Solidarity demos across Europe for protestors in Turkey

Hundreds of people have gathered in Brussels, Madrid and most major German cities in a show of solidarity with protestors in Turkey,according to euronews.

Holding up anti-government banners and chanting “Resign,” the crowds called for Turkish premier Tayyip Erdogan to step down from what many now see as his increasingly authoritarian rule.

One protestor in Brussels told euronews, “We would like to get rid of this government first and get more freedom, freedom of speech. And at the end of it all, we’d like a better government.”

Many have

complained that Turkish mass media – under the control of Erdogan’s AKP party since 2002 – has been strangely mute about events over the last few days.

By contrast, Twitter, Facebook and other global sites have been humming with the news in Turkey.

But any talk of a ‘Turkish Spring’ seems – at least for the moment – premature. So far, only a small cross-section of society has been represented by the protestors, mainly upper-class youths from the secular “white Turk” social strata.

M. D