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1 of 6People try to escape from a cafe, after tear gas fired by riot police outside to disperse protesters seeped in, at central Istanbul, May 31, 2014.Yagiz Karahan—Reuters -
2 of 6A plain clothes police officer, left, detains a protestor.Bulent Kilic—AFP/Getty Images -
3 of 6Anti-government protesters lie on the ground after riot police fired teargas.Murad Sezer—Reuters -
4 of 6A protester walks away with closed eyes as Turkish riot police officers fire tear gas to disperse demonstrators.Bulent Kilic—AFP/Getty Images -
5 of 6A man protects a woman as they face a police officer dispersing protesters who gathered on the central Istoklal avenue near Taksim square.Bulent Kilic—AFP/Getty Images -
6 of 6Injured protesters escape.Gurcan Ozturk—AFP/Getty Images
Police fired tear gas and water cannons at protestors in Istanbul Saturday on the one-year anniversary of the Taksim Square protests. It was a heavy-handed effort to prevent the mass protests that rocked the country last year, and in Istanbul’s Taksim Square, 25,000 police were deployed, charging protestors who huddled together en masse, reports the BBC. Earlier in the day, a CNN reporter was detained by police.
Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan has faced an increasingly divided electorate in the face of attempts to block YouTube and Twitter and quell opponents.
Erdogan warned young people Friday not to partake in demonstrations, saying the movement begun last year against his government was founded by “terrorist organizations” that “manipulated our morally and financially weak youth to attack our unity and put our economy under threat”.
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