Report
2 million in the streets of Istanbul, one of the largest protests in Turkish history
“Starting today, every weekend we will be in a different square in Istanbul to demand the return of our mayor and early elections.” The political crusade against Imamoglu and his administration has also extended to 14 other individuals and 12 companies.
On Saturday, Istanbul saw one of the largest demonstrations in the history of the Republic of Turkey. According to Turkey's main opposition force, the Republican People's Party (Cumhuriyet Halk Partisi, CHP), there were more than two million people in Maltepe Square. The demonstration, organized in solidarity with the city's mayor, Ekrem Imamoglu, who has been in prison since March 19, was mainly an occasion to protest against the central government.
“What they did to Imamoglu and his colleagues is a coup. We are here to bravely defend our democracy,” were the words of Özgür Özel, the CHP leader, who spoke from the stage in front of hundreds of thousands of people. His speech, which lasted almost an hour, was frequently interrupted by the ocean of protesters with the slogan “Tayyip, resign!” addressed directly to the President, Recep Tayyip Erdogan.
In his long speech, Özel used inclusive language and promised that the struggle will not stop until early elections are held: “Starting tomorrow, I call on everyone to support our campaign to go to the polls. We are ready to govern together with everyone: Kurds, Turks, Sunnis or Alevis. We will build a better future. We are not afraid, because brave people like you die only once, while cowards like Erdogan die every day.”
There was also a surprise waiting for those who went to Maltepe on Saturday: an AI-made video message from Mayor Ekrem Imamoglu urging people to keep resisting and fighting.
Once again, CHP leader Özel stressed the importance of the boycott campaign launched a few days ago by his party, an initiative targeting a number of companies directly connected to the family of the president or which display obedience towards the government’s orders. From the stage, Özel showed the live broadcasts of eight major Turkish TV channels that were not covering the massive demonstration: “If we don't see images of us for 10 more minutes, we will announce the extension of the boycott to the companies affiliated with these channels.”
After Özel’s words, the HaberTurk TV channel began broadcasting images from the square, while another, NTV, kept silent. As a result, Özel called on all people to boycott the products of the Dogus Group, which owns NTV. At the end of his speech, he stressed: “Our struggle will continue in the streets. Starting today, every weekend we will be in a different square in Istanbul to demand the return of our mayor and early elections.”
Turkey's streets everywhere will continue to be filled with protesters in the coming days. It is likely there will also be no shortage of police violence, which has been much talked about thanks to visual evidence provided by protesters: swollen eyes, fractures, damaged eardrums, cigarettes put out on their bodies and sexual assaults while in detention were some of the abuses cited in the complaints made by victims. The latter issue was also raised by lawyer Eren Keskin in an interview with ArtiGerçek: “These are forms of clear sexual torture that the police have been using for years in Turkey.”
Nearly 2,000 people have been detained since March 19, with 263 arrested. Trials are scheduled to begin in early April. The arrested are mostly young people, on charges that either don’t exist at all or arise from the crackdown on freedoms. Among them are Yagmur Taylan, president of the Student Representative Council of Bogaziçi University, and 19-year-old Eren Ögetürk, who were arrested in dawn raids for taking part in the protests. Many other young people remain in detention, while their parents have been protesting in front of the Çaglayan Palace of Justice in Istanbul for days.
Among those detained who were later released is Mehmet Pehlivan, Mayor Ekrem Imamoglu’s lawyer. After his release, he denounced the fact that “statements of anonymous witnesses are being used to justify [Imamoglu’s] detention and open the trial. One of these witnesses has been involved in more than a hundred criminal cases. It turns out that prosecutors have threatened some detainees into making statements against the mayor. There are a number of unsigned documents, supported by letters and statements that may have been made by the mayor.”
The political crusade against Imamoglu and his administration has also extended to 14 other individuals and 12 companies. The Istanbul Prosecutor General's Office decided to confiscate the assets of these persons and companies simply because they collaborated on some projects with the city's municipality.
The crackdown also continues to target journalists. Kaj Joakim Medin, a Swedish reporter for the Dagens ETC newspaper, was stopped on his arrival in Turkey on March 27 and arrested two days later.
Andreas Gustavsson, editor-in-chief of the paper, let it be known that Medin was there to document the demonstrations and that he has not been informed of the reason for his arrest. According to the Reuters news agency, this was connected to an investigation launched after the anti-Ankara protests organized in Stockholm in January 2023. The situation in Turkey continues to deteriorate, with increasing human rights violations and political repression as the country moves towards a full-blown popular uprising.
Originally published at https://ilmanifesto.it/siamo-due-milioni-la-piazza-di-istanbul-avvisa-erdogan on 2025-03-30