Turkey marks 566th anniversary of conquest of Istanbul

ISTANBUL-Anadolu Agency

Turkey's president marked the 566th anniversary on May 29 of Istanbul's conquest by Ottoman troops, "which started a new age and changed the course of world history."     

"May Ottoman Sultan Mehmet II and his heroic army rest in peace," Recep Tayyip Erdoğan said on Twitter more than half a millennium after Ottoman Sultan Mehmed II stormed the city straddling Europe and Asia on May 29, 1453.     

Additionally, Turkey's presidential communications director commemorated the anniversary.

“We shout out! We say persistently to those who cannot stand Istanbul to become an Islamic city, to those who set an eye on these sacred lands, to those colonized minds which say 'the persecution began in 1453' that may the 566th anniversary of the conquest of Istanbul be blessed,” Fahrettin Altun wrote on Twitter.

Sultan Mehmet II conquered the city from where the Byzantines ruled the Eastern Roman Empire for more than 1,000 years.

The conquest transformed the city, once the heart of the Byzantine realm, into the capital of the new Ottoman Empire.