Turkish PM Erdoğan to meet with Taksim protesters on Wednesday, Deputy PM says

ISTANBUL

AFP photo

Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan will meet with a group representing the Taksim Gezi Park protesters on June 12, Deputy Prime Minister Bülent Arınç said today, speaking after a Cabinet meeting headed by Erdoğan.

“The prime minister has given an appointment to some groups for Wednesday. They will be briefed on the facts of these incidents and our prime minister will listen to their thoughts,” Arınç told a group of reporters in Ankara after a six-hour-long Cabinet meeting.

However, Arınç did not identify the groups that would be met.

Meanwhile, the Taksim Solidarity Platform, which organized the protests against the park’s demolition from the very first day and held a meeting with Arınç on June 5, announced via its Twitter account that it was not the group that would be meeting with Erdoğan.

Arınç said “illegal demonstrations” would no “longer be allowed” in Turkey. “If the issue is the environment, democracy and human rights, then we really want to talk to the addressees of these issues,” he said, adding that damage to business places caused by the ongoing protests would be covered.

Meanwhile, the Deputy PM also said the government had “more than one concrete piece of evidence” about "foreign actors" behind the Gezi Park protests.

“We are seriously working on the domestic and foreign dimensions of the incidents. It looks as if these incidents are planned from one center and that there are internal efforts to make the incidents seem more than what they really are,” said Arınç.

He also said that Çarşı, football club Beşiktaş’s legendary supporters’ group, had declared that it would no longer support the protests, adding that other supporters’ groups might make similar statements soon.