Jailing the Cemaats: Salim Çevik on the Süleymancı Arrests

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After years of judicial pressure on political opponents and civil society leaders, the Turkish government is now targeting religious conservatives.

The Süleymancılar community, or cemaat in Turkish, has seen multiple waves of arrests and new investigations since mid-August on a variety of charges centered on allegedly criminal finances.

To dig deeper into recent developments and what they mean for Turkish Pres. Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s policies towards religious communities, Turkey recap editor Diego Cupolo spoke to Salim Çevik, a visiting fellow at the Centre for Applied Turkey Studies at the German Institute for International and Security Affairs.

This podcast covers the origin of Turkish state policies towards religious communities, how this changed under Erdoğan and the widening crackdown by Justice and Development Party (AKP). We conclude with what all this means for the next election cycle.

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