On May 19, information spread on the Internet that a citizen of Turkmenistan, Farhat Meymankuliev, known as Farhat Durdyev, was detained by the Turkish police. The information comes from his representative, known under the pseudonym “Yunus”, who contacted migrants in Turkey A. Mamedov and in Poland N. Annaev and sent them a video of the detention. Radio "Azatlyk" interviewed Annaev.
During May 20 and 22 (weekends), human rights activists tried to get more complete and reliable information about the status of Farhat's residence in Turkey, about the reasons for his detention, whether he had a lawyer and other important for Farhat's future fate data. At the request of human rights activists, several activists asked Yunus to clarify these issues in order to correctly build a defense strategy. There is no answer yet. Also, our representative contacted Farhat's former lawyer, Mustafa Yaman, who agreed on Monday, May 22, to contact the blogger's relatives.
Farhat is known for his Youtube videos with harsh remarks about the government of Turkmenistan. The blogger's videos saturated with obscene words are very popular, which cannot but irritate the authorities. At the moment, the Youtube channel of the blogger is not available.
Durdyev was detained in an apartment he rented in Istanbul along with other Turkmen citizens. Together with him, three of his roommates were taken to the police station. Then they were released, and the blogger was sent to a deportation center in the suburban Istanbul district of Tuzla.
According to some reports, his Turkmen passport is valid until 2026. But the information that the blogger allegedly has refugee status has not yet been confirmed. But there was information that back in December 2022, an application was filed against Farhat Durdyev by compatriots who accused him of various criminal offenses. And also that he did not respond to the summons to come to the police, sent by the Turkish authorities to his place of residence.
We are trying to clarify the ambiguous, sometimes mutually exclusive data that comes to us from various people.
Turkmen Helsinki Foundation for Human Rights
