Five people have been killed and thousands injured as Turkey is gripped by its biggest wave of anti-government protests in years. Ankara has been criticized for its crackdown on the protests, which it has attempted to downplay in the media. 15:20 GMT: Approximately 2.5 million people have taken to the streets across Turkey since May 31, when a harsh police crackdown [...] → Read the full article…
A large proportion of the educated youth all across Turkey are currently leading a vast movement against the government’s repressive and reactionary practices. This is a very important moment in what I have called “the rebirth of History.” In many countries around the world, middle school, high school, and university youth, supported by a part of the intellectuals and the middle class, are [...] → Read the full article…
The protests in Turkey are, quite simply, an assertion of humanity in the face of inhumanity. My first experience with tear gas took place last Tuesday in a rundown bar off of Istanbul’s İstiklal Street where my friend and I had come after visiting Gezi Park. The Turkish prime minister’s hallucinatory depiction of the composition of the anti-government protests had [...] → Read the full article…
GENEVA (18 June 2013) – UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Navi Pillay on Tuesday welcomed last week’s decision by the Turkish Government to put on hold further action on the Gezi Park development in Istanbul until there is a court decision, and then to submit the issue to a local referendum. She urged Turkey’s government and civil society to [...] → Read the full article…
ISTANBUL – Everyone who enters Istanbul’s Taksim Square, the heart of nearly 20-day-long protests against the government, will be considered a member or a supporter of a terrorist organization, Turkey’s European Union minister said in a televised interview late last night. “I request our citizens who supported the protests until today kindly to return to their homes,” Egemen Bağış said [...] → Read the full article…
As academics concerned with the recent developments in Turkey, we stand in solidarity with the people peacefully protesting to protect Gezi Park in Taksim, and we condemn the excessive police brutality that was inflicted on them. What started on Monday, May 27, as a movement to peacefully protest the demolition of a public park and its replacement with a shopping [...] → Read the full article…
ISTANBUL – Hürriyet Daily News Dozens of lawyers were detained for several hours by police at Istanbul’s Çağlayan Courthouse today for joining the Taksim Gezi protests, which have been raging across the country for 15 days now. A Special Forces Unit intervened in a protest being held inside the Çağlayan Courthouse, leading to a number of lawyers falling to the [...] → Read the full article…
ISTANBUL: Turkish stocks fell and the lira weakened Monday after Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan railed against speculators and held a tough line on protests, and as Moody’s warned that prolonged unrest could have a negative effect on credit. The cost of insuring Turkish debt against default rose to the highest since the end of October 2012, according to data from Markit, [...] → Read the full article…
Famous actor Memet Ali Alabora has said he is being threatened by unknown people over his support for the Gezi Park protests, after a Turkish daily showed him as one of the leading figures of “a plan to topple the Turkish Government.” Daily Yeni Şafak claimed on June 10 that a theatre play called “Mi Minor,” allegedly supported by an [...] → Read the full article…
Duran Akbas, who was seriously wounded when shot by the police yesterday, is still in the intensive care unit after surgery. He has not yet woken up and is in a critical condition. It is said that his survival is nearly a miracle. We have not lost hope, just as we have not lost hope since Mayday for Dilan, Meral [...] → Read the full article…