President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan has filed a lawsuit for damages against journalist Sedef Kabaş, who has been arrested on charge of “insulting the President”, and against Fırat Sakar, the Executive Board Chair of the firm that the TV channel is affiliated with. Erdoğan has demanded 250 thousand Turkish Lira (TRY) in damages.
The petition submitted to the İstanbul 20th Civil Court of First Instance briefly reads, “… with remarks targeting the client and containing insults and accusations that could not be tolerated, the defendant put the client in a position of a ‘person who disturbs and damages the order of society’ before the public and committed this act in such a way to convey it to large masses by getting on a TV program, thereby causing the client to be humiliated, degraded and worn out before society” (February 8).