A total of 97 people have been arrested in Türkiye In the mass demonstrations convened this Friday to demand the Resignation of the Government of Rece Tayyip Erdogan y protest against the arrest of the mayor of the town of IstanbulEkrem Imamoglu, who has been accused of corruption and terrorism and is one of the president’s main political rivals.
Tens of thousands of protesters concentrated on various cities of the country, mainly in Estambul, Ankara to Izmir, Despite restrictions and prohibition to demonstrate, as reported by local media.
According to Turkish Interior Minister Ali Yerlikaya, 97 people were arrested “for the crime of resistance to fulfilling their functions.”
Different cities
People chanted, among other songs, “resignation government”, and they had also convened protests in other cities in the country for the night. As local media have disseminated, they were dispersed with tear gas.
On Friday morning, the Turkish president described the protests of “street terror” and accused the main opposition party, the Republican Party (CHP) of Imamoglu, of taking advantage of the investigation as a pretext to plunge the country in chaos.
“We will not tolerate any alteration of public order. Just as before we did not yield to street terror, now we will not bow to vandalism,” said Erdogan.
Court slopes
A court has not yet ruled on accusations of corruption and terrorism against Imamoglu and other people, although the arrest of the mayor on Wednesday caused protests throughout the country.
A total of 326 accounts were being investigated for encouraging criminal acts in social networks, as announced by Turkish Interior Minister Ali Yerlikaya.
The Ankara authorities prohibited for five days the right to concentration throughout the province, the capital of the country included, in a decision taken “for interest of public protection” after two days mobilizations of national scale for the arrest of the mayor of Istanbul and one of the great opposition leaders of the country.
