Erdoğan assures Taksim protesters no mall will be built at Gezi Park
Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan who made a speech at the Ministry of European Affairs Istanbul conference on June 7 signaled no withdrawal regarding the construction of a historical barracks at Taksim Gezi Park.
However, he assured protesters that no mall would be built on the site and urged that protests which he claimed to have turned into vandalism should come to an end.
The Prime Minister took every chance to emphasize his willingness to discuss “democratic rights” and said the shopping mall was not possible in the Artillery Barracks anyway, on account of measures. He went on to say “We told them that we may build a city museum instead, and a green area that would be far better than the current park. We also wanted to turn the Atatürk Culture Center to an opera building.”
Erdoğan who spoke to a large group of foreign guests on June 7th stated the events had been subject to “horrible disinformation.”
The PM’s exact words were “Social media has bred terrible campaigns of lies. I know every one of the sources. You have to know who to address in these situations, and this one has no one for me. It makes you wonder what the function of their parliamentary counterparts is”.
Turkish Premier also claimed that a certain part of those at the Gezi protests wanted to harm the ongoing peace process and added that the European Union was also at fault in supporting such demonstrations.
Erdoğan’s words were “On one side you say you support the peace process then you go ahead and support these people who wish to intervene with the process”.
Furthermore, foreign media was at the PM’s target and he accused foreign outlets of “serving stories to placed orders with ideological approaches”. This comment was obviously targeted at the recent full-page ad placed by Gezi supporters on the pages of The New York Times.
07.06.2013
SOURCE: MEDIA
