In a striking display of political mediation, Turkey’s Nationalist Movement Party (MHP) has brokered a high-profile reconciliation between two notorious organized-crime families.
Devlet Bahçeli, the veteran 78-year-old leader of the MHP and junior partner in the governing coalition under President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, hosted senior members of the Saral and Şahin clans at the party’s headquarters in Ankara.
In a series of photographs published on September 26, Bahçeli was pictured alongside representatives of both families.
“Two distinguished families of our country, the Sarals and the Şahins, came together at our headquarters in a historic embrace with our chairman,” a statement said.
The extraordinary meeting marked a symbolic truce in a decades-long feud between the two crime groups, whose rivalry is rooted in Turkey’s Black Sea region.
Their conflict has involved illegal gambling operations, extortion and targeted killings across Turkey. Both clans have faced extensive prosecutions and government crackdowns over the past two decades.
Turkey’s Interior and Justice Ministries did not issue an official comment on the nature of the agreements reached during the meeting with Bahçeli.
