Turkey’s main opposition leader, Kemal Kilicdaroglu, pressed charges with the Istanbul chief prosecutor’s office against a notorious Turkish mafia boss Nov. 18 after he openly threatened him in a letter he shared via Twitter triggering uproar. Kilicdaroglu’s lawyer said the four-page diatribe handwritten and signed by Alaattin Cakici posed a direct threat to his client, who is the leader of the pro-secular Republican People’s Party (CHP).

In the letter, dated Nov. 17 and peppered with obscenities and threats of physical violence, Cakici accused Kilicdaroglu of treason in concert with Kurdish militants and foreign powers. “Be sensible,” he warned, using an expression that is commonly used by Turkish gangsters to intimidate their victims. Cakici’s ire was sparked by Kilicdaroglu’s suggestion in a speech to the parliament the same day that the mobster had been recently freed from prison thanks to pressure on Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan from his far-right nationalist partner Devlet Bahceli, while thousands of prisoners of conscience continue to rot in Turkish jails.

Cakici boasts close ties to Bahceli: The nationalist leader visited Cakici when he fell ill in jail in 2018 and met with him following his release in April this year under a controversial amnesty law that was pushed by his Nationalist Action Party (MHP). Bahceli took to Twitter to defend Cakici against Kilicdaroglu’s “collaborators” who he claimed were trying to smear him, saying that he and the mob leader believed in the same cause

His threats against Kilicdaroglu have been greeted with silence by Erdogan and members of his ruling Justice and Development Party. Their apparent indifference flies in the face of Erdogan’s recent pledges, which have been echoed by his justice minister, for sweeping economic and judicial reforms that are meant to restore investor confidence in Turkey’s battered economy.