In Istanbul, over 50 individuals were apprehended by Turkish authorities during a prohibited march for Istanbul Pride on Sunday. This marks the continuation of a government crackdown on the event that has persisted for over ten years.
With a strong police presence, strategic locations throughout the city were effectively locked down, preventing any significant gatherings from forming. This forced the organizers to repeatedly change their plans and relocate the event.
Yildiz Tar, who serves as the editor-in-chief of the LGBTQ+ rights organization and the magazine Kaos GL, reported on social media platform X that 54 people, including six legal representatives, were taken into custody during the march. By Sunday evening, only seven of those detained had been released, while the remaining 47 individuals were still being held.
The Confederation of Progressive Trade Unions of Turkey (DISK) confirmed that there were at least three journalists among those detained during the event.
Despite the crackdown, the event did receive some political support. Kezban Konukcu, a Member of Parliament from the Peoples’ Equality and Democracy Party (DEM), who participated in the event, made a defiant statement: “The palace regime will not be able to stay in power by demonizing the LGBTQ community.”
Although Istanbul Pride once welcomed tens of thousands of participants, this has changed since 2015. The ban on the event has coincided with the increasingly religiously conservative stance of the ruling Justice and Development Party, as it seeks to appeal to its conservative base.