A Turkish journalist is going to prison for insulting Turkey's Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan on Twitter.

The criminal court in Ankara sentenced Önder Aytaç, a well-known writer and columnist for the opposition newspaper Taraf, to a 10-month prison sentence on Monday for "insulting public officials" — in this case, Erdoğan, according to the BBC.

Aytaç, whose Twitter handle is @onderaytac, is a former police official and part of the Gülen movement, a religious group that once had close ties to Erdoğan but now opposes the Prime Minister. Aytaç's sentence is reportedly suspended for one year, but it's unclear if that means he won't end up going to prison or if his sentence is simply delayed.

The tweet that put Aytaç in Turkish government's cross hairs was reportedly posted in 2012. At the time, Erdoğan announced that he would be shutting down private schools that the Gülen movement operates around the world.

Linking to a story on the matter, Aytaç, who has 180,000 followers on Twitter, said: "CLOSE THEM DOWN MY CHIEF :-)" using the word "my chief" (ustam in Turkish), which is how Erdoğan loyalist refer to their leader.

But Aytaç added the letter k at the end of ustam, which is what got him in trouble, according to Zeynep Tufekci, an assistant professor at the University of North Carolina.

http://t.co/zYBEmYiD =>> KAPAT BE USTAAAAAAMMMMMMK :) => yorumkariniz da yazinin altina lutfen — DR. M. ÖNDER AYTAÇ (@onderaytac) September 20, 2012

"Aytaç added a letter, 'k' to the word which transforms the end portion of the word to an off-color abbreviation, in effect writing 'eff off,'" Tufekci explained in a post on Medium.

This is the latest example of Turkey's crackdown on Internet freedom. Last month, Erdoğan blocked Twitter for two weeks, after pledging to "eradicate" the social network, following numerous leaks that allegedly showed widespread corruption within his government.

Just a week after the Twitter ban, Erdoğan blocked YouTube as well, after an alleged recording of a high-level government security meeting was posted online. YouTube remains blocked despite a lower court ruling ordering it to be unblocked.

Aytaç did not respond to our request for comment.