Turkish court ousts leader of main opposition party

Key points

• A court in Turkiye has annulled the 2023 leadership election of the main opposition Republican People’s Party (CHP) in a sharp escalation against the country’s embattled opposition.
• It is the latest in a string of moves targeting the CHP, Turkiye’s oldest political faction that won a huge victory over President Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s ruling AK Party in the 2024 local elections and has been rising in the polls.
• The ruling on Thursday overturned the result of a leadership election that brought in current party head Ozgur Ozel, with the court naming the party’s former chair, Kemal Kilicdaroglu – who lost the election to Ozel – as interim leader.
• The case was seen as a test of Turkiye’s shaky balance between democracy and increasingly centralised power, and the ruling may throw the opposition into further disarray and possible infighting.
• It could also boost Erdogan’s chances of extending his more than two-decade...