Turkey’s ruling AK Party on Tuesday announced Emre Kaya as its new “TRNC representative”.

Kaya’s appointment was announced alongside the appointment of Erdal Yetimova as the party’s representative in the United Kingdom. He replaces the outgoing “TRNC representative” Fahri Yonluer, who had been in post since 2022.

Little is known about Kaya thus far, except for that he seems to have been involved in the “Cyprus-Palestine Initiative”, the group which organised a pro-Palestine rally in northern Nicosia’s central Sarayonu Square on August 3.

He also appears to be affiliated to the Union of International Democrats (UID), a group based in Germany which encourages the country’s Turkish population to participate in local politics.

Upon his appointment, he said, “in this important task, I will try to be worthy of the honour of serving our party and our noble nation.”

The AK Party was formed in 2001 and have been continually in government in Turkey since 2002, firstly and briefly under Prime Minister Abdullah Gul, and then under Prime Minister turned President Recep Tayyip Erdogan.

They had been the largest party in every nationwide electoral contest until the local elections held in March this year, where opposition party the CHP won the plurality of votes cast and the mayoralties of Turkey’s five largest cities.