Protesters with the "adalet" or "justice" march passed through the towns of Tavsancil and Gebze as they approached their end point in Istanbul, Turkey on 7 July 2017. Opponents of President Recep Tayyip Erdogan have been walking from Turkey's capital, Ankara, to Istanbul in protest of ongoing purges and the jailing of elected officials. NurPhoto/SIPA USA/PA Images. All rights reserved.On July 9, Turkey’s 25 day-long ‘Justice March’, in which a procession of thousands of Turkish citizens slowly made their way from Ankara to Istanbul, came to an end in a peaceful mass rally.
Despite a heavy security presence and fears that the protest might end in violence, it passed without a hitch. This was no small feat. A year after an abortive July 2016 putsch, the country remains under a state of emergency and, as a result, mass demonstrations are prohibited.
However, whether out of fear or some other inscrutable political calculation, Turkey’s elected-despot Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, chose not to deploy force to this act of public defiance.
