ERBIL, Kurdistan Region - The Turkish interior ministry on Friday removed the mayor of Istanbul’s Besiktas district days after he was arrested and accused of bribery and membership in a criminal organization.

The Republican People’s Party, Turkey’s main opposition party, condemned the arrest as politically motivated, with Istanbul Mayor Ekrem İmamoğlu calling it an attempt to sway public opinion. #EuropeNe

Prosecutors in Istanbul say the mayor of one of Turkey’s opposition strongholds has been arrested as part of a bid-rigging investigation

A fresh drive to bring an end to Turkey's 40-year Kurdish conflict has seen politicians from the pro-Kurdish party meet jailed leaders.

THE mayor of one of Turkey’s opposition strongholds was arrested today as part of a bid-rigging investigation, prosecutors in Istanbul said. Riza Akpolat, who heads Besiktas municipality on the city’s European side, was detained at his summer house in Edremit on Turkey’s west coast, news agency DHA reported.

A delegation from Turkey's pro-Kurd DEM political party met Saturday with its former president, jailed since 2016, as it pursues an effort to end decades of conflict between Ankara and the outlawed Kurdish PKK rebel group.

A delegation from one of Turkey’s biggest pro-Kurdish political parties has met a leading figure of the Kurdish movement in prison, the latest step in a tentative process to end the country’s 40-year conflict.

Turkey's top diplomat on Friday ruled out a role for French troops in Syria, saying it was only negotiating with the United States which has sought to head off Turkish military action against Kurdish fighters there.

Abdullah Ocalan, jailed head of the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) militant group ... who works in the tourism sector, said in Istanbul. (Reporting by Ece Toksabay and Huseyin Hayatsever in ...

the CHP mayor of Istanbul’s Esenyurt district. Ozer has been behind bars since October as part of a separate investigation into his alleged connections to the banned Kurdistan Workers’ Party ...

Turkey's Kurdish Leaders Meet Jailed Politician as the Two Sides Inch Toward Peace ISTANBUL (AP ... the imprisoned head of the Kurdistan Workers’ Party, or PKK. While the PKK has led ...

By Akin Nazli in Belgrade The Turkish government has been at it again, trampling on “Kurdish” and other opposition ballot box outcomes that stick in its craw. On January 13, it arrested the co-mayors of a municipality held by pro-Kurdish party DEM and appointed trustees.