Turkey’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs abruptly ended the post of nine honorary consuls, including those working for Belgium, Austria, Sweden and the UK, despite requests by some of the countries to maintain them in their posts.

The Foreign Ministry did not offer a reason for the decision, but the honorary consuls who talked to Al-Monitor said that they thought the reason, at least for half of them, was their criticism toward the Turkish government and its policies both in speech and on social media.

“I was told that it was because of my social media posts that criticized the government,” said one ex-consul of an EU country speaking on condition of anonymity. “I know that at least some of the representations requested the MFA to reconsider their position, but they met with a strict no.”

The claims that the social media posts played a role in the ministry’s decision to strip the honorary consuls of their posts come at a time when social media users in Turkey regularly face harassment, censorship or arrest over comments critical of President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and the government. Even old social media posts may prove to have long shadows. Earlier this year, journalist Melis Alphan faced charges of “spreading terrorist propaganda” over a photo that she posted on social media of the 2015 Newroz celebrations in the southeastern province of Diyarbakir. Similarly, thespian Genco Erkal faces four years of imprisonment for several social media posts, one of which dates back to 2016. He is charged with insulting the president with a post that asked him to “display his university diploma.”

Topics such as corruption within the government and speculation on the health of the president may lead to detention or firing. On Nov. 3, the Turkish directorate general of security announced that it had launched a probe into social media posts under the hashtag #olmus (he is dead) that speculated about the health of Erdogan, which has become a particularly sensitive topic, particularly after Foreign Policy ran an article on whether the Turkish president was “too sick to lead Turkey.”

Unlike professional diplomats, honorary consuls, whose status is also governed by the Vienna Convention on Consular Relations, have judicial immunity only in respect to acts performed in the exercise of their functions. These functions are mainly to boost bilateral trade and cultural ties, as well as carry out consular affairs such as issuing visas.

During the Ottoman Empire, the honorary consuls, chosen among the resident Greeks, Venetians and other non-Muslims, played a strong role in the Western powers’ relations with the empire, particularly in terms of trade and in relations of the Great Powers with local Christian communities. There are currently more than 120 honorary consuls in Turkey, some of which are high-profile Turkish businesspeople.

The honorary consuls, usually contracted for a five-year term, are chosen by the country they represent but need the approval of the host country’s Foreign Ministry to start and continue their functions. Five years ago, in the wake of an unsuccessful coup, the Foreign Ministry overhauled the diplomatic list to weed out businessmen who allegedly had links with US-based cleric Fethullah Gulen.

The current termination, which was communicated to the embassies in mid-October, became public when the Swedish Consulate-General in Istanbul posted a statement in Swedish on its website Nov. 3 to explain that their Antalya consulate was temporarily closed. “We regret having to announce that the Swedish Honorary Consulate in Antalya will not be able to offer any consular service for the time being,” the statement read.

The statement made it clear that the request came from Ankara. “[This is] due to the Turkish authorities’ request that we end the mandate of the current honorary consul Nil Sagir, who represented Sweden for many years and whose mandate we recently extended to 2025. We would like to thank Nil Sagir for her outstanding efforts during this time. We know how valuable the work is that she and her staff carried out for the many Swedes who live in or visit this fantastic part of Turkey, as well as for the contacts between Swedish and Turkish companies in the region.”

Sagir told Al-Monitor, “I know that the embassy talked to the Turkish Foreign Ministry [to keep me in the post], but they were told that the decision was irreversible.”

Sagir, a lawyer whose husband was one of the founding members of the opposition Iyi Party of Meral Aksener, said in a farewell letter to the Swedes in the southern region of Antalya that she would “continue to speak out for a Turkey where the rule of law and human rights are respected, as I have always done.”

Mustafa Ulku Caner, who has served as Austria’s honorary consul in Izmir for more than two decades, confirmed to Al-Monitor that the request came from Ankara and not Vienna. “I was informed of the memo by the embassy,” Caner, also a lawyer, said. “They were not given a reason, but I think it is because of my opposition to the government policies.” Caner is a former member of the opposition Republican People’s Party (CHP) and writes a column in the daily Yurt, a small newspaper that follows a left-of-center line.

Among the people whose term ended is Belgium’s honorary consul in Izmir Nezih Ozture, and Nese Coskunsu, who was the UK’s honorary consul in Bodrum. Others include Romania's honorary consul in the Mediterranean port of Iskenderun; Ethiopia's honorary consul in Konya, the central Anatolian town that is a stronghold of the Justice and Development Party; and Lithuania’s honorary consul in Nevsehir.

Two honorary consuls from Istanbul, the commercial and cultural capital, were also on the list obtained by German media outlet Deutsche Welle’s Alican Uludag. One was Mustafa Cikrikcioglu, the former deputy chair of Turkey’s Exporters Union who had been briefly detained following the unsuccessful putsch in 2016. Cikrikcioglu had been accused of supporting the Fethullah Gulen Terrorist Organization (FETO), a movement led by Gulen, which Ankara accused of infiltrating the Turkish bureaucracy and carrying out the July 2016 coup attempt. He was cleared of charges. Emir Uyar, the honorary consul of the Dominican Republic, is a frequent face in Turkey’s tabloids, particularly due to his love affair with top model Adriana Lima.

One of the ex-honorary consuls, who spoke on background, said that he and his colleagues were aware that the Foreign Ministry was keeping a tight eye on their social media posts. “We have been warned in the past to be careful of what we say, write and what we share on social media, but I had thought that as long as we were not being offensive and remained on the side of law, it would not create a problem,” the consul said.

Asked whether she thought her posts might have played a role, Sagir told Al-Monitor, “I have had some posts that expressed criticism toward the government, which is my right as a citizen, but never have I been offensive toward the Turkish state or toward Turkish institutions.”

There were no official comments from the Belgian, Austrian and UK embassies contacted by Al-Monitor, nor from the Turkish Foreign Affairs Ministry.

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