Despite substantial evidence of criminal activities, ranging from abuse of power to bribery, a trial revealing the intricate workings of a sophisticated human smuggling network involving senior officials from Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s ruling party concluded with the acquittal of all of the indicted individuals, including a German national of Turkish descent.
The case originated in the Yeşilyurt district municipality of Turkey’s Malatya province, which sent 90 individuals in two separate groups to the German city of Hannover under the guise of attending an environmental workshop organized by a Turkish-run German company on February 15 and September 19, 2020, none of whom ever returned.
It was later uncovered that the Yeşilyurt municipality, governed by President Erdogan’s Justice and Development Party (AKP), had facilitated the issuance of special grey passports — passports exempt from Schengen visa requirements and valid for visa-free entry into numerous other countries that have agreements with Turkey — enabling illegal migration. Substantial bribes reportedly changed hands to facilitate the issuance of these passports.
None of the migrants, masquerading as tourists or visitors on a short business trip, arriving in Germany by the busload under the pretext of participating in a green-environment project endorsed by the Turkish municipality, returned to Turkey. However, their official grey service passports — lacking re-entry stamps from Turkish border authorities or exit stamps from German border police — were inexplicably returned to Turkish authorities by the municipality. Regulations require that each passport holder personally surrender their service passport to the Provincial Directorate of Population and Citizenship Services upon completing an official visit.
After the main opposition Republican People’s Party publicly exposed the scandal in April 2021, the government — despite having prior knowledge of the issue — was compelled to initiate an investigation. Nevertheless, the inquiry culminated in the dismissal of charges and the acquittal of local AKP officials implicated in the passport scam. Even though dozens of individuals, including governors and other officials from various government institutions, were involved, not a single person was ultimately held accountable.
The entire investigation, indictment and trial amounted to little more than a facade, designed to give the appearance of the Erdogan government’s resolve to dismantle the smuggling network, while the reality told a different story.
The entire investigation, indictment and trial amounted to little more than a facade, designed to give the appearance of the Erdogan government’s resolve to dismantle the smuggling network, while the reality told a different story. It also served to ease mounting pressure from the European Union, which has grown increasingly concerned about migrant smuggling originating from Turkey with the support of the Erdogan government.
In 2020, two separate groups were sent to Germany after being issued special passports, following an official endorsement by the Yeşilyurt municipality in collaboration with a little-known local organization, the Malatya Personal Development World Association (Malatya Kişisel Gelişim Dünyası Derneği in Turkish). The protocol signed between the municipality and the association, which was approved by the city council, enabled migrants to obtain official grey passports, granting them visa-free travel to Germany.
According to the indictment, bribes ranging from 4,500 to 7,000 euros per person were paid to officials involved in the scam. Most of those sent to Germany were not residents of the city, but rather Kurds from the southeastern provinces, some of whom were alleged to have ties to the outlawed Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK), with one individual reportedly a Syrian national.
A citation letter from Turkish mayor Mehmet Çınar was awarded to Ersin Kilit, a Turkish-German dual national who is alleged to be the coordinator of human trafficking from Turkey to Germany:
During the first trip, four municipal officials — city council member Nusret Aslan; deputy mayors of Yeşilyurt, Bekir Karakuş and Şahin Özer; and the municipality’s director of the Department of Public Works, Hasan Deviren — traveled to Germany to give the appearance of legitimacy to the visit.
Their travel and accommodation costs were covered by Ersin Kilit, a member of the pro-Kurdish Peoples’ Equality and Democracy Party (DEM Party) and a suspect accused of orchestrating the operation from Germany. While in Germany, Kilit handed over the final installment of the bribe, amounting to 40,000 euros, to the visiting Turkish officials.
After the scandal was exposed, public prosecutor Fahri Ersoy initiated an investigation, filing an indictment on September 15, 2022. However, only three suspects were named as perpetrators, while dozens of others, including the mayor and the governor of the province, were excluded from the inquiry — despite their signatures authorizing the trips being prominently featured on the documents.
The suspects included Bekir Karakuş; Ali Ayrancı, former mayor of the village of Servi in Bingöl; and Kilit. They were charged with human smuggling and faced potential prison sentences ranging from three to eight years. However, despite the charges, all three suspects were swiftly released after a brief period of pre-trial detention. Kilit was the last to be released.
Kilit’s Turkish lawyer, Emirhan Eren, revealed that while his client was still in detention, the organizers of the passport scam sent him a message, assuring him that he would be freed if he remained silent. The message stated, “Ersin, stay quiet; we’ll find a way to get you out. It’s a short process, and we’ll all be out. Just make sure you don’t turn on each other.” In the end, that is precisely what transpired.
In his statement to the investigating prosecutor, Mayor Çınar denied any knowledge of the organizers or the passport scam, instead shifting the blame onto his deputy, Karakuş, who testified in court that he had acted with the mayor’s full knowledge and approval.
Interestingly, the mayor of Yeşilyurt, Mehmet Çınar, who had authorized the trips, was spared from charges and instead was listed as a witness in the case. His powerful connections — ranging from President Erdogan and the head of Turkey’s intelligence agency, Ibrahim Kalin, to the chief public prosecutor in Malatya — seemed to offer him strong protection from any criminal liability.
In his statement to the investigating prosecutor, Mayor Çınar denied any knowledge of the organizers or the passport scam, instead shifting the blame onto his deputy, Karakuş, who testified in court that he had acted with the mayor’s full knowledge and approval. The mayor falsely claimed he had never met Kilit and rejected any suggestion of a quid pro quo.
Despite being spared from investigation and designated as a witness rather than a suspect, Çınar showed little regard for the proceedings, failing to attend the trial hearings for an extended period. He only appeared toward the end of the trial when the court issued an order for the police to forcibly bring him to the courthouse.
Court documents reveal that the organizers donated substantial sums of money to both the municipality and the association to secure their involvement in the scheme. Mayor Çınar even personally wrote a letter of appreciation to Kilit for his donations to the project run by the municipality. Several witnesses testified that Mayor Çınar was, in fact, aware of the scam and attempted to cover it up when rumors began circulating. He played a key role in securing the city council’s approval for the trip.
During the trial, Kilit testified that he had met Mayor Çınar in his office in early 2020, alleging that the mayor introduced him as someone who could assist with the municipality’s trip to Germany. Kilit admitted to providing an invitation letter on behalf of a company his family owns in Germany and coordinating with municipalities in Hannover and Nuremberg to organize meetings that would make the visit appear official. He claimed that the cash he handed over to officials in Germany was intended for his brother in Turkey.
Mehmet Sait Aytekin, a public school teacher and the head of the Malatya Personal Development World Association, was also spared from the investigation, despite being found to have unlawfully registered 103 individuals as members without proper entries in the association’s registry or written applications. Similarly, invitations from Germany and collaboration protocols with the municipality were approved without proper governance, including decisions signed solely by Aytekin.
It was evident that the Erdogan government sought to protect the mayor from any criminal liability, using his deputy as a scapegoat and ultimately shielding him and his associates by the end of the trial.
It was evident that the Erdogan government sought to protect the mayor from any criminal liability, using his deputy as a scapegoat and ultimately shielding him and his associates by the end of the trial.
The trial began in January 2024 at the Malatya 10th Criminal Court of First Instance, after the case had been repeatedly reshuffled among various provinces, including Ankara, due to a jurisdictional dispute. In the end, the court ruled to acquit all of the defendants, citing insufficient evidence to convict them of facilitating human smuggling.
No charges were ever filed for abuse of power or bribery against any official involved in issuing special service passports to individuals who were, in fact, ineligible. Çınar is no longer mayor but he continues to work closely with President Erdogan and senior government officials. His family business in cement and brick manufacturing thrives, benefiting from generous contracts awarded by government agencies.
It was further revealed that the Erdogan government was aware of the entire scheme after receiving a tip from a Turkish consulate official in Hannover, who suspected migrant smuggling was involved in these trips. Deputy Consul Güler Fidan, working at Turkey’s Hannover Consulate, informed Consul General Gül Özge Kaya about the scam. When the consul general failed to act, Fidan and her husband, Mehmet Fidan, shared their findings with the public.
The couple faced the wrath of the Erdogan government for attempting to blow the whistle and were punished by the foreign ministry, which dismissed them from their positions in February 2021 through a presidential decree, reassigning them to headquarters. In May 2021, they were also subjected to an internal disciplinary investigation by the Turkish Embassy in Berlin.
In February 2022, the Turkish foreign ministry stripped Mehmet Fidan of his civil servant status, despite his having already retired due to reaching the mandatory retirement age of 65. Although Fidan successfully challenged the decision legally, the ministry issued a second ruling to revoke his civil servant status, effectively depriving him of his green passport, which is typically granted to active and retired government officials.
Meanwhile, a criminal complaint filed by Güler Fidan in Ankara against Consul General Kaya was dismissed by the Ankara Public Prosecutor’s Office, Bureau for the Investigation of Civil Servant Crimes, which ruled there were no grounds for an investigation.
It turns out the passport scam in Malatya was not an isolated incident. Several municipalities across Turkey have also been implicated in similar passport scams, where Turks seeking to bypass visa restrictions and settle in Europe as migrants were unlawfully provided official service passports in exchange for bribes.
It turns out the passport scam in Malatya was not an isolated incident. Several municipalities across Turkey have also been implicated in similar passport scams, where Turks seeking to bypass visa restrictions and settle in Europe as migrants were unlawfully provided official service passports in exchange for bribes.
According to former Interior Minister Süleyman Soylu in April 2021 during an interview with a Turkish television channel, 2,872 people had used service passports in connection with local municipalities to travel abroad since 2018, with 804 of them never returning. He also mentioned that the ministry’s investigation, which covered 27 local municipalities in 19 provinces, was still ongoing.
Nothing substantive has ever come of these administrative investigations by the interior ministry, much like the botched criminal investigations launched by public prosecutors in related cases. Not only did the executive and judicial branches in Turkey fail to punish the perpetrators, but a legislative motion to investigate allegations of municipalities sneaking dozens of Turks into Europe with special passports was also rejected in parliament in April 2021 by Erdogan’s party and its ally, the far-right Nationalist Movement Party.
Although the Erdogan government managed to derail all avenues of investigation into such scams, German federal and local prosecutors have launched their own inquiries into the human smuggling network involving the unlawful use of Turkish service passports. Kilit, who has been living in Germany since the age of 10 and is believed to be the main coordinator of the smuggling network, along with his family company, Kilit GmbH, became subjects of a criminal investigation in Germany.
Kilit’s lawyer in Germany, Mahmut Erdem, claimed that his client had been scapegoated in a massive trafficking network that was facilitated with the approval of Turkish authorities, which sent busloads of people to Germany between 2018 and 2021. He argued that Kilit was a victim who had been deceived by his Turkish associates.
