Turkey is holding 13 volunteer environmentalists in pretrial detention on terrorism charges, and their lawyer says they ...

Turkey is holding 13 volunteer environmentalists in pretrial detention on terrorism charges, and their lawyer says they likely won't be released until after the NATO summit ends in Ankara on July 8. The 13 are volunteers with TEMA, one of Turkey's most prominent environmental protection foundations. Their lawyer, Suleiman Cetin, told AFP the detainees are between 65 and 73 years old, require medical care, and are being held despite appeals filed on their behalf. He called the situation a serious miscarriage of justice. The arrests were part of a much larger sweep on June 23, when Turkish authorities rounded up 225 people. Of those, 178 were placed in pretrial detention on terrorism charges, just days before the NATO summit scheduled for July 7 and 8 in Ankara. The charge against the TEMA volunteers is striking. Prosecutors allege they waved at a protest they passed while returning from a birdwatching sanctuary on June 3. According to Turkish NGO MLSA, that interaction is the basis of the terrorism suspicion. Cetin pushed back hard on the legal logic. He pointed out that Turkish law does not allow detention based on a mere possibility of committing a crime, and that among those jailed are a biodiversity professor and soil erosion specialists. A LGBTQ+ magazine editor, a trade unionist, and a university lecturer were also caught in the same wave of arrests. Human Rights Watch said last Thursday that using anti-terrorism laws to silence people ahead of a NATO summit runs directly against the alliance's foundational values. The summit itself, where Turkey is the host nation, opens in one week. #Turkey #NATO #HumanRights