Two prominent Turkish investigative journalists were released on bail on Friday after being detained on Thursday, with their newspapers condemning their arrests on blackmail charges as an attempt to intimidate the press.
Timur Soykan and Murat Agirel, who work for opposition newspapers Birgun and Cumhuriyet, respectively, were arrested following their investigation into the sale of Flash Haber TV, a Turkish television station, to a local tycoon.
Their employers argued that the journalists were also targeted for their separate investigations into the arrest of Istanbul Mayor Ekrem Imamoglu, a key rival to President Recep Tayyip Erdogan.
“We were subjected to great injustice… but we’re relieved we weren’t sent to prison,” Soykan said as he left an Istanbul court. “We were uncovering a scandal,” he explained, referring to their probe into the Flash Haber TV acquisition. “We were simply doing our job as journalists.”
Soykan and Agirel, both well-known figures in Turkish investigative journalism, were arrested on charges of “threatening” and “blackmailing” individuals involved in the TV station sale. Officials confiscated electronic devices from their homes during the arrests.
Ibrahim Aydin, chairman of Birgun, criticised the authorities, accusing them of attempting to silence the press. “The government’s target is not criminals but real journalists who strive to convey the truth,” he wrote on X.
The two journalists had also recently raised concerns about the arrest of Imamoglu, who is considered the main challenger to Erdogan’s rule. Media rights organisation Reporters Without Borders said Soykan and Agirel had posted a YouTube video alleging irregularities in the official investigations targeting Imamoglu and other mayors from the main opposition CHP party.
Soykan spoke on Friday about the reality for journalists in Türkiye. “Journalists have to get used to having their homes searched and being arrested when they carry out investigations,” he said. “But we won’t stop writing what we know to be true,” Agirel told Cumhuriyet.
Imamoglu’s arrest on March 19 sparked the largest protests in Türkiye in more than a decade, and at least 13 journalists have been arrested since, accused of participating in illegal demonstrations they claim to have been covering as part of their journalistic duties. A Swedish journalist was also detained in Istanbul and charged with “terrorism” and “insulting” Erdogan.
