ISTANBUL — Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan on Thursday toughened his stance against demonstrators who continued to occupy a park in central Istanbul just one day after he met with leaders of the protest movement for the first time, declaring in a nationally televised speech that the use of force by the police was justified if order was not immediately restored. He said it was his “final” warning.
Over the past two weeks, Gezi Park in Taksim Square has become a central gathering place for Turkish citizens disillusioned with Mr. Erdogan’s government, presenting him with his most serious challenge in his decade in power. Despite his blunt warning, crowds grew in the park Thursday morning, preparing for a confrontation.
After Mr. Erdogan met with protest leaders on Wednesday, he seemed to offer a compromise, proposing a public referendum to decide the fate of the park, where the government plans to build a mall designed like an Ottoman-era army barracks. But he coupled any thought of reconciliation with an ultimatum that if protesters did not disperse immediately, they would be forcibly removed.
“We have not responded to punches with punches. From now on security forces will respond differently,” Mr. Erdogan said on Wednesday. “This issue will be over in 24 hours.”
Mr. Erdogan reiterated and sharpened that warning in a speech on Thursday morning.
“Using a Molotov cocktail is a crime, burning and destroying is a crime, destroying public order is a crime,” he said in his televised statement, in reference to protesters who set barriers around Gezi Park to block police interference. “These cannot be called a struggle for freedom, struggle for rights.”
He signaled yet another security operation on Gezi Park, the epicenter of protests during which several protesters and a police officer have been killed and thousands have been injured.
“Please attend your children, pull them back, otherwise we would not be able to wait any longer,” he said. “Because Gezi Park does not belong to occupying forces.”
Mr. Erdogan’s mixed message — offering a referendum while at the same time threatening a crackdown — was the latest move in the prime minister’s seemingly confused strategy to resolve the crisis over Gezi Park.
On Thursday, he called foreign and local news media coverage “immoral and misleading.”
Speaking before officials of his ruling Justice and Development Party in Ankara, Mr. Erdogan dismissed criticisms by the European Union, which Turkey has long aspired to join.
“I do not recognize any European Union Parliament decision on us,” he said to a standing ovation.
As Mr. Erdogan’s beleaguered government issued its latest warning, thousands of protesters returned to the square after the riot police dispersed crowds Tuesday night and Wednesday morning with tear gas and water cannons.
In Gezi Park, protesters on Thursday were girding for a police raid that they expected to come at any moment. Many were skeptical of the government’s plan to hold a referendum, and some said it was not a suitable solution.
“They first tell us to go home, and then they present the idea of the referendum?” asked Bora Ekrem, 24, a student. “How can we trust them? If they were sincere about a vote, they would not ask us to leave the park. We will not leave until they declare the park is ours.”
The referendum was also seen as an attempt by the government to confine the protests to the debate about the park, when the park controversy was in fact the catalyst for a broader outburst of civil unrest against what many Turks see as the increasing authoritarianism of Mr. Erdogan and his Justice and Development Party.
“A referendum would be a step forward, and I think we could win,” said a protester, Zeynep Pinto, 28, an interior designer. “But we want more than the park now. We want change.”
Experts criticized the idea of taking to a referendum what is essentially an urban planning decision that should be made by local representatives and not dictated by the prime minister, as such issues often are in Turkey. A court decision has temporarily halted construction at the park.
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