Freemuse calls for immediate release of comedian Deniz Göktaş
Comedian Deniz Göktaş’s stand-up show “Ölü Deniz/ Dead Sea,” performed across Türkiye for nearly three years, has come under government scrutiny due to the political topics it addresses. The show, which went viral on social media after Göktaş shared it on YouTube on 24 June, drew wide attention for addressing many of Türkiye’s political taboos, including the Kurdish issue, founder of modern Turkey Atatürk, current President Erdoğan, imprisoned opposition figures, celebrity drug raids, gangs and current political events. In a climate where censorship and self-censorship have become normalised, the performance was widely embraced by the public. However, pro-government figures and institutions quickly reacted. After pro-government figures accused Göktaş of insulting President Erdoğan, the comedian was targeted by social media trolls and clips of the show shared on X were blocked in Türkiye on the grounds of “protecting national security and public order.” The Istanbul Chief Public Prosecutor’s Office later launched an investigation into Göktaş on charges of “insulting religious values.” Upon returning from abroad, he was taken into custody at Istanbul Airport with his hands cuffed behind his back. After giving a statement, he was arrested on 3 July on charges of “insulting the President” and “insulting religious values”. In the letter he wrote from prison, Göktaş said he had not shared the performance for attention or out of bravery, but because he was exhausted by fear and self-censorship. “My frustration has overcome my fear”, he said. An access blocking order was later issued for the YouTube video under Article 8/A of Law No. 5651, though YouTube has not yet removed it. Göktaş’s Instagram account was also no longer accessible at the time of publication. Freemuse calls for Göktaş’s immediate release and urges Turkish authorities to drop charges against him. Artistic freedom and political satire must be protected.
Eastern Europe and the South Caucasus: Narrowing Borders
In early 2026, Freemuse published its annual report on the State of Artistic Freedom documenting attacks on artistic freedom worldwide throughout 2025. This regional update examines developments in Eastern Europe and the South Caucasus in the first half of 2026. This period demonstrates that artistic freedom remains deeply intertwined with wider political and social tensions across Eastern Europe and the South Caucasus. As governments invoke security concerns, societies debate identity, and conflicts shape public life, artists often become the first to encounter the boundaries of acceptable expression. The cases documented here suggest that those boundaries are becoming increasingly contested and, in some places, increasingly narrow. Artistic Freedom and Civic Space: Rising Global Concerns International institutions recognise these patterns as part of broader attacks on civic space. In March, the European Parliament adopted resolutions on human rights violations in Georgia, including one condemning the persecution of political opponents and calling for targeted EU sanctions. A month later, it warned that Russia’s war extends beyond military aggression to attacks on Ukraine’s cultural identity. EU statements throughout 2026 also highlighted the absence of independent journalism and freedom of expression in Russia and Russian-occupied Ukrainian territories. For artists, these concerns are reflected in the prosecution of anti-war speech, forced exile, venue and platform censorship, and the use of “foreign agent” and “undesirable organisation” designations to marginalise independent cultural voices. Eastern Europe: War, Repression and Identity Politics In Russia, a notable case of artistic expression challenging the official narrative of the war in Ukraine that arose this year was the banning of Pavel Talankin’s Oscar-winning documentary Mr. Nobody Against Putin, which documents wartime propaganda in a Russian school. Prosecutors claimed the film promoted extremism, negative attitudes toward the government and the war. Ukraine’s cultural sector remains under pressure from Russia’s ongoing war. European institutions have repeatedly framed Russia’s destruction of Ukrainian cultural infrastructure and heritage as part of a wider attempt to erase Ukrainian identity. The European Parliament motions in April 2026 highlighted Russia’s systematic attempts to erase Ukraine’s history, culture, language and identity, and cited damage to over 1,700 cultural heritage sites and 2,500 cultural infrastructure sites. At the same time, domestic pressure on LGBTI+ expression persisted. In February, Ukrainian singer MÉLOVIN’s concert in Rivne was cancelled after protesters opposed to same-sex marriage gathered outside the venue. The artist is known not only for his music but also for his stance on protecting the rights of LGBTI+ people. Organisers cited audience safety. Even amid war and Ukraine’s European integration efforts, conservative mobilisation can still restrict artists’ public visibility and performance. Artists in Belarus continue to exist in the most repressive environments in Europe. PEN Belarus reported that in January–March 2026 at least 63 people out of 911 political prisoners in the country were cultural figures. Five representatives of the cultural field were forcibly expelled or deported from the country, and three cultural and educational institutions were liquidated by a ruling of the Minsk City Executive Committee. Following the pattern of extreme sentencing of artists, in March, musician, producer and radio host Aleh Khamenka, leader of the folk-modern band Palac, was sentenced to three years in prison. This was for alleged “facilitation of extremist activities” over cooperation with Belarusian Radio Racyja, which reflects the regime’s continued use of “extremism” laws to criminalise independent cultural and media work. Artists Face Retaliation for Public Dissent Serbia’s anti-government protest movement increasingly spilled into the cultural sector during the first half of 2026. Artists and cultural workers who supported student-led protests reported dismissals, threats, censorship, media harassment and other forms of pressure. In May, the Community of Arts and Culture appealed for international solidarity, describing a climate in which cultural workers faced professional and personal consequences for expressing support for civic mobilisation. The film sector became a particularly visible battleground. In February, nine leading Serbian film associations issued an open letter accusing authorities of a “coordinated campaign of state-sponsored censorship” and a “complete institutional blockade” of independent filmmaking. The organisations alleged that public funding calls had been frozen for more than 14 months despite available funds, while filmmakers critical of the government faced political interference, informal blacklists, exclusion from public support schemes and public attacks. International concern also grew over the broader human rights situation. In May, the Council of Europe Commissioner for Human Rights warned of a deteriorating climate for dissent in Serbia, citing intimidation, harassment and reprisals against those expressing solidarity with protest movements. Against this backdrop, artists and cultural workers increasingly found themselves at the centre of wider struggles over freedom of expression and civic participation. South Caucasus: ‘Foreign Influence’ Laws, Suppression of Protests and Contested Histories Georgia became one of the region’s most alarming causes of concern. The Council of Europe Commissioner for Human Rights warned in April about the chilling effect of “foreign influence” laws on civil society, journalists and human rights defenders. The Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) also documented violence against protesters, including artists, and restrictions on assembly, expression and civic activity. Artists and cultural institutions in Georgia traditionally are at the forefront of civic protests. In the first half of the year, theatre communities and other artists in Batumi and Tbilisi were among those facing pressure and under wider attack. In May, internationally known opera singer Paata Burchuladze was sentenced to seven years in prison over his role in October 2025 anti-government protests. The case turned a prominent artist into a symbol of Georgia’s broader crackdown on pro-democracy voices. In Armenia, the controversy over Tigran Paskevichyan’s documentary Our Path to Independence that focuses on the period from the 1988 Karabakh movement to independence demonstrated how artistic work on national memory remains politically sensitive. A court initially barred screenings and distribution of the film, that had been commissioned by Public Television of Armenia. Public Television later released it on YouTube, ending the legal dispute but not the concern over institutional control of historical narratives. In Azerbaijan, the Council of Europe’s Parliamentary Assembly’s warning on the silencing of critical
Free Omar Salah Marei
Freemuse joins the International Coalition for Filmmakers at Risk in calling on film workers, rights organisations, institutions, and individuals worldwide to support Egyptian filmmaker and screenwriter Omar Salah Marei, who has been held in pretrial detention since 11 May 2026. More than 100 film workers and institutions have already signed the petition, including Emma Thompson, Laura Poitras, Aki Kaurismäki, Mia Hansen-Løve, the Dardenne brothers, Agnieszka Holland, Mohammad Rasoulof, Alex Gibney, and Alberto Barbera, Director of the Venice Film Festival. Omar was taken from his home in Cairo by plainclothes security officers without a warrant. His laptops, phones, and scripts were seized. He was held incommunicado for six days before appearing before Egypt’s Supreme State Security Prosecution. His detention has since been extended, and he remains denied regular access to his lawyer and family. The charge against him, “deliberately spreading false news”, is based on his social media commentary and appears to be an attempt to silence free expression. Omar urgently needs medical care. He has a thyroid disorder requiring daily medication and is recovering from major wrist surgery. There is no clear indication that he is receiving proper treatment. We call on the Egyptian authorities to immediately release Omar Salah Marei, drop all charges against him, and ensure he receives urgent medical care and humane treatment.
Cuba: Free Luis Manuel Otero Alcántara
Freemuse urges on the Cuban authorities to immediately and unconditionally release performance artist and human rights activist Luis Manuel Otero Alcántara, given grave concerns over his deteriorating health, personal safety and the legality of his ongoing imprisonment. On 6 April, Otero Alcántara ended an eight-day hunger strike at Guanajay maximum-security prison where he has been held for over five years. The hunger strike was triggered by mounting threats and systematic violations of his rights in detention. According to Cubalex, an independent Cuban legal organisation, Otero Alcántara has been subjected in recent weeks to death threats by State Security agents and prison officials. These threats were reportedly made during a prison inspection on 27 March, when officials threatened him and other political prisoners with lethal violence. This is the seventh hunger strike Otero Alcántara has undertaken since his arbitrary detention in July 2021, when he was arrested following his participation in nationwide protests against the Cuban government, amid widespread shortages of food and medicine. His health is a matter of serious concern. He previously suffered partial facial paralysis as a result of earlier hunger strikes, raising alarm about the cumulative and potentially irreversible impact on his physical integrity. There are growing fears that authorities may seek to extend his sentence beyond its expected completion in July 2026, further abusing the justice system to silence dissent and suppress freedom of expression. Otero Alcántara’s case reflects a broader and well-documented pattern of repression in Cuba, which the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR) and its Special Rapporteur for Freedom of Expression have consistently flagged — including the use of arbitrary detention, threats and judicial harassment to target artists and individuals perceived as critical of the government. Freemuse calls on the Cuban authorities to immediately and unconditionally release Otero Alcántara; ensure he receives urgent independent medical care and guarantee his safety and physical integrity. It also urges the authorities to end all threats, harassment and reprisals against him, and calls on international and regional human rights mechanisms to closely monitor his situation and take urgent protective action. By Diana Arévalo, Freemuse’s Latin America regional researcher.
Músicos cubanos en prisión: un llamado a la visibilidad y la solidaridad
Diana Arévalo* Con al menos 17 artistas cubanos encarcelados, la visibilidad internacional sostenida y la solidaridad resultan esenciales para evitar que el silenciamiento de artistas termine por normalizarse. Hoy es necesario insistir en un hecho simple: hay músicos cubanos que permanecen en prisión. Y con el paso de los meses, aumenta el riesgo de que su encarcelamiento deje de provocar indignación y empiece a asumirse como parte de la normalidad. La profundización de la crisis social y económica en Cuba ha deteriorado las condiciones de vida en toda la isla. La escasez de combustible, las fallas en los servicios de salud y agua, y los prolongados cortes de electricidad afectan el acceso a alimentos, medicamentos y agua potable. La Oficina del Alto Comisionado de las Naciones Unidas para los Derechos Humanos ha advertido que estas condiciones impactan gravemente el disfrute de derechos fundamentales, incluido el derecho a la vida y el acceso a servicios esenciales. En paralelo, Amnistía Internacional ha documentado que miles de personas salieron a las calles en las mayores protestas antigubernamentales registradas en décadas. Desde las manifestaciones nacionales de julio de 2021, miles de ciudadanos protestaron contra el autoritarismo gubernamental, las restricciones a las libertades civiles, las estrictas medidas adoptadas durante la pandemia y la falta de reformas económicas y políticas prometidas. Las autoridades cubanas respondieron con detenciones masivas y procesos penales contra manifestantes, artistas y voces críticas, utilizando figuras amplias como sedición y desorden público. Muchos han recibido condenas desproporcionadas en procedimientos que generan serias dudas sobre el respeto a las garantías del debido proceso. Según el Observatorio Cubano de Derechos Culturales, al cierre de 2025 al menos 17 artistas seguían privados de libertad como consecuencia de su práctica artística o de su participación en la vida cívica Maykel Castillo Pérez, rapero conocido como Maykel Osorbo, fue detenido en mayo de 2021 y condenado el 24 de junio de 2022 a nueve años de prisión por el Tribunal Municipal de Centro Habana. Fue declarado culpable de desacato, difamación de instituciones y organizaciones, de “héroes” y “mártires”, atentado y desorden público. Su proceso judicial se produjo en el contexto de su actividad artística y su posicionamiento público, incluida su participación en la canción Patria y Vida, que se volvió viral y se asoció con las protestas de julio de 2021. El 3 de diciembre de 2025, la Comisión Interamericana de Derechos Humanos emitió el Informe No. 251/25 (Caso 14.264), en el que concluyó que el Estado cubano recurrió al derecho penal para sancionar su expresión artística y su participación en protestas. La Comisión determinó violaciones a la libertad de expresión, la libertad personal y las garantías judiciales, y llamó a cesar el hostigamiento en su contra. Castillo Pérez permanece en prisión. Fernando Almenares Rivera, rapero y artista visual conocido como Nando OBDC, fue detenido el 31 de diciembre de 2024 en La Habana tras un allanamiento policial en su vivienda. Durante el registro, los agentes fotografiaron sus obras y confiscaron objetos personales. Inicialmente se informó a su familia que estaba siendo investigado por presuntos vínculos con actividades terroristas, aludiendo a supuestos contactos con personas en el extranjero. En Cuba, con frecuencia se señala a la diáspora, a organizaciones de derechos humanos y a medios internacionales como promotores de “terrorismo”. Semanas después, la acusación fue reformulada como “propaganda contra el orden constitucional”, por acciones que incluían colocar pancartas en espacios públicos exigiendo respeto a los derechos humanos y difundir mensajes críticos de políticas gubernamentale. Durante los primeros días de detención habría permanecido incomunicado y sin acceso a su familia. En enero de 2026, las autoridades confirmaron que fue condenado a cinco años de prisión por propaganda contra el orden constitucional relacionada con la difusión de mensajes en defensa de los derechos humanos. Como coordinador del proyecto independiente Arte Prohibido, había impulsado iniciativas en favor de la libertad artística. Su condena evidencia cómo la protesta simbólica y el activismo cultural pueden terminar siendo objeto de persecución penal. Wilmer Moreno Suárez, cantante y compositor conocido como Mister Will D’Cuba, fue detenido en julio de 2021 tras las protestas en La Güinera, La Habana. Posteriormente fue condenado a 18 años de prisión por “sedición”, una de las penas más severas impuestas a manifestantes vinculados a las protestas del 11 de julio. Su perfil artístico y presuntos contactos en el exterior habrían sido utilizados como elementos incriminatorios en su contra. Moreno ha impugnado su condena y ha denunciado condiciones especialmente duras de detención en la prisión Combinado del Este. A pesar de ello, continúa componiendo música. Muchos de los artistas procesados en casos relacionados con las protestas provienen de barrios populares y comunidades afrodescendientes. Su música recoge experiencias vividas desde los márgenes sociales de Cuba. El perfil social y racial de quienes han sido condenados plantea preocupaciones sobre una aplicación desproporcionada de la ley y sobre la criminalización de voces urbanas críticas. Diversas organizaciones e iniciativas independientes de la sociedad civil continúan documentando estos casos. El Observatorio Cubano de Derechos Culturales registra las vulneraciones en curso, mientras que la Mesa de la Juventud Cubana impulsa la campaña Exprésate, orientada a promover la visibilidad sostenida y la solidaridad. En el Music Freedom Day, el paso del tiempo no puede profundizar el silencio. La visibilidad interrumpe la normalización de la represión y la solidaridad rompe el aislamiento al que suelen ser sometidos quienes crean y disienten. Hoy conviene recordar un hecho simple: hay músicos cubanos en prisión. La urgencia radica en no permitir que esa realidad se vuelva cotidiana. Links de algunos temas de los artistas: *Diana Arévalo es investigadora regional para América Latina de Freemuse e investigadora y productora multimedia de Bulla, el radar de libertad artística de la Fundación Cartel Urbano. https://cartelurbano.com/bulla/musicos-cubanos-en-prision-un-llamado-la-visibilidad-y-la-solidaridad
The Trap Has New Rooms: Art, Freedom and Resistance in Georgia
By Musa Igrek In Tbilisi, exhibitions are closing. The organisations that funded them are shutting down. Artists are leaving. The dismantling of Georgia’s cultural life has come gradually, and it is not finished. Lali Pertenava watches it from the inside. A curator, researcher, founder of the Public Art Platform and board member of the International Association of Art Critics (AICA) Georgia, she spoke to Freemuse about what remains. Her work rests on the idea that art and civic life are inseparable. The word she reaches for, before any other, is “trapped”. She says it the way people say words they have been living with for a long time. The trap, as she describes it, has a specific architecture. Since 2023, Georgian Dream – the ruling party founded by the oligarch Bidzina Ivanishvili, a French citizen who is widely understood to retain control over the Georgian state – has passed a succession of laws that have made independent civic and cultural life functionally impossible. A report submitted to the United Nations in December 2025 by Freemuse and AICA put Georgia’s artistic freedom crisis on the international record. The laws that produced the crisis are worth naming. The “foreign agents law” has become the signature instrument of governments seeking to supress civil society while maintaining the appearance of legality. Georgia’s version, the Law on Transparency of Foreign Influence arrived in 2024 with the same intent. Known locally as the ‘Russian law’, it requires any organisation receiving more than twenty percent of its funding from abroad to register as pursuing the interests of a foreign power. A separate Foreign Agents Registration Act followed in 2025, adding criminal penalties of up to five years. There is also the Grants Law, amended repeatedly, which requires government approval before any foreign donor can issue a grant to a Georgian recipient. Non-compliance carries up to five years in prison. Human Rights Watch has called this a mechanism to curtail peaceful protests, independent media, and free speech. Since we spoke with Pertenava, the trap has acquired new rooms. On 4 March 2026, the Grants Law was extended further – receiving unauthorised funding now carries up to six years in prison. New amendments extended criminal liability to anyone receiving foreign support for broadly defined political purposes. A new article in the criminal code went further still: “extremism against the constitutional order”, carrying up to three years for those who decline to recognise Georgian Dream as a legitimate authority. “As members of Georgia’s civil society”, Pertenava says, “we are punished and criminalised without cause”. “Artists are only permitted to participate in pro-government activities or produce lovely, non-critical works.” The consequences for the arts have been particularly acute, because the arts in Georgia had never been insulated against shock. Contemporary Georgian art developed not through state patronage but through a patchwork of international support: foreign agencies, diplomatic missions, local Civil Society Organisations (CSOs), the occasional residency programme. Artists were not eligible for social protection or professional tax advantages. Most relied on local CSOs or international funding, two streams that the new legislation have been, in Pertenava’s phrase, “eliminated”. The majority of independent organisations have shut down or suspended operations. Georgia’s independent cultural ecosystem, Pertenava says, has been largely extinguished. There is an irony that Pertenava notes. In a country where the independent contemporary art world has been effectively legislated out of existence, the most popular, and state supported museum in the country is dedicated to Stalin, who was born in Georgia. The museum has been drawing visitors since 1957, more reliably, it turns out, than anything built since. But the ironies of the situation are not her primary concern. What weighs on her more are: the people who have left, and the conditions facing those who have stayed. Most LGBTI+ artists, she says, have left the country, driven out by a combination of a new family values law that makes it problematic to publicly acknowledge their existence and a rate of community violence that makes life itself precarious. Actors, poets, and other artists have been prosecuted, or given criminal records, for expressing opinions at protests. The Georgian Orthodox Church, as Pertenava describes, has long been an instrument of cultural pressure – closing exhibitions and its affiliated groups disrupting events. Georgian Dream inherited that hostility and gave it the force of law. Those patterns continue. For artists who remain, the options have been reduced to a stark binary. “In reality”, Pertenava says, “artists are only permitted to participate in pro-government activities or produce lovely, non-critical works”. State-funded theatres require government approval for their productions. Street groups affiliated with Georgian Dream disrupt or destroy individual artistic actions, an informal enforcement mechanism that operates alongside, and reinforces, the formal legal one. The atmosphere, she says, is one of pervasive intimidation. On 29 January, artists and activists in Tbilisi watched Georgia’s Universal Periodic Review before the UN Human Rights Council, witnessing the government’s delegation repeat “obvious lies”. Sketch: Ana Riaboshenko. And yet, what continues, in the middle of all this, is music. Every Saturday, professors from the Tbilisi State Conservatory and professional musicians stage protest marches, playing drums and traditional Georgian instruments as they go. The music, Pertenava says, has become something new in the process. The experimental percussion of protest finding its way into the practice of classically trained musicians, producing what she calls a “potent symbiosis” between performance and the sounds of the street. One of the participating musicians told her that the experience had liberated her from the constraints of academic music, that her sense of what performance could be had expanded. Necessity, as it tends to do, has proven generative. Anonymous acts of defiance appear and then vanish. Enormous banners bearing lines of poetry, “The people’s river will never end, flowing from the heart of homeland”, are hung in public places by cultural workers and artists, then quietly taken down. Civil society workers and artists have drawn together, Pertenava observes, in ways they had not before, speaking what she describes as the same language, finding that their concerns and their methods have converged.