Editorial Board
Erdogan Shows Why Turkey Shouldn’t Give Him More Power
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Protests against plans to replace an Istanbul park with a shopping mall have spread across Turkey, metastasizing into something far more politically significant. While the demonstrations aren’t the start of a Turkish Spring, they show why Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s design to turn his country into a presidential republic next year should be stopped.
The police response to the Gezi Park protests has been brutal, hundreds of people and turning central Istanbul into a battle zone. The nation’s leader should have tried to defuse the situation by listening to the protesters’ concerns and calling for restraint from the security forces. That is how President Abdullah Gul responded.