PodcastTurkish police brutalize Suruç massacre commemorators, detain 60 protesters
Turkish police on July 20 brutalized commemorators of the Suruç massacre and detained 60 of them in Istanbul and İzmir. Even journalists who were trying to document the protestors' demonstration were attacked. On the sixth year anniversary of the massacre, the protestors were calling for justice, wanting cover-ups to end, local and national security forces held accountable for negligence.
The Suruç Families Initiative gathered with members of other civil society organizations on July 20 in Istanbul and İzmir to commemorate the sixth anniversary of the Suruç massacre that claimed the lives of 33 members of the Federation of Socialist Youth Associations (SGDF) and wounded more than a hundred in 2015.
The commemorators were met with brutal police intervention at both locations, using plastic bullets and pepper spray to disperse the crowds who had gathered to protest the government's negligence to track down responsibility and complicity on the part of the local and national security forces for the massacre.
The commemorators in Istanbul's Kadıköy district held banners that read "No dream left unfinished" and "Let hearts beat for justice," and chanted "We will call to account for Suruç massacre."
Police claimed that the crowd's chant constituted criminal activity and warned the group of an "intervention" if they didn't stop their demonstration.