Police Detains Newspaper Sellers at Subway Exit

Police detained Burak Butur and Hasan Ortatepe - newspaper sellers who work for BirGün and Aydınlık daily newspapers respectively - for noise pollution complaints by the exit of Taksim Subway Station in downtown Istanbul. Newspapers sellers were issued a fine of 88 liras (roughly 35 euros). 

“We will continue to sell our newspapers,” Butur told bianet. 

“We have been escorted to the police station in Taksim. Police issued an 88 lira (roughly 35 euros) fine and released. Once we were out, we continued to sell our newspapers,” BirGün newspaper seller Burak Butur told bianet. 

Butur continued as follows:

“At 7:30 am today, we were selling our newspapers just like every morning at the exit of Taksim Subway Station. Around 8:30 am, 3 police officers and a civil policeman approached to us and said they were going to detain us. 

“In the meanwhile, they pulled from my shoulder a bit. I didn’t understand what was happening. Then they became more gentile to us. 

“In response, I objected. When I asked them why they were detaining us, they said they received noise complaints. After that, we objected again, onlookers stepped in and joined our side too. 

“Then they escorted us to Taksim Police Station. They explained us why we were detained. They said we were also part of their ‘people’ but others complained about us. We objected again but they issued an 88 lira fine to us and made us sign an attestation. 

“Around 9.30 am, we got out of the station and resumed to sell our newspapers as if nothing happened. 

“We have lost some sales as we were detained at a peak hour. We will resume our sales from now on too.” (EKN/BM)

* bianet was unable to reach the other newspaper seller Hasan Ortatepe  from Aydınlık newspaper. 

* Click here to read the original article in Turkish.