What exactly happened in Turkey last month and what is happening at this moment? What kind of historical events led up to it? You can find information on the history of the Turkish government and politics in SearchWorks.

On May 28, 2013 a peaceful sit-in at Gezi Park in Taksim, Istanbul was disrupted by police and resulted in a number of deaths and many injuries. The sit-in was a response to an announcement made by the government for plans to demolish the small park and replace it with a shopping mall. After the violent police reaction, many other protests about governmental personal liberty infringements in Turkey formed and grew into movements.

These movements emulate the Occupy movements from the western world and are rapidly spreading throughout the rest of Turkey (Ankara, Izmir, Bursa, Trabzon, Samsun Edirne, and many other cities). The popular Turkish band “Kardeş Türküler” has even produced a protest video on YouTube. Social media outlets, especially Twitter, are playing an important part in the quick distribution of public information. In response, Prime Minister Erdogan called Twitter a “menace.”

For current English-language news about the situation in Turkey we have links to daily online newspapers and their Facebook and Twitter accounts as well:

• Hurriyet Daily News website,  Twitter: @HDNER, Hurriyet Daily News Facebook page
• Today’s Zaman website, Twitter: @todayszamancom, Today's Zaman Facebook page
• Twitter hashtags to follow: #OccupyGezi and #DirenGeziParki
• A timeline of the events as explained by the Hurriyet Daily News
• Photos of the Occupy movement collected on a tumblr site