Angry relatives face with riot police in Soma (Photo: DHA)
While Erdoğan was speaking to the media about the incident, rocks were being thrown and some people were shouting that Erdoğan was a “Murderer!” and a “Thief!”
Nearly 30 people came to Taksim Square to stage a silent protest of the fatal mining accident on Wednesday. The group lay motionless on the ground at the square for some time. The group dispersed without shouting slogans or making any press statements.
Another group staged a sit-in protest in İstanbul’s Kadıköy district on Wednesday. The protesters lit candles for the miners killed in the disaster and shouted slogans like, “We will burn the murderers with the same coals that swallowed the miners”; “This is not working accident, it is murder”; and “Miners didn’t die; they were killed.”
Police took strict security measures in front of an office of Soma Holding, the company that owns the Soma coal mine, in the Levent district of İstanbul on Wednesday as a precaution against demonstrations or attacks.
At the Taksim metro station, a group of people lay on the ground for a short time in silence in protest of the disaster in Soma.
Members of the Turkey Youth Union (TGB) and the Labor Youth gathered in Eskişehir province at 1:00 a.m. on Wednesday and lit candles for the miners. The protesters, who wore miner’s helmets, kept protesting through the night. They accused the government of being the “killer of the miners.”
Another sit-in protest was held in Ankara’s Güvenpark. Members of civil society organization People’s Houses (Halkevleri) marched on the Energy and Natural Resources Ministry headquarters in Ankara, shouted slogans in protest of the disaster.
A group of students from Middle East Technical University (ODTÜ) who attempted to march toward the Energy and Natural Resources Ministry to protest the death of the miners was met with police force. Police used water cannon and tear gas against the students.