German MP says she was detained in Turkiye for social media posts

A German lawmaker said on Sunday she was detained for several hours when entering Turkiye earlier this month based on social media posts she made in 2019, adding that she would still travel to Turkiye and speak her mind about its government.

Goekay Akbulut, a Bundestag member for far-left Die Linke party, was detained in Antalya airport on Aug. 3 after an arrest warrant was issued by the Turkish public prosecutor for alleged “terror propaganda,” she said.

Germany is home to the world’s largest Turkish diaspora community, but relations between Berlin and Ankara have been strained in recent years by German criticism of President Tayyip Erdogan’s crackdown on suspected opponents after a failed coup in 2016 and Turkiye’s military offensive against Kurdish militia in Syria in 2019.

+++Weitere Infos zum türk. Haftbefehl gegen mich+++

1. Beschuldigt wurde ich aufgrund von Social-Media-Beiträgen von 2019 mit "Terrorpropaganda".

2. Die mehrfachen Morddrohungen gegen mich kamen ebenfalls aus Kayseri (Türkei), wie der Haftbefehl.

3. Meinen Verwandten-Besuch… pic.twitter.com/VNuBwLovgw

— Gökay Akbulut MdB (@AkbulutGokay) August 13, 2023

Akbulut, a Turkiye-born German citizen of Kurdish heritage, was released after making contact with the German foreign ministry, she said. Turkish authorities were not immediately available to comment.

Akbulut has criticized the Turkish government for “waging a brutal war against the Kurdish population inside and outside its borders,” according to her official website.

“I will travel to #Tuerkei in October again as part of the delegation trip of the German-Turkish Parliamentary Group and, as always, will not mince my words: #FreeThemAll,” she said in a post on social media platform X on Sunday.

Erst in der Türkei am Flughafen habe ich erfahren, dass ein Haftbefehl der Staatsanwaltschaft Kayseri gegen mich vorliegt. Bevor ich dazu Aussagen musste, wurde die Akte innerhalb von wenigen Stunden gelöscht. Ich danke dem Auswärtigen Amt für ihren schnellen Einsatz! Der Vorfall…

— Gökay Akbulut MdB (@AkbulutGokay) August 12, 2023

It was not clear exactly what she was referring to, nor which social media posts she believed triggered the Turkish arrest warrant.

The German embassy in Ankara and the consulate in Antalya were in contact with a lawmaker, a source at the German foreign ministry told Reuters.

Akbulut, 40, has called for the lifting of a German ban on the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK), which is considered a terrorist group by the European Union and the United States.