Ali Karimli's whereabouts were unclear on November 30, a day after the raid on his Baku home, according to the Popular Front Party. Other officials with the party, known as AXCP, also reported their residences searched and had also gone missing. Turan Ibrahim, whose father Mammad serves as a member of the party's presidium, said in a post on Facebook that more than a dozen security agents searched his father's house, seizing his phone and computer and took him to undisclosed locations.
Opposition members accuse President Samia Suluhu Hassan of cracking down on dissent to stay in power. Voters in Tanzania are heading to polling booths on Wednesday to vote for a new president, as well as members of parliament and councillors, in elections which are expected to continue the ruling Chama Cha Mapinduzi (CCM) or Party of Revolution's 64-year-long grip on power.
Hasan Mutlu, mayor of Istanbul's Bayrampasa district, was taken into custody early Saturday on charges including bribery, embezzlement, fraud and bid rigging by the municipality, according to state broadcaster, TRT Haber. The Istanbul police reportedly raided 72 locations, seizing documents and detaining Mutlu and several of his deputies. Mutlu denied the allegations on X, writing: I have served only Bayrampasa and you, my esteemed fellow citizens What has happened consists of political operations and baseless slanders.