not a political pariah. And Trump dismantled America’s democracy. He keeps doing that every day. He is mimicking Erdoğan’s playbook. Like, only the ones that really watched Turkey in the last decade and a half would realize that it took more than a decade to dismantle a Turkish institution to capture the state. But, you know, Trump is doing the same.

And it is the public now on the streets in Turkey is our only hope. You know, only a few months of Trump administration was — sufficed to traumatize, you know, many in the West. Turkey’s Democrats have been living under Erdoğan’s fist for almost 25 years. And many are imprisoned, like I said. Many lost jobs. Many lost their loved ones. But they still show up on the streets. And it’s that hope. It’s that source of hope that we — the resilience that keeps us going. And I hope America’s Democrats will also have that resilience and hope in them to fight before too late.

AMY GOODMAN: Ezgi, I wanted to end by asking about the title of your Substack, Angle, Anchor, and Voice.

EZGI BAŞARAN: Yes, like I said, I mean, Albert Hirschman’s very, very influential book, you know, inspired me to have that. I would like to give an angle about what I write, sometimes to very Eurocentric and Orientalist rhetoric, and I would like to crush that narrative, in a ways to show parallels between what they see as backward Third World countries. And my anchor is in my, you know, scholarly and journalistic integrity. And I’m trying to get my voice, and everyone’s voice that are being, you know, limited, to more people. That’s the reason.