Turkish pop star Gulsen Colakoglu has been jailed pending trial on charges of “inciting or insulting the public to hatred and enmity” after she made a joke about religious schools in Turkey, according to the state-run Anadolu news agency.
The charges appear to be related to a video circulating on social media from a Gulsen concert in April, when she joked about one of the musicians.
He “graduated from Imam Hatip (religious schools). That’s where his pervert side comes from,” she said.
Several Twitter users could be seen sharing the video on Thursday with a hashtag calling for her arrest and saying it is offensive to associate the schools with perverts.
Gulsen denies that she has committed any crime and is appealing the arrest, according to her lawyer Emek Emre.
After her detention, Gulsen shared a message on her official Twitter and Instagram accounts, apologizing to “anyone who was offended” by the joke and saying it had been twisted by “malicious people who aim to polarize our country.”
“I made a joke with my colleagues, with whom I have worked for many years in the business. It has been published by people who aim to polarize society,” she said.
“In defending the freedom I believe in, I see myself thrown towards the radical end that I criticize. I apologize to anyone who was offended by my speech in the video,” she said.
She later said in a testimony that it was an “unfortunate joke” and asked to be released, saying she had a child depending on her and that she would come to court or a police station when needed, according to Anadolu.
Gulsen has previously been targeted by Turkish conservative groups for her revealing stage outfits and support for the LGBTQ community.
The Muslim majority country is officially secular but highly polarized over issues surrounding secularism, religion, women’s rights and LGBTQ rights.
Imam Hatip schools, which teach religious studies alongside the Turkish curriculum, have grown in the two decades that the conservative Justice and Development Party (AKP) has been in power.
