Turkish police have briefly detained five people over "making propaganda for a terrorist organisation” after they gestured the “victory sign” in İstanbul.
They were taken to a police headquarters for “making terror propaganda,” being accused of carrying out propaganda on behalf of the armed Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK).
According to the police report, the detainees said they made the victory sign for entertainment purposes when asked about their motive.
They detained citizens were released in the evening on July 24.
The victory sign is mostly used by the leftists in Turkey, and at the same time, it refers an anti-government stance.
In 2015 a woman protested the Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan by making victory sign had been subjected to violence by Erdoğan’s bodyguards and detained by the police.
In 2016, two police officers on duty in front of Peoples’ Democratic Party (HDP) headquarters in Ankara broke off the victory sign-bearing hands of a snowman that was made by HDP staff.
