I was born and raised in Ankara. But when I think of Ankara the first thing that comes to my mind is not Kuğulu Park, nor Bestekar Street or Kızılay and Atakule… It is our garden with the ivy covered fences. “To write is easy, you sit before the typewriter and bleed,” says Ernest Hemingway to another writer, Martha Gellhorne, [...] → Read the full article…
ANKARA Police exercised “excessive force” in trying to quell the Gezi Park protests in Istanbul and İzmir, according to a recent report prepared by Interior Ministry inspectors. The report demanded permission to open preliminary an investigation into some cases of the excessive use of force in Istanbul. It also demanded permission to probe plainclothes police officers who were seen carrying [...] → Read the full article…
Okan Göçer sustained head injuries due to a tear gas canister on June 1st on Istiklal Street where he had gone to participate in the Gezi protests. He was in a coma for twenty one days. The left side of his head collapsed as a result of his broken skull. We met with him at Okmeydanı Hospital. He wore a [...] → Read the full article…
A court arrested four suspects (including a policeman) for the willful murder of Ali Ismail Korkmaz, a Gezi Park protestors who died in the results of massive beating in Eskişehir province. By Beyza KURAL – Istanbul – BIA News Desk beyza@bianet.org A court arrested four suspects (including a policeman) who stood trial for the willful murder of Ali Ismail Korkmaz [...] → Read the full article…
Fethullah, 14, who fled domestic violence and took refuge in the Gezi Park encountered state violence this time. The police first fined him, then beat him, and finally shot him in the eye with a rubber bullet. “I saw the Gezi, it was beautiful” The Taksim Gezi Park, the symbol of the Gezi movement, hosted those whose “stories” were not [...] → Read the full article…
During the Gezi resistance Mehmet Istif (36) was sprayed into his face with pepper gas causing severe injuries to the inside of his mouth. These injuries have been treated for the past month. Istif, who has lost one fourth of his tongue and has difficulties in speaking, said, “I will apply to the judiciary for the identification of the chemical [...] → Read the full article…
“The resistance of revolutionaries and people will teach AKP a painful lesson” says Beycan Taşkıran, ESP Istanbul Provincial Executive, who had a rib fractured during the police attack which started on June 15th against the Gezi Park protests and who had been put in an airless jail cell for 4 days right after being detained. Beycan Taşkıran is a socialist [...] → Read the full article…
It was towards midnight when my students, once again, came to rescue me in the moment of devastation under the influence of gas; they found me sitting on the ground at the corner of a side-street… I had run out of Talcid solution and water. I was enormously excited when Bianet’s editorial director, Haluk Kalafat, first talked about the idea [...] → Read the full article…
ISTANBUL - Police fired water cannons and tear gas at a group of demonstrators who gathered in Taksim Square to protest the violence used against a 14-year-old teenager who has been in intensive care for 46 days after being hit by a tear gas canister in Istanbul during the Gezi Park unrest. Berkin Elvan was not a protester but a by-stander [...] → Read the full article…
A young woman, who rode a bike, photographed the events helped people the during Gezi protests in Ankara on 2 June, has been beaten up by the police while eating at a cafe. She was harshly abused by the police for half an hour because she had a cycle helmet that was taken as evidence of ‘being a demonstrator’. She [...] → Read the full article…