What you need to know about protests in Turkey

• Police broke up an opposition rally using tear gas and water cannons
• The unrest comes amid internal conflict within the main opposition CHP
• The opposition is under inreased pressure following electoral gains over President Erdogan

 

Turkish riot police on Tuesday fired tear gas and used water cannons to disperse a rally called by ousted opposition leader Ozgur Ozel.

The rally took place in the coastal city of Izmir around midday (0900 GMT) as Turkey began preparations to shut down for four days to mark the religious holiday of Eid al-Adha, also known as the Greater Eid.

Before the rally began, the governorate ordered the closure of the city's central Cumhuriyet Square and deployed a large number of riot police with water cannon trucks to break up the flag-waving crowd, according to Turkish media reports.

"President Ozgur, free Turkey!" they shouted in scenes broadcast live on TV.

The demonstration moved to a nearby location and continued peacefully. Ozel addressed his supporters from a bus in Izmir, a city considered a stronghold of the secular opposition.

Political tensions escalate in Turkey

The protests in Izmir came just days after police stormed the headquarters of Turkey's main opposition CHP party to take control of the building.

Police stormed the premises using tear gas and journalists were removed from the building in Ankara.

That marked a violent end to a standoff that had been going on for several hours between members of the Republican Peoples' Party, or CHP, and its new court-appointed leadership.

Tensions had been rising since last week when an appeals court nullified the election of Ozgur Ozel as party chairperson in 2023, suspending him and members of the party's executive board.

The ruling said he should be replaced by Kemal Kilicdaroglu, his predecessor, who led the party for 13 years but never won any national elections.

Ozel, who is 51 years old, is one of the few remaining figures within the party to have avoided charges that could land him in detention.

The court ruling was the latest in a string of moves against the CHP, which scored a major political win over President Recep Tayyip Erdogan's ruling AKP party in 2024 local elections.

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Edited by: Dmytro Hubenko