Barış Atay Mengüllüoğlu (born 22 September 1981) is a Turkish actor and a politician of the Workers' Party of Turkey (TİP).

Early life and education

He is interested in Theater play since he was ten years old and acted in multiple shows during his early life. He attended primary and secondary school in

Antakya Antakya (), Turkish form of Antioch, is a municipality and the capital Districts of Turkey, district of Hatay Province, Turkey. Its area is . Prior to the devastating 2023 Turkey–Syria earthquakes, 2023 earthquakes, its population was recorded ...

and studied Theater at the

Yeditepe University Yeditepe University () is a private non-profit university situated in Istanbul, Turkey. Established by the Istanbul Education and Culture Foundation ('', İSTEK Vakfı'') in 1996, Yeditepe University now claims to be the largest of the 74 priva ...

Istanbul Istanbul is the List of largest cities and towns in Turkey, largest city in Turkey, constituting the country's economic, cultural, and historical heart. With Demographics of Istanbul, a population over , it is home to 18% of the Demographics ...

, from where he graduated in 2009.

Professional career

He played in several Turkish TV series and movies and together with friends he established the Emek Sahnesi Theater in 2011. He is an outspoken critic of

Recep Tayyip Erdoğan Recep Tayyip Erdoğan (born 26 February 1954) is a Turkish politician who is the 12th and current president of Turkey since 2014. He previously served as the 25th prime minister of Turkey, prime minister from 2003 to 2014 as part of the Jus ...

's policies and the application of the rule of law in Turkey. He acted in the theater play "Only a Dictator" (), which was widely viewed as a parody of Erdoğan. The play was subsequently prohibited to be performed in the Kadiköy district where the Emek Sahnesi Theater is located. As a reaction to this ban, he published the piece in the internet and the play was then shown in the

Maxim Gorki Theater The Maxim Gorki Theatre () is a theatre in Berlin-Mitte named after the Soviet writer Maxim Gorky. In 2012, the Mayor of Berlin Klaus Wowereit named Şermin Langhoff as the artist director of the theatre. History It is the oldest concert hall bui ...

Berlin Berlin ( ; ) is the Capital of Germany, capital and largest city of Germany, by both area and List of cities in Germany by population, population. With 3.7 million inhabitants, it has the List of cities in the European Union by population withi ...

Political career

He was a strong supporter of the

Gezi Park protests A wave of demonstrations and civil unrest in Turkey began on 28 May 2013, initially to contest the urban development plan for Istanbul's Gezi Park. The protests were sparked by outrage at the violent eviction of a sit-in at the park protesting ...

and as such was criticized by

Melih Gökçek İbrahim Melih Gökçek (; born 20 October 1948) is a Turkish politician who served as the mayor of Ankara from 1994 to 2017. From 1991 to 1994, he was an MP. Gökçek has won municipal elections in 1994, 1999, 2004, 2009, and was controversial ...

from the governing party, the

Justice and Development Party Justice and Development Party may refer to several political parties, the best-known ones being: * Justice and Development Party (Morocco) * Justice and Development Party (Turkey) Justice and Development Party may also refer to: * Justice and Dev ...

(AKP. In November 2013, he was briefly detained due to suspected links to RedHack, a Turkish hacker group supportive of the Gezi Park protests, but released after a week. In May 2018, he was announced as a candidate of the Peoples Democratic Party (HDP) for the parliamentary elections in 2018 in which he was elected as a representative of the

Hatay province Hatay Province (, ) is the southernmost province and metropolitan municipality of Turkey. Its area is , and its population is 1,686,043 (2022). It is situated mostly outside Anatolia, along the eastern coast of the Levantine Sea. The province ...

. In 2018, he and Erkan Baş announced their resignation from the HDP and together joined the Workers' Party of Turkey (TİP), becoming their only representatives in the Parliament.

Controversies

In June 2020, he claimed a car of the TIP he was using was sabotaged by his political opponents in order to cause an accident. After he demanded clarification in a case in which a sergeant was accused of the rape of the

Kurdish Kurdish may refer to: *Kurds or Kurdish people *Kurdish language ** Northern Kurdish (Kurmanji) **Central Kurdish (Sorani) **Southern Kurdish ** Laki Kurdish *Kurdish alphabets *Kurdistan, the land of the Kurdish people which includes: **Southern ...

18 year old student İpek Er, but released from custody, he drew harsh criticism on him by the Turkish Minister of the Interior

Süleyman Soylu Süleyman Soylu (; born 21 November 1969) is a Turkish politician. He is a deputy chairman of the Justice and Development Party. He previously served as the Minister of Labour and Social Security from November 2015 to August 2016 and the Minis ...

, who blamed him of being a sympathizer of the

Kurdistan Workers' Party The Kurdistan Workers' Party, or the PKK, isDespite the PKK's 12th Congress announcing plans for total organisational dissolution, the PKK has not yet been dissolved de facto or de jure. a Kurds, Kurdish militant political organization and armed ...

(PKK) and the People's Liberation Party/Front (DHKP-C) and advised him "don't get caught". The following night, he claimed that he was attacked by five individuals, causing him to stay the night in the hospital. For the assault, he blamed Soylu.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Atay, Barış Turkish male film actors Turkish male television actors Turkish male stage actors Workers' Party of Turkey (2017) politicians Peoples' Democratic Party (Turkey) politicians 1981 births People from Wilhelmshaven Living people Male actors from Lower Saxony