Top court approves Istanbul development that sparked protests in 2013

Turkey's top administrative court has removed its block on a controversial redevelopment of an Istanbul park that in 2013 sparked the most serious anti-government protests in years, a pressure group said on Thursday.

Istanbul authorities had planned to rebuild an Ottoman-era barracks on the site of Gezi Park, one of the few green spaces in the city centre, on the fringes of Taksim Square. But the construction was blocked by court order after the mass protests in May–June 2013 that snowballed into a wave of public anger against the rule of President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, then premier, and left eight people dead.

But the Taksim Solidarity pressure group, which monitors the issue, said Turkey's top administrative court, the Council of State, had reversed its previous decision to block the construction. It denounced the authorities for putting "the pursuit of short-term economic interests before our political, natural, historic and cultural assets" and said the decision was "evidence of the political pressure on the judiciary".

"The decision is devoid of all professional, ethical and scientific principles," it said. The group warned that "Taksim Square and Gezi Park are no longer just under the protection of Istanbul and Turkey but under the whole world."

The court decision was taken on 31 March, after a rare appeal by the municipality of Istanbul. However the ruling was never communicated publicly and was first reported by the daily newspaper "Cumhuriyet" on Wednesday, before being confirmed by Taksim Solidarity.

News of the ruling angered secular opponents of the Islamic-rooted Erdogan and the Twitter hashtag #SanaGeziyiYiktirmayacagiz (We will not let you destroy Gezi) has become a worldwide trending topic.

The decision by the Council of State paves the way for the creation of an expert panel that could then give the green light for the redevelopment.

Before the protests, the municipality had aimed to rebuild the nineteenth-century barracks for luxury commercial and residential use. The barracks – designed by the famous Armenian-origin Balyan family of Ottoman architects – had stood for decades but were badly damaged during a rebellion in 1909. After housing Turkey's first football stadium in the 1920s, the barracks were demolished in the 1940s and Gezi Park built in their place as part of an urban transformation plan.    (AFP)

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