Turkey protests: Dangerous waters with
no sign of compromise
11 June 2013
Last updated at 15:17 ET
![Mark Lowen]()
By Mark Lowen BBC
News, Istanbul
![Police fire tear gas in Taksim Square,
Istanbul, 11 June 2013]()
Police used tear gas to try to clear Taksim
Square
It began just after dawn
on Tuesday: the thud of tear gas fired across Taksim
Square in the biggest police operation here for over a
week.
Arcs of water cannon were spewed towards protesters,
some of whom responded with petrol bombs and bricks.
For 12 days, the central square in Turkey's biggest
city had been under the authority of a growing protest
movement. This was the moment that the government
decided to retake it.
All through the day, the game of cat and mouse
continued.
Once the police retreated, the protesters regrouped.
They took refuge in the adjoining Gezi Park, where the
unrest was first sparked in response to government
plans to redevelop it.
I watched as telecoms trucks were set ablaze, black
smoke fusing with the white plumes of tear gas into an
acrid mix.
Not listening
What began as a demonstration by environmentalists
has mushroomed into something far bigger: a fight by
disparate groups for greater freedom in Turkey and a
preservation of the country's secular order.
A protester tells Mark Lowen how tear gas felt like
"a panic attack"
They see a government with an authoritarian,
neo-Islamist agenda: the highest number of journalists
in the world in prison, restrictions on alcohol sales,
massive construction projects prioritised over human
rights.
"This is not an Arab spring", one protester, Melis
Behlil, told me.
"We have free elections here. But the problem is that
the person elected doesn't listen to us."
She told me she had been in Gezi Park since the
morning and that tear gas was thrown inside. "A
canister was fired towards the head of my colleague",
she said.
"Luckily, he was wearing a hard helmet, which was
ripped in half."
And what of the timing? The police clear-out came a
day before Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan was
supposed to hold talks with some protesters - a
potential chance for dialogue. That prospect now seems
in tatters.
Continuing support
But Mr Erdogan has stood firm throughout.
He has called the protesters "vandals" and
"terrorists".
On Tuesday he told parliament that the movement was
an international conspiracy against Turkey to
destabilise its economy.
He lashed out at the foreign press for launching
"comprehensive attacks" on the country and warned
protesters that they were pawns in a wider game. "We
won't show any more tolerance," he said.
Vast swathes of the country still back him. The
protest movement has made the headlines - but another
side of Turkey exists. Mr Erdogan's support base is
conservative and more religious.
They back a prime minister who has won three
elections, who has hugely increased Turkey's
international prestige, who has opened the country's
EU accession talks and launched a peace process with
the Kurdish minority.
He has rallied his troops in recent days and plans
big marches in Istanbul and Ankara this weekend.
The fear is that as the two sides square off against
each other, Turkey's schism will deepen, leading to
paralysis.
For now, there is no sign of compromise.
Peaceful majority
"If he wants to come and build on this park", said
Mert Ustas, one young protester, "he'll have to put
the cement on our heads."
![Injured protester in Taksim Square, Istanbul,
11 June 2013]()
A number of protesters were
injured in the operation
The prime minister has urged demonstrators to voice
their discontent at the ballot box in municipal and
presidential elections next year.
But he knows the unrest will have to be stemmed long
before then - and an attempt at reconciliation
launched.
As night fell, the clashes continued here.
But the violent protesters are a minority in an
otherwise peaceful social movement.
I have spent days in Taksim and Gezi Park and have
met mainly young leftist Turks enjoying a largely
festive atmosphere here. The petrol bomb-throwers are
the fringe.
Turkey is in deep crisis, unsure of the path ahead. A
large section of this population feels alienated from
the government and won't be cowed by tear gas.
One of the world's key Muslim democracies is now in
dangerous waters.
