Turkish police crack down on fresh revival of protests
17 Jun 2013 5:51 AM IST
Turkish riot police fired tear gas and water cannons on Sunday at demonstrators trying to return to Istanbul’s main square, maintaining a hard line against rekindled protests as the prime minister’s supporters prepared to rally across town.
Police in uniform and plainclothes sealed off Taksim Square and adjacent Gezi Park, which riot police cleared on Saturday evening. Crews worked through the night to remove all traces of a sit-in that started more than two weeks ago and became the focus of the strongest challenge to Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan in his 10 years in office.
Istanbul’s governor, Huseyin Avni Mutlu, said the square was off-limits to the public for the time being, and nobody would be allowed to gather. A spokesman for the protesters vowed the group would retake Gezi Park.
‘We will win Taksim Square again and we will win Taksim Gezi Park again,’ Alican Elagoz said.
A call went out for another demonstration in Taksim Square for Sunday afternoon, but the area was within a tight police cordon, with passers-by subjected to identity checks and bag searches.
Thousands of protesters trying to reach the area were stuck on side streets in a blanket of tear gas. Erdogan, who has repeatedly insisted that the protests were part of a nebulous plot by bankers and foreign media to destabiliSe Turkey, was to deliver a speech at a political rally in an area of Istanbul about 10 kilometers (6 miles) from the square.
A similar speech in Ankara on Saturday before the raid was attended by tens of thousands of supporters, who cheered him as he warned protesters that security forces ‘know how to clear’ the area.
The protests began as an environmental sit-in to prevent a development project at Gezi Park, but anger over a violent crackdown there quickly spread to dozens of cities and spiraled into a broader expression of discontent with what many say is Erdogan’s increasingly authoritarian decision-making.
Police in uniform and plainclothes sealed off Taksim Square and adjacent Gezi Park, which riot police cleared on Saturday evening. Crews worked through the night to remove all traces of a sit-in that started more than two weeks ago and became the focus of the strongest challenge to Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan in his 10 years in office.
Istanbul’s governor, Huseyin Avni Mutlu, said the square was off-limits to the public for the time being, and nobody would be allowed to gather. A spokesman for the protesters vowed the group would retake Gezi Park.
‘We will win Taksim Square again and we will win Taksim Gezi Park again,’ Alican Elagoz said.
A call went out for another demonstration in Taksim Square for Sunday afternoon, but the area was within a tight police cordon, with passers-by subjected to identity checks and bag searches.
Thousands of protesters trying to reach the area were stuck on side streets in a blanket of tear gas. Erdogan, who has repeatedly insisted that the protests were part of a nebulous plot by bankers and foreign media to destabiliSe Turkey, was to deliver a speech at a political rally in an area of Istanbul about 10 kilometers (6 miles) from the square.
A similar speech in Ankara on Saturday before the raid was attended by tens of thousands of supporters, who cheered him as he warned protesters that security forces ‘know how to clear’ the area.
The protests began as an environmental sit-in to prevent a development project at Gezi Park, but anger over a violent crackdown there quickly spread to dozens of cities and spiraled into a broader expression of discontent with what many say is Erdogan’s increasingly authoritarian decision-making.
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