April 14, 2026, 3:08 p.mApril 14, 2026, 3:08 p.m
Former Turkish opposition leader Kemal Kilicdaroglu has been sentenced to almost a year in prison for insulting current President Recep Tayyip Erdogan.
Kemal Kilicdaroglu.Image: keystone
The court in Mersin sentenced Kilicdaroglu to eleven months and 20 days in prison for insulting a public official, his lawyer confirmed to the DPA news agency.
The allegations relate to statements made in 2014, when Erdogan was still serving as Prime Minister. The lawyer did not give any details. The verdict is not yet final, so the convicted person does not have to go to prison initially.
Kilicdaroglu was chairman of the largest opposition party, CHP, for more than ten years and was defeated by Erdogan in a runoff in the 2023 presidential election. Özgür Özel replaced the long-time party leader at the head of the CHP after his defeat and realigned the party. Despite low support within the CHP, Kilicdaroglu is said to still have ambitions for the party leadership.
In the local elections last year, the CHP achieved a surprising success under Özel’s leadership and won most of the municipalities in the country. Since then, numerous opposition politicians have been arrested as part of terror and corruption investigations, including the now deposed Istanbul mayor and Erdogan rival Ekrem Imamoglu. (hkl/sda/dpa)