ISTANBUL: A Turkish court jailed comedian Deniz Goktas pending trial on Friday for insulting President Tayyip Erdogan and religious values, a court document seen by Reuters showed, days after prosecutors opened an investigation into remarks he made on stage.
The Istanbul Chief Public Prosecutor’s Office said earlier this week it had launched an investigation after identifying what it described as criminal expressions in content shared by Goktas on social media. Police detained him at Istanbul Airport when he flew back to Turkiye from a trip abroad on Thursday.
Prosecutors said the investigation concerned allegations that Goktas insulted religious values during a stand-up performance in Istanbul on June 1, in which he made references to Erdogan and jailed Istanbul Mayor Ekrem Imamoglu.
Insulting the president is among the charges against him, Goktas’ lawyer Metin Aslan said in a social media post.
The performance quickly went viral online, and attracted more than nine million views on YouTube as of Friday, with clips spreading widely across X, Instagram and other social media platforms.
