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President Erdogan
Photo: ADEM ALTAN / AFP
Not that the expectations were too great.
Recep Tayyip Erdoğan has been in power in Turkey for 17 years.
People know what to think of him and his reform promises.
And yet there was some hope among the Turkish opposition when Erdoğan announced judicial reform and a human rights offensive in November.
Perhaps, some believed, the severe economic crisis in Turkey was forcing the president to loosen his authoritarian rule a little.
Disappointed hope
One week was enough to dash all hopes.
Last Friday, a Turkish court extended the imprisonment of the patron Osman Kavala, one of the most important supporters of Turkish civil society.
Erdoğan accuses him of participating in the 2016 coup attempt.
The trial of Kavala is set to continue in February.
Earlier this week, the European Court of Human Rights renewed its call for the release of the opposition politician Selahattin Demirtaş, who has been held by the Turkish government since 2016 as an alleged terrorist aid worker.
Erdoğan has already made it clear that he does not feel bound by the judgment from Strasbourg, even though his country is a member of the Council of Europe.
The decision was "politically motivated," he said.
Last Wednesday, a Turkish court sentenced Can Dündar, the former editor-in-chief of the daily Cumhuriyet, to 27 years and six months in prison.
In 2015, Dündar revealed arms deliveries by the Turkish secret service to jihadists in Syria.
Erdoğan therefore defamed him as a terrorist and spy.
Dismantling the rule of law
Since the release of the »Welt« correspondent Deniz Yücel in 2018, the interest of Germans in the fate of political prisoners in Turkey has declined significantly.
But that does not mean that the situation for opposition members and journalists in the country has improved.
Innocents are still in jail in Turkey.
Erdoğan, meanwhile, is unwaveringly continuing to dismantle the rule of law and democracy.
He is betting that Germans and others will get used to this injustice.
Deniz Yücel was released after a year in custody, mainly because civil society in Germany was incessant pressure.
People like Demirtaş or Kavala do not have the privilege of a German passport.
They still deserve not to be forgotten.
You can read an interview with the captured politician Demirtaş here: "That has nothing to do with rightly"
An interview with the convicted journalist Dündar here: "Erdoğan has his back to the wall"
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