TURKEY: Workers clean up the streets after fierce clashes in the Turkish capital of Ankara

Record ID: 861867

  • Title: TURKEY: Workers clean up the streets after fierce clashes in the Turkish capital of Ankara
  • Date: 4th June 2013
  • Summary: ANKARA, TURKEY (JUNE 4, 2013) (REUTERS) VARIOUS OF CLEANING TRUCK SWEEPING ROAD HEAVY MACHINERY WORKING VARIOUS OF WORKERS CLEANING STREETS VARIOUS OF POLICE / SECURITY
  • Embargoed: 19th June 2013 13:00
  • Keywords:
  • Location: Turkey
  • City:
  • Country: Turkey
  • Topics: Crime / Law Enforcement,Domestic Politics
  • Reuters ID: LVA874357C62SYUMNRM3RO9IWOWC
  • Aspect Ratio:
  • Story Text: The streets of Ankara were calm on Tuesday (June 4) morning after days of clashes.
    As municipality workers cleared the streets, police tightened security in areas in the capital where the clashes took place.
    Tens of thousands of people took to the streets in Turkey's four biggest cities for the past four days and clashed with riot police firing tear gas in the fiercest anti-government protests in years.
    Hundreds of police and protesters have been injured since Friday (May 31), when a demonstration to halt construction in a park in an Istanbul square grew into mass protests against a heavy-handed crackdown and what opponents call Erdogan's authoritarianism. Protests have been held in dozens of cities.
    The demonstrations showed no sign of abating on Monday (June 3) with protesters gathering again in Taksim Square. Barricades of rubble hindered traffic alongside the Bosphorus waterway and blocked entry into the area. Leftist groups hung out red and black flags and banners calling on Erdogan to resign and declaring: "Whatever happens, there is no going back."
    In Ankara, protesters threw up a barricade in the Kizilay government quarter and lit a fire in the road as a helicopter circled overhead.
    Police charged demonstrators, mostly teenagers, and scattered them using tear gas and water cannon.
    Erdogan has dismissed the protests as the work of secularist enemies never reconciled to the mandate of his AK party, which has roots in Islamist parties banned in the past but which also embraces centre-right and nationalist elements.
    The party has won three straight elections and overseen an economic boom, increasing Turkey's influence in the region.
    Turkey's leftist Public Workers Unions Confederation (KESK), which represents 240,000 members, said it would hold a "warning strike" on June 4-5 to protest over the crackdown on what had begun as peaceful protests.
    The unrest delivered a blow to Turkish financial markets that have thrived under Erdogan. Shares fell more than 10 percent and the lira dropped to 16-month lows.
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