Protesters gather for a mass rally in Istanbul at the call of Turkey’s main opposition CHP over the jailing of city mayor and top party figure Ekrem Imamoglu whose arrest has sparked the country’s biggest street demonstrations in over a decade.
The mass protests over Imamoglu’s March 19 detention have prompted a repressive government response that has been sharply condemned by rights groups and drawn criticism from abroad.
The rally in Maltepe on the Asian side of Istanbul comes on the eve of the Eid al-Fitr celebration marking the end of Ramadan, which starts tomorrow.
Widely seen as the only Turkish politician capable of challenging President Recep Tayyip Erdogan at the ballot box, Imamoglu was elected as the CHP’s candidate for the 2028 presidential race on the day he was jailed.
Under a cloudless blue sky, protesters with posters of Imamoglu can be heard chanting “Everywhere is Taksim, resistance is everywhere!” on board ferries crossing the Bosphorus to the Asian side of the city, an AFP correspondent says.
The slogans are referring to the city’s iconic Taksim Square, the epicentre of massive protests in 2013.
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