Tag Archives: Gezi Park

English Pen: Turkey: end human rights violations against writers and journalists

Restrictions on freedom of expression during and following the Gezi Park protests The Turkish authorities severely restricted the right to freedom of expression of journalists and writers during and after the Gezi Park protests in 2013, English PEN and PEN International said in a new joint report published today. Journalists, protesters and social media users are still facing prosecution in [...] → Read the full article…

Roar Magazine: Culmination of Resistance Against Urban Neoliberalism – Burak Köse

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Emerging from a long history of resistance to the AKP’s spatial politics, Gezi made it possible to imagine a more egalitarian and democratic way of life. On December 17, 2013, Turkey woke up to another morning of dawn operations involving raids, home and office searches, and arrests that have become a routine in the legal and political landscape of the [...] → Read the full article…

Forbes: Corruption at the top in Turkey, How Construction is Involved

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It’s worth remembering that Erdogan’s mystique first showed cracks over his virulent reaction to the Gezi Park protests. That too was about huge building projects. There’s something about construction that seems to matter a lot to Erdogan’s grip on power. The fact is, no other industry does the same job that banks do of dispersing money throughout the economy, while [...] → Read the full article…

After GEZI PARK and GULSUYU the struggle continues at METU: Let’s protect our urban habitat against violation and abuse!

Our living spaces are perpetually threatened by all institutions of the governing political logic. Not long ago, this logic had shown its dark and revanchist face through the clouds of tear gas during Gezi and it’s now re-surfacing on bumpers of bulldozers destroying the Middle East Technical University (METU) campus, one of the few remaining green spaces of Ankara. What [...] → Read the full article…

Notes To The Future – Patti Smith


Listen my children and you shall hear the sound of your own steps, the sound of your hereafter. Memory awaits and turns to greet you, draping its banner across your wrists. Wake up arms, delicate feet. For as one to march the streets!

Poem: Patti Smith / Translation: İnan Mayıs Aru / Editing: Yağmur Telli Yücel / Graphics: Çağatay Apaydın / Music: Vladimír Godár – Záhrada VII. (Emeleia)

Footage in this film are taken from various recordings shot during Gezi Uprising and shared on the net as “Gezi Video Archives”. Thanks to all resistance cameramen.

13 October 2013

Hurriyet Daily News: New law to permit Turkish police to detain ‘possible’ protesters

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A new regulation will allow Turkish police to detain those who possess the “risk of conducting a protest” from 12 to 24 hours without the demand of a prosecutor or a judge, prompting acute worries from opposition deputies. The new regulations that will be conducted jointly by the justice and interior ministries will allow the police to detain a suspect [...] → Read the full article…

BirGün: My neighborhood razed to the ground – Ege Dündar

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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…

Al-Monitor: Welcome to Post-Gezi Turkey – Orhan Kemal Cengiz

Riot police use water cannon to disperse demonstrators during a protest in central Istanbul

The protests that erupted in Istanbul’s Gezi Park in late May and then spread across the country marked a watershed in Turkish politics. The protests aimed to stop the cutting of trees at Gezi Park, but quickly grew into mass demonstrations against the government of the Justice and Development Party (AKP) and most particularly against Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan. [...] → Read the full article…

Hurriyet Daily News: Turkish police used excessive force in Gezi protests, Interior Ministry’s report says

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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…

Firat News: Gezi Park closed to people on World Peace Day

Taksim’s Gezi Park was closed by police on Sunday to prevent people from gathering in the area to mark the World Peace Day. The closure which came after the police mobilization in the area as of early morning has reportedly been ruled following the calls made on social media to form a human chain at the park and many other [...] → Read the full article…