The Istanbul Chief Prosecutor's Office on issued a capture warrant for lawyer Kemal Aytaç on 2 February Friday for reading a statement from the Turkish Medical Association (TBB) criticizing Turkey's incursion into the Kurdish enclave of Afrin in Syria and describing war as "damaging to public health" at a demonstration outside Istanbul's main courthouse on Thursday.
Aytaç has been organizing pickets called "Justice Watch" outside the Istanbul Çağlayan Courthouse for 44 weeks, protesting the high number of journalists, lawyers and others in prison.
He wasn't detained because he couldn't be located at his residential address. Police officers who came to detain him said he was being sought for reading out the TTB statement in the 44th week of Justice Watch.
Eleven TTB doctors were detained after the association issued the said statement. Three of them were let go on 2 February under judicial control measures.
A statement issued by members of Aytaç's Justice Watch said Aytaç will be at Çağlayan Courthouse to testify in the investigation on 5 February, Cumhuriyet reported.
