New charges for Gezi Park protesters as anniversary nears

A Turkish court has ordered the arrest of 47 suspects in the Gezi Park protests that kicked off on 28 May 2013, on the same day that an activist group calls for action on the 31 May to commemorate the event.

In total, about 255 defendants, including seven foreigners, stand accused of a variety of charges including damage of public property and theft during the demonstrations that originated in Gezi Park, Taksim Square in Istanbul.

Some are accused of “damaging a place of worship” due to the fact that they took shelter from tear gas attacks in a mosque.

The 47 newly ordered arrest warrants are due to a failure to enter defence pleas, a chargeable offense.

The charges come as the pioneers of last year’s demonstrations issue a call for rallies on Saturday to mark the anniversary.

The group Taksim Solidarity organised a press conference this morning in Istanbul, in which spokesperson Mücella Yapıcı called for anniversary rallies on the 31 May “in Ankara, İzmir, Antakya, Eskişehir, Bursa, Adana, Mersin and Diyarbakır” and that they would organise in Taksim Square as a reminder “that we, as Taksim Solidarity, didn’t abandon our demands and our gains.”

“Thriving on the creative intelligence of our youth,” the group said in a statement, “the embracing compassion of our mothers, the power of the workers, the vibrant voice of women, and the loud cry of the LGBTI, the Gezi Resistance has left a permanent honourable mark in the social, urban and democratic history of our country.”

Sorrowful times

Istanbul governor Husein Avni Mutlu already announced on Wednesday that protesters would not be allowed access to Taksim Square on Saturday.

“We know what Turkey experienced last June,” he said in response to reporters’ questions, according to the website Today’s Zaman. “We went through sorrowful times for our city, our country and our people. We do not wish for such incidents to be repeated. The peace of this country and the security of the city must not be thrown into a risky situation, like in the past. It is all our responsibility to keep peace and security.”

The governor already provoked some controversy this morning on social media after cryptically tweeting: “You can’t make baklava with maize flour and you can’t make a dough roller from a mulberry tree.”

The tweet resulted in a barrage of jeering tweets from other users, with one saying “It should be fig tree, not mulberry” and another saying “OK, but if you make a dough roller from a mulberry tree anyway, would police intervene?” a reference to the heavy-handed tactics of police during the demonstrations last year.