This video is called Turkey – The Protesters of Gezi Park.
It seems that the Turkish Erdogan government gets “inspiration” from its NATO allies, who have repeatedly bombed weddings in Afghanistan and Iraq …
From Hürriyet daily news in Turkey:
Police seal off Istanbul’s Gezi Park ahead of protester couple’s wedding
Saturday, July 20 2013
Riot police have closed access to Gezi Park ahead of a wedding for a couple that met during the first wave of Gezi protests and had planned to symbolically tie the knot at the park, before firing water cannon at the crowd gathered for the event.
As the crowd gathered for the wedding, police cordoned off the entrance, announcing they would not allow the wedding ceremony to take place.
Police then pushed back the crowd onto the İstiklal Avenue entrance of Taksim Square. What was initially planned as a wedding transformed into a demonstration, and police fired water cannon after protestors refused to disperse.
Police chased some of the protesters into the side streets, cutting off some of the pedestrian entrances to the İstiklal Avenue. Some protesters have also been detained, according to reports.
Police reopened the park a couple of hours after the intervention, around 7:45 p.m., according to daily Hürriyet.
Couple head to Gezi after marrying at municipality
The couple, Nuray and Özgür, headed to the park after marrying at the Şişli district’s municipality building.
“Do you accept to live, be happy and resist together until death do you part,” the registrar asked the couple while the guests chanted “Everywhere resistance, everywhere love,” adapting with a pince of humor for the occasion the protest’s most famous motto. An LGBT activist who took the floor made them promise to not get angry with their child if he or she happened to be gay.
Despite sealing off the park more than two [times] at first and firing water cannons to a crowd that gathered to participate at the wedding party, the police agreed to let the group enter the park for a short amount of time to take pictures.
But police officers interrupted the party, forcedly ejecting the newly-weds and restricting the access of the park once again.
Nuray, a trained nurse, and Özgür, a partially trained doctor who abandoned medical school, met in the first days of the unrest when Nuray turned her house into an infirmary to treat injured demonstrators, according to a friend.
The couple had invited all protesters and those that identify themselves as “chapullers” or “çapulcu” to their wedding at the symbolic location.
Turkish police crack down on internal opposition: here.
Related articles
- Turkish police fire water cannon at Istanbul protesters – Reuters (reuters.com)
- Re: Turkish police fire tear gas, water cannon at Gezi Park protesters (wikileaks-forum.com)
- Turkish police fire teargas, water cannon to disperse park protesters… (rt.com)
- Police fire tear gas, water cannon at Gezi Park protesters (translatingtaksim.wordpress.com)
- Affrontements à Istanbul, Ankara, Hatay, Antioche – 12/13 juillet 2013 (berthoalain.com)
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De strijd in Turkije laait weer op (Turkije 1)
Sinds afgelopen vrijdag is de strijd in Turkije tegen de AKP-regering weer in
alle hevigheid losgebarsten. Het verzet laaide op toen de AKP-burgemeester van
Ankara, Melih Gökçek, zijn plan wilde doorvoeren om een weg aan te leggen
dwars door de bossen van de Midden-Oosten Technische Universiteit (ODTU). Lees
verder: http://www.doorbraak.eu/strijd-turkije-laait-weer/
———————–
Turkse politie schiet activist dood in Antakya (Turkije 2)
In Antakya, een grensstad met Syrië, is vannacht tijdens een demonstratie een
activist doodgeschoten door de politie. Het wordt daardoor in andere steden en
wijken nu razendsnel onrustig. Lees verder:
http://www.doorbraak.eu/turkse-politie-schiet-activist-dood-antakya/
——————–
De opstand in Turkije groeit met de dag (Turkije 3)
Een kort verslag over de gebeurtenissen van de afgelopen twee dagen. Op
dinsdag 10 september, precies 33 jaar na de militaire coup, was het verzet in
Turkse steden en wijken heviger dan ooit. In meer dan twintig steden gingen
demonstranten de straat op, onder meer in de drie grootste steden van Turkije:
Ankara, Izmir en Istanboel. Lees verder:
http://www.doorbraak.eu/opstand-turkije-groeit-dag/
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Remembering the 12 September 1980 military coup
On 12 September 1980, a National Security Council which brings together the chief of General Staff, general Kenan Evrem , and chiefs of staff of army and security forces took power by proclaiming a state of siege throughout the country. Politicians, from Ecevit to Demirel, Erbakan, Turkes are arrested, the National Assembly is dissolved and the activities of associations and trade unions are banned. The junta extends to a retired admiral, who becomes Prime Minister, Bulent Ulusu.
In the eight and a half months that followed the massacre of Maras, in late December 1979, the dead were at least 3856. That of September 12, 1980 is the third coup in Turkey in thirty years. The first was that of May 27, 1960, the second that of March 12, 1971. Between 1971 and 1984 violence and repression against the Kurds and against the left reaches its peak. A generation is essentially destroyed.
The junta exercises legislative and executive power (and the judiciary through the military courts) and says it will bring political stability, an end to civil violence, restore Kemalism and impose the discipline necessary for economic reforms. The junta left power in 1983. The legacy is heavy: some fifty militants (mostly leftwing people) are sentenced to death, more than 400 leftist activists were killed, tortured to death or disappeared. More than 600 thousand people have been taken into custody, 85 thousand incarcerated for long periods. Thousands of trade unionists and intellectuals imprisoned, many academics dismissed. In contrast, the National Security Council authorizes far-right militants like Abdullah Catli (wanted for murder including that of seven students in Ankara) to go to Europe to “fight against the Armenians.”
The military act galvanized by what they perceived as the nearing disintegration of some vital values imposed by Ataturk: national unity, ‘Turkishness’, populism and secularism. Values under attack, according to the military, either the left or right, by Kurds, marxists and the Islamists. The military act with a sense of great urgency in the period in which they hold the power to rebuild the governing authority. An attitude that make some commentators using the term ‘velvet coup’ to define the golpe. Nothing is far from the truth though: in 1983, when returning power to civilian rule, the military has officially 592 deaths on its conscience. Furthermore 60 thousand people are arrested within three years of military rule (according to figures by the generals themselves). Of these 54% are left-wing activists, 14% right-wing militants and 7% of Kurds. These data contrast sharply with those provided by the International League for Human Rights which claims that between September 1980 and September 1982, the Kurds detained have been at least 81 thousands.
The generals create an ultra-nationalist and conservative regime close to the far right and declare that any ideological choice other than Sunni Islam is considered a “perversion” and needs to be treated with psychiatric treatment (with doctors from the school of Lombroso). The use of Kurdish language is banned, on the mountains of Kurdistan appear writings like “happy is he who can say I am Turk”, in prison is mandatory reading the “Discourse” by Mustafa Kemal. A draft Constitution is written according to which general Kenan Evren is appointed president of the Republic and exempts generals from any criminal liability. The Constitution eliminates almost all the freedoms that had survived the previous coup in 1971. The new constitutional chart is based on control. It strengthens the powers of the president, giving him the right to dissolve the Assembly and enact laws by decree. It reduces the parliament to a single chamber and reduces the role of political parties.
But perhaps the heaviest article is Article 14 which limits the freedom of individuals and organizations, and prohibits the political struggle based on class, language, race.
A referendum is called to approve the new Constitution. The “yes” ‘won’ with 92% of the votes. But to vote “no” had been declared an act of treason against the motherland.
These are the figures (possibly they are higher) of the military coup:
650,000 arrests
1 million 683 thousand people investigated
7,000 death penalty demands
517 death penalty executed
50 hanging
98,400 people sentenced for membership of an illegal organization
388,000 people had their passport withdrawn
30,000 people were forced to go into exile
171 people died as a result of torture
937 films were censored
14,000 people were stripped off their citizenship
299 people died in prison
400 journalists were sentenced to a total of four thousand years in prison
Source: ANF – NEWS DESK 12.09.2013
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Regenboogtrappen in Turkije: verfraaiing of nieuwe protestgolf?
door: Just Fontein
Hij deed het om een glimlach op het gezicht te toveren van zijn buurtbewoners, maar de 64-jarige Huseyin Cetinel, die vorige week een trap in zijn buurt in regenboogkleuren schilderde, werd binnen de kortste keren op het schild gehesen als voorvechter van gelijke rechten voor homo’s en lesbiennes. Nu verschijnen van Istanbul tot Van in het uiterste oosten van Turkije vrolijk gekleurde trappen in het straatbeeld.
Met veertig kilo verf en de helpende hand van zijn schoonzoon ging de gepensioneerde Cetinel aan de slag met de trap die de Istanbulse kunstenaarswijk Cihangir met de wijk Findikli verbindt en op loopafstand ligt van het Taksimplein. Vier dagen later, op 26 augustus, zat het werk erop. 142 traptredes netjes beschilderd in regenboogkleuren. Verfkosten: zo’n 600 euro.
Binnen een paar dagen groeit de trap uit tot een heuse attractie in de buurt. Honderden mensen posten foto’s met de Findikli-trap op Facebook en Twitter, van huwelijksfoto’s tot professionele fotoshoots. De Istanbulse variant van de Escadaria Selarón, de beroemde trap van Jorge Selarón in Rio de Janeiro.
De trap blijft ook niet onopgemerkt bij de Turkse gaycommunity, die de actie van Cetinel ziet als een solidariteitsverklaring. De actievoerders die een paar maanden geleden in het Gezipark en op het Taksimplein protesteerden tegen de Turkse premier Erdogan adopteren de trap als symbool van hun protestbeweging.
Op de nacht van 29 op 30 september wordt de trap haastig overgeschilderd in de oude kleur grijs, tot grote ontsteltenis van de buurtbewoners. Het bestuur van de deelgemeente, in handen van de regerende AK-partij, geeft uiteindelijk toe de trappen grijs te hebben geschilderd.
Zie filmpje hieronder met
Volkskrant 04-09-2013
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Turkije bezaaid met regenboogtrappen
Van het westelijke Edirne tot Van in het uiterste oosten van Turkije schilderen Turken momenteel trappen in felle kleuren. De ‘regenboogtrappen’ zijn veranderd van een project ter ‘verfraaiing’ van het straatbeeld in een actie van verzet tegen de grijsheid en uniformiteit van de staat.
De eerste gekleurde trap – 142 treden – verscheen eind augustus in Istanbul. Verantwoordelijk waren een gepensioneerde man en zijn schoonzoon, die de buurt wilden verfraaien. Tot vreugde van de buurtbewoners, maar tot afgrijzen van het bestuur van de deelgemeente, in handen van de regerende AKP: die verfde de trappen meteen weer grijs. Om ze daarna snel weer in de regenboogkleuren te kwasten, voordat de buurt het heft zelf in handen zou nemen.
Verband met protesten
De reactie van de lokale AKP bracht een enorm regenboogenthousiasme op gang: op verschillende plekken in Istanbul, in Ankara, Izmir en Edirne maar ook het zuidoostelijke Diyarbakir en het oostelijke Van gingen burgers met potten verf naar openbare trappen. Lokale autoriteiten grepen niet in: in maart zijn er lokale verkiezingen en de gunst van de kiezer is veel waard.
Veel mensen brengen de regenboogtrappen in verband met de protesten in Istanbul aan het begin van de zomer, rondom Gezipark. De eerste regenboogtrap is op loopafstand van het park. De trappen kunnen ook het begin zijn van grotere protesten tegen ‘meer grijs’ later deze maand, als de scholen en universiteiten weer beginnen. In Ankara moeten bijvoorbeeld bij een universiteit bomen worden gekapt om plaats te maken voor een grote grijze snelweg. De eerste protesten daartegen zijn al gesignaleerd.
Volkskrant 04-09-2013
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