Berkin Elvan

A man on trial for insulting the father of Berkin Elvan, the youngest victim of the 2013 Gezi protests, has testified he was ?encouraged? by then-prime minister President Recep Tayyip Erdo?an, saying ?Similar remarks were previously made by the president of this country.?

The youngest victim of the Gezi Park protests, 14 year-old Berkin Elvan, was commemorated June 16 where he was shot by a tear gas canister in Istanbul on June 16, 2013.

Elvan died in March 2014 after lying in a coma for 269 days. Carnations and bread were laid where he was shot.

Özgür Mumcu, a journalist for Turkish daily newspaper Cumhuriyet, faces up to four years eight months in prison for ?defaming? President Recep Tayyip Erdo?an in an opinion piece published on March 18.

The op-ed penned by Mumcu had the title ?Tyrant and a coward,? and criticized Erdo?an?s complaint against Hatice Cömert, the mother of Gezi protest victim Abdullah Cömert. 

Hundreds of Turkish citizens defied stepped-up security measures in Istanbul adopted for the second anniversary since the Gezi Park protests.

In 2013, what started as an environmental demonstration grew into days-long rallies against the government of then PM Recep Tayyip Erdogan which culminated violently.

Riot police and water cannons stood on alert on May 31 as Taksim Square and Gezi Park, alongside numerous roads and metro stations leading to Taksim, were closed to prevent gatherings called by Taksim Solidarity, a collective organization of several rights groups at the center of the Gezi Park protests, to commemorate the second anniversary of the nationwide anti-government protests. 

Riot police and water cannons stood on alert on May 31 as Taksim Square and Gezi Park, alongside numerous roads and metro stations leading to Taksim, were closed to prevent gatherings called by Taksim Solidarity, a collective organization of several rights groups at the center of the Gezi Park protests, to commemorate the second anniversary of the nationwide anti-government protests. 

A Turkish artist on May 30 unveiled a two-storey-high mural featuring those killed in protests two years ago over an Istanbul park that spiralled into nationwide demonstrations against the leadership of Tayyip Erdo?an.
   

Twenty-year-old Mehmet Ayval?ta?, 22-year-old Abdullah Cömert, 26-year-old Ethem Sar?sülük, 18-year-old Medeni Y?ld?r?m, 19-year-old Ali ?smail Korkmaz, 23-year-old Ahmet Atakan and 15-year-old Berkin Elvan? 

It has been two years since they were murdered during the Gezi Park incidents. 

An investigation was launched May 28 into social media posts made by a number of prominent media figures during the March 31 hostage crisis in Istanbul?s Ça?layan courthouse, Al Jazeera Türk has reported.

Painter Haydar Özay, the son of the 21-year gardener of Istanbul's Gezi Park, has spent his life there. He has recently finished a huge, 50-square meter painting of the park, which will be on view from May 30, the second anniversary of the Gezi protests.