{"id":148166,"date":"2026-08-18T17:55:14","date_gmt":"2026-08-18T17:55:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/148166\/"},"modified":"2026-08-18T17:55:14","modified_gmt":"2026-08-18T17:55:14","slug":"retired-admiral-jailed-pending-trial-over-2023-government-change-remarks","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/148166\/","title":{"rendered":"Retired admiral jailed pending trial over 2023 government change remarks"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

An \u0130stanbul court has arrested retired admiral T\u00fcrker Ert\u00fcrk and jailed him pending trial over remarks from 2023 in which he said the government would change \u201cpainfully or painlessly,\u201d one day after police detained him when the old video resurfaced on social media, BBC Turkish reported.<\/p>\n

Ert\u00fcrk was\u00a0detained<\/a>\u00a0on Monday as part of an investigation by the Bak\u0131rk\u00f6y Chief Public Prosecutor\u2019s Office\u00a0on suspicion of publicly making threats against people\u2019s lives, health or physical safety with the aim of causing fear and panic as well as incitement to commit a crime.<\/p>\n

After questioning him, prosecutors referred Ert\u00fcrk to a criminal magistrate judge in Bak\u0131rk\u00f6y and requested his arrest. The judge ordered him jailed pending trial on the threat allegation but not on the alleged incitement offense.<\/p>\n

Ert\u00fcrk denied threatening violence, telling prosecutors that his comments were a political assessment and had been shared out of context.<\/p>\n

The investigation concerns remarks Ert\u00fcrk made during a television appearance on March 20, 2023, before Turkey\u2019s presidential and parliamentary elections.<\/p>\n

\u201cLook, the government is going to change now. Painfully or painlessly, the government is going to change. That is why everyone needs to come to their senses. You, me \u2026 everyone, of course, everyone,\u201d Ert\u00fcrk said.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat is why we expect the Supreme Election Board to make its decisions according to its conscience and the law. Otherwise, I think we as a country will face difficulties in the future.\u201d<\/p>\n

Ert\u00fcrk denies making a threat<\/p>\n

Ert\u00fcrk told prosecutors that the excerpts had been taken out of context and that his remarks contained no criminal elements, according to BBC Turkish.<\/p>\n

He said he meant that Turkey would continue to suffer unless the ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) was removed through elections and that his words should be treated as a political assessment, not a threat.<\/p>\n

Ert\u00fcrk also referred to the government\u2019s current peace initiative with the outlawed Kurdistan Workers\u2019 Party (PKK), saying the talks supported his view that continued AKP rule had harmed the country.<\/p>\n

The PKK is designated as a terrorist organization by Turkey and its Western allies.<\/p>\n

Lawyer questions timing<\/p>\n

Ert\u00fcrk\u2019s lawyer, Ayhan Y\u0131ld\u0131zel, criticized the arrest, saying that the remarks at the center of the case were made about three-and-a-half years ago.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe believe that even law students would have difficulty understanding how any criminal element could be derived from these statements,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

The lawyer also questioned how quickly prosecutors acted after the old video was recirculated.<\/p>\n

According to Y\u0131ld\u0131zel, an X user reposted the clip shortly after midnight on Monday and called on either the Bak\u0131rk\u00f6y or Ankara chief public prosecutor\u2019s office to investigate Ert\u00fcrk. About eight hours later, reports emerged that the Bak\u0131rk\u00f6y prosecutors had opened an investigation on their own initiative.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhile criminal complaints by ordinary citizens remain unprocessed for months or even years, it requires an explanation as to how this post, which amounted to an instruction, led to an investigation being launched within eight hours, most of which were nighttime hours,\u201d Y\u0131ld\u0131zel said.<\/p>\n

He argued that the sequence raised questions about judicial independence, citing Article 138 of the Turkish Constitution, which prohibits authorities and individuals from instructing courts or judges in the exercise of their duties.<\/p>\n

Y\u0131ld\u0131zel also questioned how remarks that caused no reported fear or panic when they were made in 2023 could suddenly be treated as a threat to the public.<\/p>\n

Similarity to Erbakan remarks<\/p>\n

Ert\u00fcrk\u2019s choice of words attracted attention because it resembled a controversial statement made by former prime minister Necmettin Erbakan in 1994.<\/p>\n

Speaking about the possible rise to power of his Islamist Welfare Party (RP), Erbakan said the transition to what he called a \u201cjust order\u201d was inevitable and that its opponents would determine whether the change was \u201charsh or soft, bloody or bloodless.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u0130smail Hakk\u0131 Karaday\u0131, chief of general staff during the military pressure campaign that forced Erbakan\u2019s government from power in 1997, later told a parliamentary commission that the statement was among the developments that had alarmed military commanders.<\/p>\n

The February 28, 1997 intervention, widely described as a \u201cpostmodern coup,\u201d did not put the military directly in power. Commanders instead used decisions taken by the National Security Council, public statements and sustained pressure to force Erbakan\u2019s resignation four months later.<\/p>\n

Turkey\u2019s military once played a dominant role in politics, carrying out coups in 1960 and 1980 and intervening in 1971 and 1997. Its political power has declined significantly under President Recep Tayyip Erdo\u011fan, who survived an attempted coup in July 2016.<\/p>\n

This article is republished from\u00a0Turkish Minute<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"An \u0130stanbul court has arrested retired admiral T\u00fcrker Ert\u00fcrk and jailed him pending trial over remarks from 2023…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":148167,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[83],"tags":[20955,11968,312,70371,8828,70132,131,55431,132,70134,155],"class_list":["post-148166","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-stockholm","tag-2028-presidential-elections","tag-freedom-of-expression","tag-human-rights","tag-incitement-to-commit-a-crime","tag-justice-and-development-party-akp","tag-necmettin-erbakan","tag-stockholm","tag-supreme-election-board-ysk","tag-sweden","tag-turker-erturk","tag-turkey"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@dk\/117117801470564578","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/148166","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=148166"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/148166\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/148167"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=148166"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=148166"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=148166"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}