A famous Turkish pop singer has been remanded in custody after joking about Islamic schools. The 46-year-old singer Gülsen Bayraktar Colakoglu, who is well known in Turkey under the stage name Gülsen, was arrested at her home in Istanbul and brought before a magistrate on Thursday.
The judge ordered her to be held in custody pending the completion of the investigation into “incitement to hatred”.
On stage, Gülsen made a joke about the religious Imam Hatip schools: She jokingly told a colleague that his “perversion” was due to his school days at an Imam Hatip school.
A video of the performance spread in the online networks and caused great outrage in the Islamic conservative party of President Recep Tayyip Erdogan. AKP spokesman Ömer Celik spoke of a “hate crime and a disgrace to humanity”.
Gülsen had spoken out in the online networks before her arrest. She joked with colleagues she has worked with for many years, the singer said. “I’m sorry that my words have given substance to malicious people who want to divide our country,” she added.