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Unrest in Turkey
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Dude fictional, you are free to use your imagination, if you choose to not part take in an impossible situation and have a bit of fun then perhaps remove whatever is in your arse, looks like a broom, hold on lemme grab the end, if you get splinters don't blame me i never stuck it up your asshold still dammit, 1 2 3 ok hopefully we got it all and splinters are minimal. (light it is a joke, plz don't get all agro) you seem super serial just trying to lift the mood but it masy darken it but i am positive so i see lighten.
shariah law and criminals common you have to see how awesome it would be o fk you know light i see where i went wrong, a rapist is a criminal but the victim is stoned/lashed or hung, possible all three, ok i am changing my imagination here. How about we get a white anc leader who has another president but he is black an afrikaaner(city), indian and only one more a muslim(damn this is a tough one, leave out the muslim, too many different beliefs, we can perhaps have them as one so sunni,shia(no idea who else have to be unanimous and send a representative to the table, soo one muslim whether they can agree i dunno but i have faith in our rainbow nation) as one and they must agree before they input their feelings. i think Afrikaners will have to sit out. No offense but i doubt the majority will take kindly to it. if i have left anyone else please i didn't do it on purpose my panel was decided by an outside force, the voice in my head, it says the panel is full.
Now decisions and budgets basically presidential stuff would need to have approval stamp, that would mean everyone agrees o yes the presidents must be from the new generation, no one over 30-35. So we can get rid of this apartheid hang up we have at the moment. Time move forward so we are going to focus on forwardness.
Now imagine a government with 5 -7 presidents representing all the various communities, granted we would need 20-40 presidents lol but this is my imagination of the perfect government so let's call it 7. I wonder how it would work out. Why do countries need one guy running the show. Corruption would drop, releasing people on medical parole would not be as easy and unity would be off the scale.
Light this post is entirely my imagination of what could work in this country. fair tale stuff nothing serious.
Like most of your posts recently. But, no problem, we enjoy fairy tales here also.
LazyLion
King of de Jungle
One of Turkey's main trade union confederations on Tuesday joined protests against the government, after another night of clashes between police and protesters in Istanbul and Ankara.
Turkey's Confederation of Public Workers' Unions (KESK) has called a two-day strike from Tuesday to protest against the police crackdown on demonstrators.
"The state terror implemented against entirely peaceful protests is continuing in a way that threatens civilians' life safety," the KESK said Monday in a statement on its website.
The police crackdown showed the Islamist-rooted government's "enmity to democracy", it said.
The left-leaning confederation has some 240,000 members in 11 unions and the action will likely affect schools, universities and public offices across the country.
Turkish police and anti-government protesters clashed again in Istanbul early Tuesday, as the reported death toll from nationwide protests rose to two.
Riot police fired tear gas at protestors who burned cars, hurled stones and bellowed angry slogans into the early hours. Similar scenes played out in the capital Ankara.
Earlier, as white fumes hung in the air in surrounding streets, thousands of other protestors gathered on Taksim Square, the symbolic heart of the protests.
"Tayyip, resign!" they yelled, waving red flags and banners and whistling.
AFP reporters saw many demonstrators being carried away by medics.
Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, who had already left on a trip to Morocco, had insisted on Monday the situation was calming down.
He rejected talk of a "Turkish Spring" uprising by Turks who accuse him of trying to impose Islamic reforms on the secular state.
The clashes, which have rocked scores of cities across Turkey, have now entered a fifth day.
Erdogan has blamed the protests on "extremists" and "dissidents" among his opponents and on Monday insisted the situation was calming down.
"The Republican People's Party and other dissidents have a hand in these events," he said, referring to the main Turkish opposition.
A medics' union earlier Monday said a man had been killed when a car ploughed into protestors in Istanbul on Sunday.
And early Tuesday, private television station NTV reported that a 22-year-old man had died after being shot in the head in Hatay province, in the south of the country.
The wave of protests began on Friday after police cracked down on a peaceful protest in Istanbul against plans to build over Gezi Park, a rare green spot adjoining Taksim Square.
That generated wider anti-government protests in Istanbul, Ankara and dozens of other cities.
Rights groups and doctors said more than a thousand people had been injured in clashes in Istanbul and 700 in Ankara.
The government's latest estimate on Sunday put the figure at 58 civilians and 115 security forces injured, with clashes in 67 cities. It also said more than 1,700 people had been arrested across the country but that many had since been released.
Deputy Premier Bulent Arinc, who is standing in for Erdogan during his absence from the country, was due to speak to journalists about the unrest at 0900 GMT Tuesday, the Anatolia news agency reported.
-- Growing international concern --
Erdogan has dismissed the protestors as "vandals", stressing that he had been democratically elected.
His Justice and Development Party (AKP) has won three successive parliamentary elections, but opponents have expressed mounting concern that Turkey is moving toward conservative Islam.
Echoing Britain and other Western allies of Turkey, US Secretary of State John Kerry voiced concern Monday over "reports of excessive use of force" by police. He urged all sides to "avoid any provocations or violence".
Erdogan's ally President Abdullah Gul called for calm, assuring protestors that their voices had been heard.
The clashes over the last few days have exposed the tensions at the heart of Turkey, which although constitutionally a secular state is peopled mostly by Muslims.
The Istanbul stock exchange closed 10 percent lower on Monday and the Turkish lira fell against the euro and the dollar.
Since coming to power in 2002, Erdogan has passed contested reforms on religious education and a recent law curbing the sale of alcohol. In 2004 he backed down on a proposed adultery law.
Shrugging off the rising protests, he pushed ahead on Monday with what he said was a pre-planned four-day official trip to Morocco, Algeria and Tunisia.
Before he left, he referred to next year's elections, when observers expect him to run for president.
"I don't know what the president (Gul) said, but for me, democracy comes from the ballot box," he said.
Source : Sapa-AFP /mjs
Date : 04 Jun 2013 07:24
Turkey's Confederation of Public Workers' Unions (KESK) has called a two-day strike from Tuesday to protest against the police crackdown on demonstrators.
"The state terror implemented against entirely peaceful protests is continuing in a way that threatens civilians' life safety," the KESK said Monday in a statement on its website.
The police crackdown showed the Islamist-rooted government's "enmity to democracy", it said.
The left-leaning confederation has some 240,000 members in 11 unions and the action will likely affect schools, universities and public offices across the country.
Turkish police and anti-government protesters clashed again in Istanbul early Tuesday, as the reported death toll from nationwide protests rose to two.
Riot police fired tear gas at protestors who burned cars, hurled stones and bellowed angry slogans into the early hours. Similar scenes played out in the capital Ankara.
Earlier, as white fumes hung in the air in surrounding streets, thousands of other protestors gathered on Taksim Square, the symbolic heart of the protests.
"Tayyip, resign!" they yelled, waving red flags and banners and whistling.
AFP reporters saw many demonstrators being carried away by medics.
Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, who had already left on a trip to Morocco, had insisted on Monday the situation was calming down.
He rejected talk of a "Turkish Spring" uprising by Turks who accuse him of trying to impose Islamic reforms on the secular state.
The clashes, which have rocked scores of cities across Turkey, have now entered a fifth day.
Erdogan has blamed the protests on "extremists" and "dissidents" among his opponents and on Monday insisted the situation was calming down.
"The Republican People's Party and other dissidents have a hand in these events," he said, referring to the main Turkish opposition.
A medics' union earlier Monday said a man had been killed when a car ploughed into protestors in Istanbul on Sunday.
And early Tuesday, private television station NTV reported that a 22-year-old man had died after being shot in the head in Hatay province, in the south of the country.
The wave of protests began on Friday after police cracked down on a peaceful protest in Istanbul against plans to build over Gezi Park, a rare green spot adjoining Taksim Square.
That generated wider anti-government protests in Istanbul, Ankara and dozens of other cities.
Rights groups and doctors said more than a thousand people had been injured in clashes in Istanbul and 700 in Ankara.
The government's latest estimate on Sunday put the figure at 58 civilians and 115 security forces injured, with clashes in 67 cities. It also said more than 1,700 people had been arrested across the country but that many had since been released.
Deputy Premier Bulent Arinc, who is standing in for Erdogan during his absence from the country, was due to speak to journalists about the unrest at 0900 GMT Tuesday, the Anatolia news agency reported.
-- Growing international concern --
Erdogan has dismissed the protestors as "vandals", stressing that he had been democratically elected.
His Justice and Development Party (AKP) has won three successive parliamentary elections, but opponents have expressed mounting concern that Turkey is moving toward conservative Islam.
Echoing Britain and other Western allies of Turkey, US Secretary of State John Kerry voiced concern Monday over "reports of excessive use of force" by police. He urged all sides to "avoid any provocations or violence".
Erdogan's ally President Abdullah Gul called for calm, assuring protestors that their voices had been heard.
The clashes over the last few days have exposed the tensions at the heart of Turkey, which although constitutionally a secular state is peopled mostly by Muslims.
The Istanbul stock exchange closed 10 percent lower on Monday and the Turkish lira fell against the euro and the dollar.
Since coming to power in 2002, Erdogan has passed contested reforms on religious education and a recent law curbing the sale of alcohol. In 2004 he backed down on a proposed adultery law.
Shrugging off the rising protests, he pushed ahead on Monday with what he said was a pre-planned four-day official trip to Morocco, Algeria and Tunisia.
Before he left, he referred to next year's elections, when observers expect him to run for president.
"I don't know what the president (Gul) said, but for me, democracy comes from the ballot box," he said.
Source : Sapa-AFP /mjs
Date : 04 Jun 2013 07:24
LazyLion
King of de Jungle
A 22-year-old man died in a hospital after being shot during anti-government protests in southern Turkey, the NTV television reported Tuesday.
"Abdullah Comert was seriously wounded... after gunfire from an unidentified person," the station reported, quoting a statement from the local governor's office in the Hatay province.
He died in hospital on Monday, the private station added.
With the latest casualty, the death toll rose to at least two in what has become a wave of protests against the Justice and Development Party (AKP) government in cities across the country.
Hasan Akgol, a main opposition party lawmaker, said Comert was a member of the youth branch of the Republican People's Party (CHP), NTV reported.
Police had launched an investigation into the incident, it added.
Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan is facing down some of the fiercest protests in his decade-long rule.
His critics denounce what they say is his authoritarian approach to government, accusing him of trying to impose conservative Islamic reforms on secular Turkey.
The unrest, which began on Friday after police cracked down on a demonstration in Istanbul, quickly blew up into anti-government protests across the country.
Source : Sapa-AFP /mjs
Date : 04 Jun 2013 04:33
"Abdullah Comert was seriously wounded... after gunfire from an unidentified person," the station reported, quoting a statement from the local governor's office in the Hatay province.
He died in hospital on Monday, the private station added.
With the latest casualty, the death toll rose to at least two in what has become a wave of protests against the Justice and Development Party (AKP) government in cities across the country.
Hasan Akgol, a main opposition party lawmaker, said Comert was a member of the youth branch of the Republican People's Party (CHP), NTV reported.
Police had launched an investigation into the incident, it added.
Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan is facing down some of the fiercest protests in his decade-long rule.
His critics denounce what they say is his authoritarian approach to government, accusing him of trying to impose conservative Islamic reforms on secular Turkey.
The unrest, which began on Friday after police cracked down on a demonstration in Istanbul, quickly blew up into anti-government protests across the country.
Source : Sapa-AFP /mjs
Date : 04 Jun 2013 04:33
LazyLion
King of de Jungle
Turkey's Islamic-led government is facing its biggest protests in years. Here is a look at the protests and what may be driving them:
Q: What's going on in Turkey?
A: Demonstrators were camping out in Istanbul's landmark Taksim Square to protest plans to rip out trees and redevelop the area when authorities launched a violent pre-dawn raid Friday to clear them out. Protests against the police's heavy-handed response quickly spread to cities across the country. Monday was the fourth day that riot police used tear gas in Istanbul and Ankara against protesters.
Q: Are the protests just about trees - or something more?
A: Demonstrators are also venting pent-up resentment against Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, who has been in office for 10 years. Many secular Turks see him as an authoritarian figure who is trying to exert his conservative religious Islamic views on them. Erdogan rejects those accusations, insisting he respects all Turks and is a "servant" of the people.
Q: Who are the protesters?
A: Most of the tens of thousands of protesters on Turkey's streets appear to be urban, secular Turks, frustrated by what they see as Erdogan's close ties to development interests and his alleged attempts to force his religious outlook on them. Erdogan says the protests have been stirred up by Turkey's opposition and extremists who are trying to force their will on the majority who backs him.
Q: What has Erdogan done?
A: Erdogan, who has been in power since 2003 after winning three landslide elections, has been credited with boosting economic growth in Turkey and raising the country's international profile. But he has been a divisive figure at home, with his government cracking down on journalists, passing laws to curb the sale of alcohol and taking a strong stand against the Syrian regime - a stance that some believe has put Turkey's security at risk. Some Turks see him as a meddler in their personal lives, speaking out against Caesarean births, telling women they should have at least three children and even advising how TV characters should behave.
Q: Why are protesters angry at police?
A: Social media has been awash with reports and videos of police abuse during the protests. Authorities have said police excesses would be investigated, but they appeared to continue unabated. Turkey's Human Rights Foundation says more than 1,000 protesters were subjected "to ill-treatment and torture" by police.
Q: What does the president of Turkey think?
A: President Abdullah Gul has taken a more conciliatory line, celebrating peaceful protests as a democratic right. "Democracy does not mean elections alone," he said Monday.
Q: What's next? Is Turkey the next country to fall to an Arab Spring revolution?
A: Turkey will be holding a presidential election next year in which Erdogan - who will hit his term limit as prime minister - could run against Gul. Despite images that resemble the Arab Spring protests that brought down leaders across the region, Erdogan is unlikely to fall. Turkey has a stable democracy and his backing by the silent majority still appears to be strong. "We already have a spring in Turkey," he said Monday, alluding to the nation's free elections.
Source : Sapa-AP /pk
Date : 04 Jun 2013 09:04
Q: What's going on in Turkey?
A: Demonstrators were camping out in Istanbul's landmark Taksim Square to protest plans to rip out trees and redevelop the area when authorities launched a violent pre-dawn raid Friday to clear them out. Protests against the police's heavy-handed response quickly spread to cities across the country. Monday was the fourth day that riot police used tear gas in Istanbul and Ankara against protesters.
Q: Are the protests just about trees - or something more?
A: Demonstrators are also venting pent-up resentment against Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, who has been in office for 10 years. Many secular Turks see him as an authoritarian figure who is trying to exert his conservative religious Islamic views on them. Erdogan rejects those accusations, insisting he respects all Turks and is a "servant" of the people.
Q: Who are the protesters?
A: Most of the tens of thousands of protesters on Turkey's streets appear to be urban, secular Turks, frustrated by what they see as Erdogan's close ties to development interests and his alleged attempts to force his religious outlook on them. Erdogan says the protests have been stirred up by Turkey's opposition and extremists who are trying to force their will on the majority who backs him.
Q: What has Erdogan done?
A: Erdogan, who has been in power since 2003 after winning three landslide elections, has been credited with boosting economic growth in Turkey and raising the country's international profile. But he has been a divisive figure at home, with his government cracking down on journalists, passing laws to curb the sale of alcohol and taking a strong stand against the Syrian regime - a stance that some believe has put Turkey's security at risk. Some Turks see him as a meddler in their personal lives, speaking out against Caesarean births, telling women they should have at least three children and even advising how TV characters should behave.
Q: Why are protesters angry at police?
A: Social media has been awash with reports and videos of police abuse during the protests. Authorities have said police excesses would be investigated, but they appeared to continue unabated. Turkey's Human Rights Foundation says more than 1,000 protesters were subjected "to ill-treatment and torture" by police.
Q: What does the president of Turkey think?
A: President Abdullah Gul has taken a more conciliatory line, celebrating peaceful protests as a democratic right. "Democracy does not mean elections alone," he said Monday.
Q: What's next? Is Turkey the next country to fall to an Arab Spring revolution?
A: Turkey will be holding a presidential election next year in which Erdogan - who will hit his term limit as prime minister - could run against Gul. Despite images that resemble the Arab Spring protests that brought down leaders across the region, Erdogan is unlikely to fall. Turkey has a stable democracy and his backing by the silent majority still appears to be strong. "We already have a spring in Turkey," he said Monday, alluding to the nation's free elections.
Source : Sapa-AP /pk
Date : 04 Jun 2013 09:04
LazyLion
King of de Jungle
Turkey's government said on Tuesday that it respected all of its citizens' "lifestyles", after days of mass rallies by protesters furious at what they see as a slew of restrictive Islamic-leaning reforms.
"Turkey's biggest wealth is its differences. Our government respects and is sensitive toward different lifestyles," Deputy Prime Minister Bulent Arinc said in televised remarks.
Source : Sapa-AFP /pk
Date : 04 Jun 2013 11:36
"Turkey's biggest wealth is its differences. Our government respects and is sensitive toward different lifestyles," Deputy Prime Minister Bulent Arinc said in televised remarks.
Source : Sapa-AFP /pk
Date : 04 Jun 2013 11:36
Sounds like some of our forum members.
Compton_effect
Honorary Master
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The best place to follow what is happening is on reddit or twitter. Some nasty footage. You do not want to see what is left of a guy's eye after he's hit by a teargas grenade.
Anyone know if anyone is protesting this outside the Turkish Embassy in Pretoria?
Anyone know if anyone is protesting this outside the Turkish Embassy in Pretoria?
LazyLion
King of de Jungle
Fresh violence erupted early Wednesday as protesters defied a government plea to end days of deadly unrest, the biggest challenge yet to Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan's decade-long rule.
Police used tear gas and water cannon on hundreds of protesters, who ignored warnings to disperse in Istanbul, Ankara and the southeastern city of Hatay, where a young protester died a day earlier.
The violence came after a second major trade union confederation announced it would join protests against the government, calling a strike for Wednesday.
In the western city of Izmir, police detained at least 25 people early Wednesday for tweeting "misleading and libellous information", state-run Anatolia news agency reported.
On Tuesday, Deputy Prime Minister Bulent Arinc apologised to legitimate demonstrators injured by the security forces, a gesture welcomed by the United States.
But that did not appease outraged protestors.
Thousands gathered at Istanbul's Taksim Square for a sixth day Wednesday, yelling defiance at Erdogan, who earlier had dismissed the protesters as "extremists" and "vandals". He was in Algeria on the second day of a four-day official visit to north Africa.
"The vandals are here! Where is Tayyip?" yelled the crowd.
They accuse Erdogan, who has won three successive national elections, of imposing conservative Islamic reforms on the predominantly Muslim but constitutionally secular nation.
But the festive atmosphere in the square was a change from the tense rallies of the previous five days. Turkish pipe music and singing blared over speakers as the crowd clapped along.
Even fans from rival football teams Galatasaray, Besiktas and Fenerbahce linked arms, united in protest.
The wave of protests broke out on Friday after police tear-gassed demonstrators at a peaceful rally against plans to build on an Istanbul park.
On Tuesday, Arinc said sorry to those who had been caught up in that initial violence.
"I apologise to those who were subject to violence because of their sensitivity for the environment," he said, though he added that his apology excluded "the rioters".
"The government has learnt its lesson from what happened," he added. "We do not have the right and cannot afford to ignore people. Democracies cannot exist without opposition."
He called on "responsible citizens" to stop the protests.
Two people have been killed in the clashes, officials and medics say, and rights groups say thousands have been injured. The government puts the figure at around 300.
Erdogan, whose Justice and Development Party (AKP) first took power in 2002, has accused the main opposition Republican People's Party of having a hand in the protests.
-- Apology 'just damage control' --
The Turkish Confederation of Public Workers' Unions (KESK), which represents 240,000 employees, lent its weight to the protests when it launched a two-day strike on Tuesday.
Spokesman Baki Cinar dismissed Arinc's conciliatory statement.
"The apology is just damage control and only because they know they are stuck," he told AFP.
On Tuesday, an even bigger union grouping, DISK, which claims 420,000 members, said it would join the strike and demonstrations on Wednesday.
The United Nations joined Turkey's key strategic ally the US and other Western partners in voicing concern about reports of police violence. It called for an independent investigation into the allegations.
The White House praised Arinc for his statement on Tuesday.
"We welcome the deputy prime minister's comments apologising for excessive force, and we continue to welcome calls for these events to be investigated," White House spokesman Jay Carney said.
Turkey, a country of 75 million people, is an important ally of the US in the region and has backed it notably in opposing Syrian President Bashar al-Assad in Syria's civil war.
Sitting at the crossroads of East and West, Turkey has long aspired to join the European Union, which sets strict requirements on human rights standards for prospective members.
Opponents have accused Erdogan of repressing critics -- including journalists, minority Kurds and the military -- and of pushing conservative Islamic policies such as religious education reforms and a law curbing the sale of alcohol.
Erdogan told protesters they should wait to express their views in elections next year, when observers expect him to run for president.
"For me, democracy comes from the ballot box," he said, insisting the disturbances would calm down by the time he had returned to Turkey on Thursday.
Italy said Tuesday that it considered the violence had not undermined Turkey's chances of joining the EU.
"We are confident that Turkey will overcome this difficult moment, proving itself to be a mature democracy," Foreign Minister Emma Bonino said in a statement.
Although the Istanbul stock market had closed 10 percent lower on Monday it recovered by nearly five percent on Tuesday after Arinc's comments.
Source : Sapa-AFP /mjs
Date : 05 Jun 2013 05:02
Police used tear gas and water cannon on hundreds of protesters, who ignored warnings to disperse in Istanbul, Ankara and the southeastern city of Hatay, where a young protester died a day earlier.
The violence came after a second major trade union confederation announced it would join protests against the government, calling a strike for Wednesday.
In the western city of Izmir, police detained at least 25 people early Wednesday for tweeting "misleading and libellous information", state-run Anatolia news agency reported.
On Tuesday, Deputy Prime Minister Bulent Arinc apologised to legitimate demonstrators injured by the security forces, a gesture welcomed by the United States.
But that did not appease outraged protestors.
Thousands gathered at Istanbul's Taksim Square for a sixth day Wednesday, yelling defiance at Erdogan, who earlier had dismissed the protesters as "extremists" and "vandals". He was in Algeria on the second day of a four-day official visit to north Africa.
"The vandals are here! Where is Tayyip?" yelled the crowd.
They accuse Erdogan, who has won three successive national elections, of imposing conservative Islamic reforms on the predominantly Muslim but constitutionally secular nation.
But the festive atmosphere in the square was a change from the tense rallies of the previous five days. Turkish pipe music and singing blared over speakers as the crowd clapped along.
Even fans from rival football teams Galatasaray, Besiktas and Fenerbahce linked arms, united in protest.
The wave of protests broke out on Friday after police tear-gassed demonstrators at a peaceful rally against plans to build on an Istanbul park.
On Tuesday, Arinc said sorry to those who had been caught up in that initial violence.
"I apologise to those who were subject to violence because of their sensitivity for the environment," he said, though he added that his apology excluded "the rioters".
"The government has learnt its lesson from what happened," he added. "We do not have the right and cannot afford to ignore people. Democracies cannot exist without opposition."
He called on "responsible citizens" to stop the protests.
Two people have been killed in the clashes, officials and medics say, and rights groups say thousands have been injured. The government puts the figure at around 300.
Erdogan, whose Justice and Development Party (AKP) first took power in 2002, has accused the main opposition Republican People's Party of having a hand in the protests.
-- Apology 'just damage control' --
The Turkish Confederation of Public Workers' Unions (KESK), which represents 240,000 employees, lent its weight to the protests when it launched a two-day strike on Tuesday.
Spokesman Baki Cinar dismissed Arinc's conciliatory statement.
"The apology is just damage control and only because they know they are stuck," he told AFP.
On Tuesday, an even bigger union grouping, DISK, which claims 420,000 members, said it would join the strike and demonstrations on Wednesday.
The United Nations joined Turkey's key strategic ally the US and other Western partners in voicing concern about reports of police violence. It called for an independent investigation into the allegations.
The White House praised Arinc for his statement on Tuesday.
"We welcome the deputy prime minister's comments apologising for excessive force, and we continue to welcome calls for these events to be investigated," White House spokesman Jay Carney said.
Turkey, a country of 75 million people, is an important ally of the US in the region and has backed it notably in opposing Syrian President Bashar al-Assad in Syria's civil war.
Sitting at the crossroads of East and West, Turkey has long aspired to join the European Union, which sets strict requirements on human rights standards for prospective members.
Opponents have accused Erdogan of repressing critics -- including journalists, minority Kurds and the military -- and of pushing conservative Islamic policies such as religious education reforms and a law curbing the sale of alcohol.
Erdogan told protesters they should wait to express their views in elections next year, when observers expect him to run for president.
"For me, democracy comes from the ballot box," he said, insisting the disturbances would calm down by the time he had returned to Turkey on Thursday.
Italy said Tuesday that it considered the violence had not undermined Turkey's chances of joining the EU.
"We are confident that Turkey will overcome this difficult moment, proving itself to be a mature democracy," Foreign Minister Emma Bonino said in a statement.
Although the Istanbul stock market had closed 10 percent lower on Monday it recovered by nearly five percent on Tuesday after Arinc's comments.
Source : Sapa-AFP /mjs
Date : 05 Jun 2013 05:02
Compton_effect
Honorary Master
- Joined
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Burger King supporting Turkish Police
Ok. Not having bacon on your menu is one thing. I could tolerate that.
But now turning away protesters in Turkey and giving free meals to Police officers?
In my personal opinion - Burger King, you can go &^%* yourself.
https://twitter.com/57UN/status/342045488767442946/photo/1
Ok. Not having bacon on your menu is one thing. I could tolerate that.
But now turning away protesters in Turkey and giving free meals to Police officers?
In my personal opinion - Burger King, you can go &^%* yourself.
https://twitter.com/57UN/status/342045488767442946/photo/1
LazyLion
King of de Jungle
Do you believe everything you read on the Internet?
thestaggy
Honorary Master
Too right. I watched Anthony Bourdain Parts Unknown on CNN two weeks ago and he visited Libya. He was chatting to a civilian that took part in the armed overthrowing of Gaddafi and when Anthony asked the chap how they beat Gaddafi he said, ''Easy, with Twitter''. When asked to elaborate the guy said that they were sendig messages via Twitter to NATO, pointing out the positions of Gaddafi's forces (armour & artillery concentrations).
Compton_effect
Honorary Master
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That they don't have bacon on their menu in Cape Town?
I think that is well documented.
I think that is well documented.
LazyLion
King of de Jungle
Correct, that is the only fact in this thread.
Hosehead
Executive Member
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LazyLion
King of de Jungle
Protests Unite Turks Across Social Spectrum
Office workers in business suits chant anti-government slogans alongside pious women wearing Muslim headscarves. Schoolchildren and bearded anarchists rub shoulders with football fans, well-heeled women in designer sunglasses and elderly couples donating food.
These disparate groups are united by alarm at what they consider unwarranted meddling and increasingly autocratic behavior by Recep Tayyip Erdogan, Turkey's most popular prime minister in decades. Even some of his supporters are joining the protests sweeping the country.
On Wednesday, thousands thronged Istanbul's central Taksim Square for a sixth straight day. Violent clashes broke out in the capital, Ankara, where riot police used tear gas and water cannon to subdue protesters. Nearly 1,000 people have been injured and more than 3,300 people detained since Friday, according to the Ankara-based Human Rights Association.
What started as an environmental outcry against plans to rip up trees in one of central Istanbul's last green spaces to make way for a shopping mall has burgeoned into the most widespread unrest Turkey has seen in decades.
"For the first time, it's everyone," said Beste Yurekli, an 18-year-old high school student helping to clean up garbage in Taksim Square's Gezi Park, where hundreds of demonstrators were camped out to try to prevent the bulldozers from moving in. "All of Turkey, we are united. We are one for the first time."
The reasons, she said, are clear.
"It's not just because of the trees. It's because we've had enough of the government. He's been acting like a dictator," she said of Erdogan.
Since coming to power in 2002, the prime minister's confidence has grown in tandem with his support, allowing him to win the 2011 election - his third consecutive victory - with nearly 50 percent of the vote. Although he has insisted his commitment to Turkey's secular traditions are unwavering, the devoutly Muslim prime minister has moved to make religion increasingly prominent.
Erdogan draws his support mainly from Turkey's large, predominantly rural, religious conservative base. In a country where the staunchly secular legacy of the modern state's founding father, Mustafa Kemal Ataturk, has been zealously upheld, his rise to power was heralded as an end to the oppression of religious Muslims, who had been banned from overt displays of their faith, such as women wearing headscarves in universities.
But his increasingly frequent interventions into people's private lives have disturbed many. Declaring that he wanted to raise a "generation" of pious youths, he has spoken out against couples kissing on public transport, sternly advised women to have at least three children and moved to curtail the sale of alcohol and ban its advertising.
With each proclamation, the modern, mainly urban population grew more alarmed. Even religious people began to chafe at what they considered unwarranted meddling in their private affairs.
"We were in Taksim Square to resist against the authoritarian governance, police violence and to protect our park," said Fatma Dogan of the Anti-Capitalist Muslims, a civil initiative founded in 2001.
Ihsan Eliacik , another supporter of the group, said at least half of the people in the initiative have voted for the ruling party in the past.
"There are people who support the ruling party yet joined us because they think that the government should change some of its policies," he said.
With his strong support base, the protests are unlikely to pose a serious threat to the survival of Erdogan's government. But they could serve as a wake-up call that the prime minister cannot ignore the 50 percent of the electorate who did not vote for him.
"I am a defender of the freedom to sin," columnist Mustafa Akyol wrote in the Hurriyet Daily News last week before the protests began. "What some people consider as sin, in other words, should not be banned by laws, unless the sins are also worthy of being objective crimes, with clear harm to others."
Speaking to AP Television News on Wednesday, Akyol noted that while Erdogan was Turkey's most popular prime minister in half a century, "his understanding of democracy has to become more participatory and more liberal. And he has to understand that democratically elected leaders also have limits that they should not cross, and they should also try to win the other people ... rather than intimidating them and making them more nervous."
Erdogan's plan to raze Gezi Park - and the ensuing violent police reaction to what started out as a peaceful protest - was the final straw for many. The prime minister's insistence that the protesters were no more than troublemakers, served only to fan the flames.
"I saw the awful images on the Internet," said businessman Bulent Peker, who describes himself as a devoted supporter of Erdogan's ruling Justice and Development Party and has voted for it in all three elections.
The protesters, he said, "were there having a picnic, protecting the trees, but their tents were burnt and they were forced out with pressurized water, which can be lethal. . My conscience was hurt."
The next day, he was among the tens of thousands who converged on Taksim Square to denounce the police crackdown and call for Erdogan to resign.
"They were people with different ideology to mine but I could not accept the fact that they were not being heard, that they were being thrown into the background," Peker said by phone from the town of Bursa in northwest Turkey.
"My feeling is that the government had to listen to what these people were thinking. It should not ignore them, or it will end up with hundreds of thousands of resentful people," said Peker, who wrote an open letter criticizing the prime minister that was published by Turkish newspapers Wednesday.
Still, he said, he would vote for Erdogan's party if elections were held tomorrow.
"Of course, my ideology won't change in one day," he said. "I support many of its other policies. On the economy, its foreign policy, what it has done about (improving) health. There is no other party that fits my views."
"But the party I want is one that brings the people together."
----
Associated Press writers Suzan Fraser and Ezgi Akin in Ankara and Nebi Qena in Istanbul contributed to this report.
Source : Sapa-AP /mjs
Date : 06 Jun 2013 00:55
Office workers in business suits chant anti-government slogans alongside pious women wearing Muslim headscarves. Schoolchildren and bearded anarchists rub shoulders with football fans, well-heeled women in designer sunglasses and elderly couples donating food.
These disparate groups are united by alarm at what they consider unwarranted meddling and increasingly autocratic behavior by Recep Tayyip Erdogan, Turkey's most popular prime minister in decades. Even some of his supporters are joining the protests sweeping the country.
On Wednesday, thousands thronged Istanbul's central Taksim Square for a sixth straight day. Violent clashes broke out in the capital, Ankara, where riot police used tear gas and water cannon to subdue protesters. Nearly 1,000 people have been injured and more than 3,300 people detained since Friday, according to the Ankara-based Human Rights Association.
What started as an environmental outcry against plans to rip up trees in one of central Istanbul's last green spaces to make way for a shopping mall has burgeoned into the most widespread unrest Turkey has seen in decades.
"For the first time, it's everyone," said Beste Yurekli, an 18-year-old high school student helping to clean up garbage in Taksim Square's Gezi Park, where hundreds of demonstrators were camped out to try to prevent the bulldozers from moving in. "All of Turkey, we are united. We are one for the first time."
The reasons, she said, are clear.
"It's not just because of the trees. It's because we've had enough of the government. He's been acting like a dictator," she said of Erdogan.
Since coming to power in 2002, the prime minister's confidence has grown in tandem with his support, allowing him to win the 2011 election - his third consecutive victory - with nearly 50 percent of the vote. Although he has insisted his commitment to Turkey's secular traditions are unwavering, the devoutly Muslim prime minister has moved to make religion increasingly prominent.
Erdogan draws his support mainly from Turkey's large, predominantly rural, religious conservative base. In a country where the staunchly secular legacy of the modern state's founding father, Mustafa Kemal Ataturk, has been zealously upheld, his rise to power was heralded as an end to the oppression of religious Muslims, who had been banned from overt displays of their faith, such as women wearing headscarves in universities.
But his increasingly frequent interventions into people's private lives have disturbed many. Declaring that he wanted to raise a "generation" of pious youths, he has spoken out against couples kissing on public transport, sternly advised women to have at least three children and moved to curtail the sale of alcohol and ban its advertising.
With each proclamation, the modern, mainly urban population grew more alarmed. Even religious people began to chafe at what they considered unwarranted meddling in their private affairs.
"We were in Taksim Square to resist against the authoritarian governance, police violence and to protect our park," said Fatma Dogan of the Anti-Capitalist Muslims, a civil initiative founded in 2001.
Ihsan Eliacik , another supporter of the group, said at least half of the people in the initiative have voted for the ruling party in the past.
"There are people who support the ruling party yet joined us because they think that the government should change some of its policies," he said.
With his strong support base, the protests are unlikely to pose a serious threat to the survival of Erdogan's government. But they could serve as a wake-up call that the prime minister cannot ignore the 50 percent of the electorate who did not vote for him.
"I am a defender of the freedom to sin," columnist Mustafa Akyol wrote in the Hurriyet Daily News last week before the protests began. "What some people consider as sin, in other words, should not be banned by laws, unless the sins are also worthy of being objective crimes, with clear harm to others."
Speaking to AP Television News on Wednesday, Akyol noted that while Erdogan was Turkey's most popular prime minister in half a century, "his understanding of democracy has to become more participatory and more liberal. And he has to understand that democratically elected leaders also have limits that they should not cross, and they should also try to win the other people ... rather than intimidating them and making them more nervous."
Erdogan's plan to raze Gezi Park - and the ensuing violent police reaction to what started out as a peaceful protest - was the final straw for many. The prime minister's insistence that the protesters were no more than troublemakers, served only to fan the flames.
"I saw the awful images on the Internet," said businessman Bulent Peker, who describes himself as a devoted supporter of Erdogan's ruling Justice and Development Party and has voted for it in all three elections.
The protesters, he said, "were there having a picnic, protecting the trees, but their tents were burnt and they were forced out with pressurized water, which can be lethal. . My conscience was hurt."
The next day, he was among the tens of thousands who converged on Taksim Square to denounce the police crackdown and call for Erdogan to resign.
"They were people with different ideology to mine but I could not accept the fact that they were not being heard, that they were being thrown into the background," Peker said by phone from the town of Bursa in northwest Turkey.
"My feeling is that the government had to listen to what these people were thinking. It should not ignore them, or it will end up with hundreds of thousands of resentful people," said Peker, who wrote an open letter criticizing the prime minister that was published by Turkish newspapers Wednesday.
Still, he said, he would vote for Erdogan's party if elections were held tomorrow.
"Of course, my ideology won't change in one day," he said. "I support many of its other policies. On the economy, its foreign policy, what it has done about (improving) health. There is no other party that fits my views."
"But the party I want is one that brings the people together."
----
Associated Press writers Suzan Fraser and Ezgi Akin in Ankara and Nebi Qena in Istanbul contributed to this report.
Source : Sapa-AP /mjs
Date : 06 Jun 2013 00:55
OrbitalDawn
Ulysses Everett McGill
I heard this morning that the party who's in power now has increased their share of the vote in the last 3 elections. But now this massive uprising. Seems there's a serious divide between the modernised youth and conservative older people.
AlphaBravo
Expert Member
Just another revolution brought on by Power hungry politicians, it is the human condition.
LazyLion
King of de Jungle
Turkey Unrest highlights PM, President Rivalry as Elections Loom
Premier Recep Tayyip Erdogan and President Abdullah Gul have strongly differing lines on Turkey's mass protests, throwing a spotlight on their growing rivalry ahead of next year's elections when both could potentially run for the presidency, observers say.
Ever since the first rounds of tear gas were fired at peaceful protesters in Istanbul's Taksim Square last week, escalating into violent clashes nationwide, Turkey's powerful prime minister has responded with characteristic defiance.
Despite facing the biggest challenge to his decade-long rule, the 59-year-old leader has dismissed the demonstrators as "extremists" and pressed on with an official trip to North Africa, vowing that the situation at home would be resolved by the time he returned on Thursday.
That prediction has been rubbished by demonstrators gathering in ever larger numbers to call for Erdogan's resignation, accusing him of authoritarianism and of imposing conservative, Islamic values on the predominantly Muslim but staunchly secular country.
"It's very hurtful to be treated this way," Ahmet Insel, a political scientist at Istanbul's Galatasaray University, said about the many young protesters whose anger has been stoked by Erdogan's tough stance.
"It's hard for him (Erdogan) to tone down his aggressive and arrogant language, which doesn't go down well with an important fringe section of society."
In stark contrast, 62-year-old head of state Gul -- often described as Turkey's "good cop" to Erdogan's "bad cop" -- has struck a conciliatory tone, reassuring the protesters their message had been "received" and urging them to voice their views in a peaceful way.
But Gul is no stranger to controversy: his history of political Islam and the symbolism of his wife's decision to wear a headscarf provoked widespread criticism when he was elected in 2007.
Pressed to respond to Gul's softer remarks on the protests, Erdogan said he did not know what the president meant, "but for me, democracy comes from the ballot box".
Long considered close political allies -- Gul and Erdogan co-founded the governing Islamic-rooted party Justice and Development Party (AKP) which has won three successive elections since 2002 -- the pair have toed a different line on several occasions in recent months, including on the issue of lifting immunity for Kurdish lawmakers.
Observers say their possible competing bids for the 2014 election, when voters will for the first time directly elect their president, will increasingly highlight their differences.
While neither has officially declared their candidacy, some experts expect incumbent Gul to seek a second term in 2014.
Populist Erdogan, whose popularity has grown with every election but whose party rules bar him from a fourth term as premier, is expected to try to boost the constitutional powers of the presidency before making his bid.
Experts believe he wants to continue his political career with a powerful executive presidency similar to that in the United States, rather than the current largely ceremonial one.
Erdogan is credited with bringing relative stability to Turkey after years of rocky coalition governments, building the country into a regional political and economic power.
He could count on the support of half the electorate in the last election but his zero-tolerance attitude to criticism and his tendency to use the courts to silence opponents have proven a major test for the country which has long sought to join the European Union.
Even as the race for the presidency has yet to be fought out in the open, the anti-government unrest that has brought thousands to the streets has already affected the chances of the would-be candidates, according to observers.
"Erdogan has been weakened by this crisis and his ascent to the post of president has been compromised," journalist Deniz Zeyrek wrote in an editorial for the Radikal, a liberal daily.
Gul, on the other hand, "has consolidated his democratic image", he added.
Source : Sapa-AFP /pk
Date : 06 Jun 2013 11:54
Premier Recep Tayyip Erdogan and President Abdullah Gul have strongly differing lines on Turkey's mass protests, throwing a spotlight on their growing rivalry ahead of next year's elections when both could potentially run for the presidency, observers say.
Ever since the first rounds of tear gas were fired at peaceful protesters in Istanbul's Taksim Square last week, escalating into violent clashes nationwide, Turkey's powerful prime minister has responded with characteristic defiance.
Despite facing the biggest challenge to his decade-long rule, the 59-year-old leader has dismissed the demonstrators as "extremists" and pressed on with an official trip to North Africa, vowing that the situation at home would be resolved by the time he returned on Thursday.
That prediction has been rubbished by demonstrators gathering in ever larger numbers to call for Erdogan's resignation, accusing him of authoritarianism and of imposing conservative, Islamic values on the predominantly Muslim but staunchly secular country.
"It's very hurtful to be treated this way," Ahmet Insel, a political scientist at Istanbul's Galatasaray University, said about the many young protesters whose anger has been stoked by Erdogan's tough stance.
"It's hard for him (Erdogan) to tone down his aggressive and arrogant language, which doesn't go down well with an important fringe section of society."
In stark contrast, 62-year-old head of state Gul -- often described as Turkey's "good cop" to Erdogan's "bad cop" -- has struck a conciliatory tone, reassuring the protesters their message had been "received" and urging them to voice their views in a peaceful way.
But Gul is no stranger to controversy: his history of political Islam and the symbolism of his wife's decision to wear a headscarf provoked widespread criticism when he was elected in 2007.
Pressed to respond to Gul's softer remarks on the protests, Erdogan said he did not know what the president meant, "but for me, democracy comes from the ballot box".
Long considered close political allies -- Gul and Erdogan co-founded the governing Islamic-rooted party Justice and Development Party (AKP) which has won three successive elections since 2002 -- the pair have toed a different line on several occasions in recent months, including on the issue of lifting immunity for Kurdish lawmakers.
Observers say their possible competing bids for the 2014 election, when voters will for the first time directly elect their president, will increasingly highlight their differences.
While neither has officially declared their candidacy, some experts expect incumbent Gul to seek a second term in 2014.
Populist Erdogan, whose popularity has grown with every election but whose party rules bar him from a fourth term as premier, is expected to try to boost the constitutional powers of the presidency before making his bid.
Experts believe he wants to continue his political career with a powerful executive presidency similar to that in the United States, rather than the current largely ceremonial one.
Erdogan is credited with bringing relative stability to Turkey after years of rocky coalition governments, building the country into a regional political and economic power.
He could count on the support of half the electorate in the last election but his zero-tolerance attitude to criticism and his tendency to use the courts to silence opponents have proven a major test for the country which has long sought to join the European Union.
Even as the race for the presidency has yet to be fought out in the open, the anti-government unrest that has brought thousands to the streets has already affected the chances of the would-be candidates, according to observers.
"Erdogan has been weakened by this crisis and his ascent to the post of president has been compromised," journalist Deniz Zeyrek wrote in an editorial for the Radikal, a liberal daily.
Gul, on the other hand, "has consolidated his democratic image", he added.
Source : Sapa-AFP /pk
Date : 06 Jun 2013 11:54