İlhan Sami Çomak
Kurdish poet Çomak was arrested in 1994 and sentenced to life in prison for membership in the banned Kurdistan Workers' Party. While in prison, he has published eight books… More
Ayşe Düzkan
On June 11, 2019, Düzkan was released after serving 18 months in Bakırköy prison in Istanbul. She was originally imprisoned in January 2018 on terrorism charges for her work… More
Edip Polat
A Kurdish writer, Polat has been jailed three times for writing in support of Kurdish self-determination, which authorities deemed to be “separatist propaganda,” even though many of his works… More
Eşber Yağmurdereli
Blind human rights activist Yağmurdereli has spent nearly 20 years in prison on various charges related to comments about Türkiye's human rights abuses. Most recently, he was arrested in… More
Ayşe Nur Zarakolu
Founder of the Freedom to Publish Commission, Zarakolu was a pioneering female figure in Türkiye's literary world. A political essayist herself, she was arrested over 30 times for her… More
Doğan Akhanli
A writer specializing in genocide studies, Akhanli has been arrested and imprisoned several times for his work on the Armenian Genocide. In 1991, he fled Türkiye for Germany where,… More
Gültekin Avcı
Avcı, a former columnist at shuttered newspaper Bugün, was arrested following the failed July 2016 coup. His trial was merged with a separate trial where defendants were accused of… More
Fikret Başkaya
Başkaya, an academic and author of several books on topics including socialism, politics, and corruption in Türkiye, was arrested in November 2017 on the basis of an article he… More
Hanım Büşra Erdal
Reporter and columnist Erdal was detained in a sweep of journalists writing for Zaman, a newspaper forced to close after the failed 2016 coup, and sentenced on terrorism charges.… More
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