BERLIN, Aug. 20 (Xinhua) -- The German Foreign Ministry urged Spain not to extradite the Turkey-critical novelist Doghan Akhanli to Ankara, Deutsche Presse Agentur reported on Sunday.
Akhanli, 60, was born in Turkey but emigrated to Germany in 1991 after spending years in a Turkish prison for political reasons. He was arrested Saturday morning while on his holiday in Spain's southern city Granada, at the request of the Turkish government.
He has written extensively about the Armenian genocide and is often critical of Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan's government.
German Foreign Minister Sigmar Gabriel requested the quickest possible consular support and also phoned his Turkish counterpart late Saturday on the detention, it reported.
Akhanli's lawyer said it is still unclear what Akhanli is charged for, while the German writers association said the arrest was "clearly political motivated."
The incident further fueled the already-tense ties between Berlin and Ankara, as a series of disputes surfaced since the July 2016 coup aimed to oust Erdogan.
Turkey has been pressuring Germany, where around 1.6 million Turks resided, to extradite the dissidents, especially the military officers. However, Berlin questioned Ankara's overseas hunt-down, seeing it as a violation of human rights.
On Friday, Erdogan called on Turks in Germany not to vote the mainstream parties in September's parliamentary elections as they are "enemies of Turkey."
