“The Erdoğan government has spent the past year attempting to remove political opponents and rivals and pursuing a barrage of lawsuits against the main opposition party,“ said Benjamin Ward, acting Europe and Central Asia director at Human Rights Watch. “This clear assault on democracy and political participation undermines the moves to end the conflict with the PKK.”
In the 529-page World Report 2026, its 36th edition, Human Rights Watch reviews human rights practices in more than 100 countries. In his introductory essay, Executive Director Philippe Bolopion writes that breaking the authoritarian wave sweeping the world is the challenge of a generation. With the human rights system under unprecedented threat from the Trump administration and other global powers, Bolopion calls on rights-respecting democracies and civil society to build a strategic alliance to defend fundamental freedoms.
Government negotiations with the jailed PKK leader Abdullah Öcalan resulted in the armed group beginning a process to disband and disarm, with the potential to bring an end to a longstanding conflict characterized by grave human rights violations including summary killings and enforced disappearances, village burnings, and forced displacement by government forces.
The authorities arrested and detained the Istanbul mayor, Ekrem İmamoğlu, the main opposition party’s presidential candidate, and in November, the Istanbul prosecutor indicted him and 401 others on corruption charges in a trial due to begin on March 9, 2026.
TV news outlets and journalists reporting the arrest of İmamoğlu and assault on the political opposition have faced multiple sanctions including fines, broadcast suspension, criminal prosecution and arrest of journalists and editors.
In October, a draft law was leaked that proposed criminalizing conduct deemed “contrary to biological sex” as well as its so-called promotion, and access to gender-affirming care outside strict new limits. While no draft law has yet been officially proposed, there are concerns that the government has not ruled out such measures.
The human rights defender Osman Kavala has been in prison for over eight years and politicians Selahattin Demirtaş and Figen Yüksekdağ for over nine years, in defiance of binding European Court of Human Rights’ judgments ordering their release.
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Source: https://www.hrw.org/news/2026/02/04/turkiye-government-targets-main-opposition
