Turkey’s Interior Minister Süleyman Soylu said on Sunday that Turkish-German journalist Deniz Yücel, who has been in a Turkish jail since February, is an agent who hid in the German consulate general for days.
Soylu’s remarks came in Trabzon province during a meeting of the ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP).
Accusing Germany and the US of involvement in espionage in Turkey, Soylu claimed that jailed reporter Yücel was hidden in the German consulate for days.
“A country that is supposedly our ally and cooperating with us and which is bragging about being the ‘biggest country of Europe’ hid an agent in the consulate in İstanbul for days and is trying to associate Turkey with terrorism, while they are protecting people from FETÖ [a derogatory term used by government circles to refer to the faith-based Gülen movement], the PKK [Kurdistan Workers’ Party] and the DHKP/C [Revolutionary People’s Liberation Party/Front] who are working to expose national secrets in their country,” said Soylu.
Yücel, a reporter for German daily Die Welt, who was detained in Turkey on Feb. 14 as part of an investigation for publishing stories on the leaked emails of President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s son-in-law and Energy Minister Berat Albayrak, was arrested by a court on Feb. 27 and sent to Silivri Prison in İstanbul.
The prosecutor had accused Yücel of “disseminating the propaganda of a terrorist organization” and “inciting people to hatred and enmity.”
In April Erdoğan said the extradition of Turkish-German journalist Yücel to Germany will never take place as long as he is president.
Erdoğan has on many occasions accused Yücel of being a German agent and a representative of the PKK.
“Deniz Yücel is still in prison because in my opinion Turkey has taken him hostage,” German Foreign Minister Sigmar Gabriel recently said.
Director of Amnesty International (AI) Turkey Idil Eser, who has been jailed since her detention on July 5 together with nine other human rights activists including German national Peter Steudtner, also said they were being held hostage by Turkey to threaten Germany.
President Erdoğan is believed to be detaining German journalists and human rights defenders to force the deportation from Germany of Turkish asylum seekers, who Erdoğan accuses of having mounted a botched coup attempt on July 15, 2016.
Turkey claims some key suspects in the perpetration of the failed coup in 2016 fled to Germany and is demanding that Berlin hand them over to the Turkish judiciary. German authorities have not responded to Ankara amid reports of torture in Turkish jails, especially in the case of coup suspects.
Erdoğan accused Germany of assisting terrorists by failing to respond to Turkey’s requests to hand over suspects wanted by Turkish authorities.