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Accusations against Swedish journalist Joakim Medin, who was detained in Turkey last week on terrorism-related accusations and subsequently arrested, are “false,” his wife, Sofie Axelsson, told Agence France-Presse (AFP) on Sunday.
Medin was detained on Thursday in İstanbul, where he had arrived to cover the mass protests triggered by the arrest of İstanbul Mayor Ekrem İmamoğlu. He was jailed the following day.
“I was able to send him a message through the lawyer and I had a message back,” Axelsson said. “He is treated well, [but] a little bit bored.”
Turkish authorities accuse Medin, reporting for the Swedish newspaper Dagens ETC, of membership in a terrorist organization and “insulting the president,” Recep Tayyip Erdoğan.
They also claim he took part in a 2023 demonstration in Stockholm organized by the outlawed Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK), during which a puppet representing Erdoğan was displayed.
But Axelsson rejected the allegations, saying, “The accusations are false, he is a journalist, nothing else.”
“He has been reporting on [Turkey] for many years, mainly on democracy and human rights,” she added.
Medin was previously detained by Syrian security forces in 2015 during a reporting trip and held in isolation for a week.