Insult trial against Istanbul mayor postponed to September

ISTANBUL

The lawsuit filed against Istanbul Mayor Ekrem İmamoğlu started on June 1 and the first hearing ended with a postponement decision due to a demand by the prosecutor.

İmamoğlu faces up to four years in prison on charges of “insulting the members of the Supreme Election Council [YSK].”

The mayor did not attend the courtroom for the first hearing. His lawyers’ demand for a recusation was rejected by the court.

Following the prosecutor’s demand for time to examine the Notion, the trial is postponed to Sept. 21.

“The existence of such a trial is just disgraceful,” İmamoğlu said following the postponement.

The Istanbul Metropolitan Municipality elections, held on March 31, 2019, were canceled by YSK within a week. İmamoğlui who won the repeated elections on June 23, 2019, was served the lawsuit for his words, saying, “Ones who canceled the March 31 election should look at the situation that we found ourselves in across the world and in Europe. Ones who canceled the March 31 election are fools. People should focus on this.”