2025-03-31T15:10:32+00:00
Shafaq News/ On Monday, Turkish opposition leader Özgür Özel accused authorities of “mistreating detained students” who participated in mass protests following the March 19 arrest of Istanbul Mayor Ekrem İmamoğlu.
Özel, leader of the main opposition Republican People’s Party (CHP), claimed that the students had been handcuffed behind their backs and held for hours without being informed of their destination.
He spent eight hours speaking with detained students arrested during protests that erupted in Istanbul. “Every student was subjected to verbal abuse, insults, and mistreatment,” Özel indicated, describing cases where detainees were “kicked in the face” or had their “heads pressed down” while on the ground.
He denounced their continued detention over the Eid holiday as “psychological torture,” adding that while they were generally “doing fine,” they should not remain in prison for an additional 18 to 20 days before their first court hearing.
“We have refrained from targeting our police, and we will continue to do so, but we will not forgive mistreatment,” he pointed out, urging detainees to “preserve evidence” of any abuses for future accountability.
Turkish Interior Minister Ali Yerlikaya unveiled, on March 27, that around 2,000 people had been [detained](https://shafaq.com/en/World/Crackdown-on-protests-Turkiye-employs-facial-recognition-and-digital-surveillance) nationwide since İmamoğlu's [detention](https://shafaq.com/en/World/Turkiye-Jailed-mayor-mamo-lu-vows-resistance-from-cell), with approximately 260 held in pretrial detention.