Hotel owners protest Çıralı demolitions

ANTALYA - Doğan News Agency

AA Photo

The owners and employees of four small hotels demonstrated yesterday with their supporters in the Mediterranean province of Antalya in protest of the evacuation and demolition of the hotels by authorities on the grounds that they were unlicensed.

Some 60 people attempted to block the demolition workers from entering the location inside a forest by the Çıralı Beach in Antalya’s Kemer district. The protestors first held a sit-in demonstration over the Antalya-Kumluca Highway and then held another sit-in protest over the Çıralı Bridge, effectively blocking all vehicular traffic on the road.

Authorities had indicated they would demolish some 300 unlicensed commercial and residential buildings in the villages of Beycik, Ulupınar and Gedelme, besides those in Çıralı Beach.