ANKARA, Turkey — Turkey on Wednesday sharply condemned a European Parliament report that called on the European Union to consider imposing sanctions on the country’s justice minister and other officials accused of undermining human rights and civil liberties.
The report, approved during a full parliamentary session earlier that day, recommends that the EU look into freezing the assets of certain Turkish officials. Among those named is Akin Gurlek, who previously served as Istanbul’s chief public prosecutor before being elevated to justice minister earlier this year.
In its findings, the European Parliament described Gurlek as a central figure in what it characterized as “the state’s repressive machinery.” The report argued that his promotion suggested “that throughout his career he has always been a political actor following a political agenda.”
Turkey’s Foreign Ministry fired back with a forceful statement, accusing the report of unfairly singling out the justice minister. “We categorically reject the report’s distortion of legal processes conducted by the independent Turkish judiciary and its targeting of our Minister of Justice with baseless accusations,” the ministry said.
During his time as Istanbul’s top prosecutor, Gurlek oversaw several high-profile legal cases against members of the main opposition party, the Republican People’s Party, known as the CHP. Opposition figures have long argued those proceedings were driven by politics rather than law.
Hundreds of officials tied to CHP-governed municipalities have faced arrest in corruption investigations. One of the most prominent cases involved Istanbul’s Mayor Ekrem Imamoglu — widely regarded as President Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s top political rival — who was taken into custody last year.
In a more recent development, a court order removed CHP party leader Ozgur Ozel from his position, reinstating his largely unpopular predecessor, Kemal Kilicdaroglu, in his place. Critics have called the move a deliberate effort by the government to weaken opposition leadership.
Erdogan’s administration, however, continues to maintain that Turkey’s courts operate free from political influence.
Whether EU leaders would risk straining relations with Ankara by sanctioning a senior Turkish government official remains an open question. Turkey plays a significant role as an EU partner in managing migration flows and serves as a key member of NATO.
The European Parliament issues annual reports as part of the process of evaluating Turkey’s progress toward EU membership — a process that has largely stalled due to ongoing concerns about the country’s democratic direction.
