Since Turkey’s 49 consulate staff and their family members were taken hostage in the northern Iraqi city of Mosul on June 11, Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s government has taken all measures to keep the public in the dark on the issue. The prime minister first warned the media on June 15 not to write or talk about the developments in Mosul. A Turkish court followed up on the warning the next day by imposing a gag order to all print, visual and Internet media. The government is now applying a similar gag order to opposition party members in parliament, denying their requests to be informed about the issue.

There was talk of convening a special session in parliament in the immediate aftermath of the hostage crisis. The government, however, argued that anything that could be revealed at that session could put the lives of 80 Turkish citizens — including 31 truck drivers besides the 49 from the consulate — at risk and the opposition complied at the outset. However, the opposition party members of the parliamentary Foreign Affairs Committee decided they wanted to be kept informed of the “seizure of the consulate and all its staff members taken hostage” just as the special session on the floor of parliament was canceled.

According to parliamentary regulations, one-third of the committee members' signatures is considered enough to request the discussion of an issue. The committee has a total of 26 members. On June 17, nine of the committee's opposition party members — five from the Republican People’s Party (CHP), not including Oktay Eksi, who was traveling, three from the Nationalist Action Party (MHP) and one from the pro-Kurdish People’s Democratic Party (HDP) — signed the petition demanding to be fully informed of the developments in Iraq. The total of nine met the minimum requirement to bring the issue to the agenda of the committee.

When they convened this morning, June 25, however, they ended up walking out in protest. Osman Koruturk, a CHP deputy and a member of the committee, told Al-Monitor, “Despite the three opposition parties’ request on June 17 in accordance with our parliamentary regulations requesting a special session on the assessment of the crisis in Iraq and ways to produce a solution, commission Chairman Volkan Bozkir did not put the petition on the agenda, stating, 'The Ministry of Foreign Affairs did not positively reply to the commission’s request, and the ministry did not provide any expert to brief the members on the issue.'” A retired ambassador, Koruturk was Turkey’s first special envoy to Iraq between 2003 and 2005. “If this is not a topic considered important and vital for the Foreign Affairs Committee, the government must consider our function only to be the approval of routine matters. This cannot be accepted,” he said.