Wednesday, June 5, 2013

Turkish Revolution evening report: victorious skirmishes in Ankara, twitter and FB censored, last message of a revolutionary martyr, etc.

Police shields captured by the rebels
It seems confirmed by now that the "democratic" Turkish Islamist government has censored some sites since days ago, notably Twitter and Facebook. The media is no or almost no reporting anything.

A letter from a Turkish woman, published by the Coordinadora Antifascista de Sevilla integrally in the original English version reads (emphasis mine):

How are you dear? We are terrible, I'm writing this mail because I think that you should know how we are doing in here right now. 

4 days ago young people who live in Estambul, they protest in a natural park. Because government wants to destroy this park and they want to build a new shopping centre. So too many youngers protest this situation in this place. But suddenly fucking polices attacked them with panzers and tanks. They used really really disproportionate force. And when the Turkish people see that on social media.

In just one day, all of the cities of Turkey protest this. And now this is civil resistance! Many young people dead, and police is going on to use disproportionate force. They nonstop using tear gas. This is the first time for Turkey, People fight with Police. 

Other hand our fucking facist government dont show anything about this fight on TV. And government blocked some websites like facebook, twitter etc. They want to blocked our communication with other cities. Because you can see this civil war just on facebook. So we are trying to share this with foreign friends to distribute all over the world. 

Unfortunately, terribly, one of my friends brother dead in this protest. I will send a youtube link you can see him. And I'm sending some photos to explain myself more.

In this three days I'm wearing your Huelga shirt (proudly) and I'm going to protest.

Por favor, Pray for us Dear. 

While it has been impossible to confirm any deaths so far in the several days of this revolutionary uprising, it seems that a lot of people are either dead or struggling between life and death, while the injured and arrested must be in the many thousands already.

This Sunday, Erdogan, in a TV interview declared: There is now a threat and its name is Twitter, reports El Diario[es].

People have been in fact persecuted in Turkey for making anti-religion comments in Twitter or writing columns criticizing the re-islamization policies of the government long before this uprising. And this increase of ideological persecution under the AKP is in fact one of the main factors behind the popular anger.

In response to this censorship, Anoymous has provided some channels to evade censorship (not sure how they work but copy-pasting them here anyhow):
For people in Turkey free VPN access:Username: vpnbookPassword: rac3vat9Server #2: euro2.vpnbook.com (Anonymous VPN) #YAN
— Anonymous (@YourAnonNews) 2 de junio de 2013

Anonymous has also attacked government sites and published some propaganda videos in solidarity with the Turkish Revolution.

Site of the murder of Cömert Abdullah
One of the mortal victims, and so far the only one named, as far as I know, is Cömert Abdullah, 22. He wrote this (translated from an Spanish version) before heading to his last street battle:

I slept only 5 hours. I have been hit by tear gas innumerable times, I risked death three times, and do you know what they say? To renounce to it, maybe is it going to be you who saves the nation?

Yes, and if we are not saved we will die in the process. (I'm so tired that I have got myself standing on 7 energetic drinks and 9 analgesics on three days, my voice is gone, but I'm going to be out there in the plaza again at 6 just for the revolution).

What can I say? It makes me cry... What a powerful overflowing youthful revolutionary enthusiasm!

On the brighter side, there is this video of a recent street battle in Ankara, where the people appears to defeat the police and take their weapons for themselves:




Spanish communist blog La Mancha Obrera publishes also an interview of some interest with Kemal Okuyan, member of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Turkey (TKP) and editor of Sol newspaper. Some translated excerpts:

(...) Nobody could estimate the dimensions of what we are living now. The Government could not, the majority opposition could not, nor could either the Left. (...) This is important. The political and ideological climate of Turkey today is different to that of 4 or 5 days ago. It is not completely different from then but it has indeed changed at an scale that cannot be understimated. 

(...) it is the culmination, at an incredible level, of the reaction, even of the hatred against the AKP government and especially against Erdogan. We thought we knew this but there was something we forgot: this hatred against Erdogan has solidified, it has grown at the same time as Erdogan grew in his arrogance, solidified his impunity. On the other hand everyone minusvalorated this hatred because it was not manifested or seemed not to have any use. But hatred is not a feeling that can be underestimated.(...)

(...) Erdogan is a catalyzer and has a multiplying effect but the movement has as goal to pay back to the fundamental elements expressed by the AKP (...)

(...) there is a middle class character in this but there has been also an important mobilization in the worker neighborhoods of Istanbul and Ankara. (...) There are limits to class organization in the workplace of a mass movement that is unstable, that moves and has also to face unemployment. It is time to look at the workplace with a new logic. We have transferred the working class to the unions' structure but the unions do not have a solid base either. All the country has arisen and the unions are not there. There is no tool that can activate the working class as leader, as dominant force! (...) Dozens of people who are classified as "middle class" have issued demands that are founded on an anticapitalist axis. The reason is that most of them are people whose work is being exploited. 

(...) This is an uprising of the People. The People is angry. Those who underestimate the opposition to Erdogan and the AKP should think again. Those who think that there will be peace and democracy with Erdogan should do the same.


Update: Webguerrillero[es] reports that another mortal victim of police violence is a person named Sarisuluk. According to witnesses, he was shot in the head in cold blood by a police agent, dying almost instantly. His death was confirmed on June 2nd at around 17:00.

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