Turkey: 23 staff members detained at Azadiya Welat newspaper

On 28 August, the police raided the main office of the Kurdish-language daily newspaper Azadiya Welat based in Diyarbakır. According to media reports, at least 23 staff members of the newspaper are currently detained at Diyarbakır Police headquarters following the raid, the names are : Yasemin Sayın, Hayat Yılmaz, Ahmet Kızılay, Arap Turan, Berxwedan Tulpar, Sürreya Dal, Zeynep İzgi, İbrahim Bayram, Engin Özelçi, Ahmet Boltan, Ceylan İpek, Mehmet Emin Kaya, Ziyan Karahan, Veysi Altın, Ercan Yeltaş, Azime Tarhan, Serdal Polat, Cengiz Aslan, Ferit Toprak, Mehmet Hüseyin Şahin, Mehmet Aydın, Pusat Bulut and Mehmet Emin Akgün. Dicle News Agency (DİHA) reported that the police justified the raid by the notice they received that “there are [illegal] organizational meetings held”. Phones and IDs of the employees have been…