ISTANBUL - Police intervened in a group of people who attempted to hold an illegal demonstration in Beyazit Square in Istanbul on Tuesday and detained nearly thirty people.
Nearly 100 people who gathered in the main campus of the Istanbul University marched to the campus gate to the Beyazit Square and made a statement protesting the incidents that had happened in front of the university's Faculty of Pharmacy killing seven students and injuring forty-one others on March 16, 1978 and the use of chemical weapons in Halabji town of Iraq on March 16, 1988.
The group returned to the campus peacefully after laying carnations in front of the faculty.
Later, a group of nearly thirty people who went outside the main campus of the Istanbul University came to the Beyazit Square. Meanwhile, a group of nearly 450 people comprising several civil organizations and student associations members gathered at bus stops in Beyazit district and began marching to the Beyazit Square.
The group which came to the square at first comprised of mostly women who were carrying photographs reflecting the results of chemical missile attack on Halabji and banners and they chanted slogans in Turkish and Kurdish about the recent incidents happened in Syria.
Meanwhile, other groups carrying banners entered the square by chanting slogans protesting the March 16 incident.
Police intervened in the demonstration with pepper-gas and clubs when groups attempted to make a press statement.
When police officers from the Rapid Deployment intervened in the groups, demonstrators dispersed through several directions. Meanwhile, some demonstrators threw stones at security forces.
(MS-AÖ) 16.03.2004