ERBIL, Kurdistan Region — The Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) urged Turkish authorities on Tuesday to release a journalist for the pro-Kurdish Mezopotamya Agency (MA), who was arrested earlier in the day for unknown reasons. Mehmet Aslan’s house in Istanbul was raided on Tuesday by Turkish police as part of an investigation launched by Antalya Chief Public Prosecutor’s Office, according to a statement from Aslan’s employer. MA added in the statement that Aslan’s house was “searched for almost two hours and his digital materials, journals and books were confiscated.” The reporter was arrested and later transferred to Antalya. “Turkish authorities must release journalist Mehmet Aslan immediately, and refrain from arresting members of the press in relation to vague and unspecified investigations,” Gulnoza Said, CPJ’s Europe and Central Asia program coordinator in New York, said in a statement. “Journalists working for the Mezopotamya News Agency must be allowed to do their jobs without continuous harassment and reprisal from authorities,” she added. Tuesday’s arrest comes amid a string of raids on the news outlet, which has had three of its journalists arrested since October 2020, according to CPJ. This includes Zeynep Durgut who was arrested in mid-December. MA claimed that Durgut was detained due to her coverage of an incident in Van province where two Kurdish villagers were thrown out of a helicopter by Turkish security forces during an operation against the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) on September 11. “Aslan has [recently] covered topics including the rights of Kurdish prisoners in Turkey, as well as prisoner hunger strikes and torture allegations,” according to the CPJ statement. Turkey is currently the world’s second-largest jailer of journalists, according to the CPJ, having put at least 37 behind bars in 2020.
