Seven fined for pan banging in southern province of Antalya

ANTALYA – Anatolia News Agency

A court in Antalya has fined seven people 88 Turkish Liras each for noise pollution from pan and pot banging, a protest that started as a reaction to the police intervention in the Gezi Park demonstrations in Istanbul. DHA photo

A court in Antalya has fined seven people 88 Turkish Liras each for noise pollution from pan and pot banging, a protest that started as a reaction to the police intervention in the Gezi Park demonstrations in Istanbul.

Atilla Sözbir, lawyer of pharmacist Aslı Filiz, one of the seven people fined 88 liras under the misdemeanor law, said they had filed a petition of objection to the Finike Penal Court of Peace. Sözbir said the fine was against the law and no one could be penalized for noise pollution for participating in a countrywide protest. He said protesting was a democratic right of his client and the other demonstrators.

Sözbir said they had objected the fines on the other six people.

Filiz said she held a pan-banging protest for about a week from her balcony at around 9 p.m. Filiz said her husband had flashed the lights to support the protests. She claimed that the fine was not a result of her neighbors’ complaints.

After the Gezi Park protests, which started in late May against a construction project in Istanbul’s iconic Taksim Square, pan and pot banging protests became widespread across the country to support the demonstrators.