‘Liberated’ Gezi Park sees municipal facelift

ISTANBUL- Hürriyet Daily News

Istanbul’s Gezi Park is decorated witcn new flowers and some cement.

Istanbul Metropolitan Municipality started re-shaping Istanbul’s Gezi Park by planting trees and flowers as of June 15, after Turkish police executed a heavy crackdown on occupiers in the park.

The municipality has been continuously carrying out renovation works in the park since June 23 after removing tents and banners. Lighting columns were also renewed in the park. At the end of the whole work, municipal workers planted 202,000 seasonal flowers, 100 trees and 5,000 roses, the municipality announced, following 19 days of occupation by people protesting against plans to destroy the park to build a shopping mall.

For more than two weeks, riot police tried to silence the protests. On June 15, the Turkish Doctors Association reported that 5 people had been killed, 7,478 injured, four critically, and ten people had lost an eye as a result of being shot by police using tear gas canisters.

Meanwhile, thousands marched in the southern province of Adana on June 23 as police repeatedly intervened to disperse the crowd.

Some 12 protesters were detained while two protesters and a police officer were injured, according to Doğan news agency.