Turkish police disperse anti-government protesters with water cannons near the entrance of Taksim Square in Istanbul, yesterday.
ISTANBUL: Turkish police fired water cannon yesterday to disperse hundreds of protesters who gathered to march to Gezi Park in central Istanbul, which has been at the heart of fierce demonstrations against Prime Minister Erdogan’s rule.
Yesterday’s protests were triggered when police blocked access to the park where a couple, who met during last month’s anti-government rallies, were planning to get married and had posted an invitation for guests to attend online. Groups of riot police chased protesters down side streets leading away from Taksim square where Gezi park is located.
The police intervention was the first in a week in Istanbul after protesters marched on Taksim last weekend, angered by a government-sponsored bill which stripped an architects’ and engineers’ association involved in the protests, the TMMOB, of its final approval authority on urban planning projects.
What had started as a small protest against the planned redevelopment of Gezi Park triggered a nationwide wave of protest last month against Erdogan, accused by his critics of becoming increasingly authoritarian.
Nuray and Ozgur fell in love behind the barricades of last month’s mass anti-government protests in Istanbul, and their wedding ceremony would have been incomplete without the Turkish police. So when the couple picked the epicentre of the revolt on Taksim Square as the venue to tie the knot yesterday, the anti-riot police obliged and provided the water cannon.
Baton-wielding police broke up a crowd of around a thousand fellow activists who had turned up for the wedding of Nuray Cokol, a 32-year-old nurse, and Ozgur Kaya, a 34-year-old electrician, in Gezi Park.
The wedding guests, veterans of the protests that started on May 31 and rattled Turkey’s government, had turned up to celebrate what the Turkish press has called “the love story of the uprising”.
“Long live the resistance, long live love,” shouted the protesters-cum-wedding guests before police backed by water cannon dispersed them. Five people died during the three weeks of protests that saw an estimated 2.5 million people take to the streets in 80 different cities to demand Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s resignation.Agencies
