Turkish police arrested 30 people on corruption charges today, including a former lawmaker from the main opposition Republican People's Party (CHP) and the mayors of three CHP-run districts of Istanbul.
The state-run Anadolu Agency reported that the arrests were part of four separate corruption investigations allegedly involving the Istanbul Municipality.
This represents the fifth wave of legal confrontations with the Istanbul administration since March 19, when Mayor Ekrem Imamoglu was arrested on corruption charges.
The arrest of Imamoglu, who is considered the biggest rival of Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, sparked large demonstrations, demanding the mayor's release and greater democratic freedoms in the country, Reuters reports.
The opposition and its supporters claim that Imamoglu's arrest, and the subsequent arrest of dozens of others by the CHP, were politically motivated.
"This time the coup did not come in boots and tanks, but in prosecutors' uniforms," CHP chairman Ozgur Ozel told a crowd of supporters in the northwestern town of Duzze.
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