Protesters gathered in Turkey's Istanbul on Thursday after the arrest of the city's mayor Ekrem Imamoglu yesterday, a prominent opposition politician and opponent of President Recep Tayyip Erdogan.
People took to the streets for the second day to protest against the government and after the authorities also limited access to social media such as X, TikTok, and Instagram. The protesters accuse the authorities of persecuting their political opponents while the opposition called Imamoglu's detention a "coup."
Previously, the authorities imposed a ban on all public gatherings in Istanbul in response to mass protests in the city on Wednesday and also moved to block road access to the local government's headquarters. Large protests were also observed in the country's capital Ankara, as well as Adana and Izmir.
