Özgür Özel reacts to the indictment against Ahmet Özer: Prepared after 155 days

CHP Chairman Özgür Özel, in a statement on his social media account, said, "The indictment prepared against our Esenyurt Mayor Prof. Dr. Ahmet Özer 155 days after his arrest is the product of a conspiracy that could not even be properly fabricated. 

With hollow allegations, an attempt was made to fabricate a crime against our Mayor, who was arrested without cause, by waiting 155 days.

However, almost the entire 83-page indictment is filled with baseless details accessible from open sources. A fake indictment has been prepared using the secret witness method we remember from the FETÖ era, as they could not find concrete evidence against Ahmet Özer, who has held high-level positions in the public sector and academia for years, and who was even invited by the very authority that arrested him today to conferences, studies, and even as a speaker to TBMM Specialized Commissions in the past," he said.

"VISITING AN ASSOCIATION HAS BEEN COUNTED AS MEMBERSHIP IN AN ORGANIZATION"

Özel stated, "The prosecutor's office, which prepared the indictment for the crime of membership in a terrorist organization according to the 2nd paragraph of Article 314 of the Turkish Penal Code, also attempted to force the 3rd and 5th articles of the Anti-Terror Law into the indictment to be used as aggravating factors.

The secret witness statements in the indictment are completely abstract and lack any foundation. In the phone call records going back 12 years, only a condolence call could be found, and a rent payment transferred to his account from his tenant and his visit to an association recognized by state institutions have been counted as 'membership in an organization'.

This indictment, signed by a mobile guillotine, is the product of a political operation. The apparatuses of the political power will never be able to overshadow Ahmet Özer's innocence and the pure will of the people of Esenyurt," he said.