How Erdogan’s win makes Turkey a much more dangerous place to be LGBT+

Some believe the only reason Erdogan has not outright called for a ban on homosexuality is that it would prompt outrage in the West, writes Borzou Daragahi

Erdogan’s aim for now is to silence and marginalise LGBT+ individuals (AP)

Fresh off his re-election victory on Sunday evening, president Recep Tayyip Erdogan went through the motions of declaring the vote a win for all Turks who participated. “There will be no losers in such a victory,” he said, standing atop a bus in Istanbul’s Kagithane district.

But clearly there are losers, especially Turkey’s LGBT+ community. They have been systematically targeted by security forces for years, and demonised by the country’s right-wing political leadership in the weeks before the vote. And all signs suggest they will remain a punching bag for Turkey’s right-wing government.

Just minutes after Erdogan’s obligatory pablum on Sunday, his upbeat bus speech took a dark detour. He began accusing the opposition centre-left Republican People’s Party (CHP), the nationalist Iyi party and the Kurdish-led People’s Democratic Party (HDP) of being fronts for a nebulous LGBT+ agenda.