Students detained for protesting Baykar and Leonardo partnership

Selçuk Bayraktar, the son-in-law of President and AKP Chairman Recep Tayyip Erdoğan and chairman of the board of Baykar Technology, had signed an agreement with the Italian aerospace and defense company Leonardo, one of the Israeli army's weapons suppliers.

Following this, the Student Collectives hung a banner on the wall of the Baykar Technology Center in Başakşehir that read, “From Baykar to Israel, the blood of Palestine is being carried.”

It was learned that two university students, members of the Student Collectives who hung the banner, were detained today following a police raid on their homes.

The Student Collectives announced the detentions with the following statement:

"Two of our university student friends, who protested the partnership established by Baykar with the Italian defense company Leonardo, which sells weapons and parts to the Israeli army, were detained after their homes were raided in the middle of the night on the grounds that they hung a banner in front of the Baykar Technology Center that read, 'From Baykar to Israel, the blood of Palestine is being carried.'

Bayraktar, who says, 'We stand against genocide, we stand with the Palestinian people,' is he standing against genocide by shaking hands and cooperating with those who provide technical support and weapons to the occupying state? Those who are truly against the genocide are our friends who exposed the collaborators, demanded a full embargo on the colonial occupying state, and were detained as a result.

We will not give up on standing in solidarity with the Palestinian people and exposing those who have used the Palestinian cause as a tool for their domestic politics for years!"