Villagers resist pro-government company's stone quarry project in Black Sea valley

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Locals have been resisting a stone quarry project in İkizdere district in the Black Sea province of Rize for a week now, often confronting gendarmerie.

The project started on April 21 after a presidential decree for urgent expropriation in the İşkencedere Valley area.

Locals filed a lawsuit against the project and started to keep a watch in the area.

Gendarmerie removed a tent set up by the villagers and put up barricades at the entrance of the valley. Yet the people continued to protest and earthmovers of the company had to leave the area. Villagers then closed the entrance of the valley with beehives.

The quarry will be used for the construction of a logistic project by Cengiz Construction, a company that has close ties to the government and has undertaken numerous infrastructure projects over the past decade.

CLICK - How has Cengiz Holding destroyed Turkey's forests?

On Sunday (April 25), soldiers entered the gardens of homes to enforce the coronavirus lockdown and prevent people from going to the project site. Several people were detained.

Yakup Okumuşoğlu, a lawyer and a member of the Environment and Ecology Movement, shared a video from İkizdere, showing several old people who managed to reach the site. People are heard saying, "We won't give our forest to you. You are our soldiers, protect us." Gendarmerie then used tear gas against villagers and detained several of them.

Ikizdere.. bir avuç insan.. “ ormanımızı vermicezzz. Bu orman senin de ormanın Komutannn.. siz bizim askersiniz.. bizi koruyunnn..” pic.twitter.com/EmWTFDfOLm

— Yakup Ş.Okumuşoğlu (@AvOkumusoglu) April 25, 2021

Several opposition politicians went to the area to support the people's protest. Peoples' Democratic Party (HDP) deputy Murat Çepni said the people were determined to prevent the project. "Everyone is extremely determined because they know that they can't live if there is a stone quarry here."

"No profit or project is more valuable than villagers' living spaces. People's water, beekeeping, and tea will be destroyed. With every dynamite that is exploded, water will be destroyed," he said.

Main opposition Republican People's Party (CHP) Party Assembly member Sevgi Kılıç was also at the project site. She shared a video of a woman suffering from tear gas.

İkizdere’de müteahhitin makinası doğayı katledebilsin diye hemşerilerimize biber gazı sıkıldı. Firdevs teyzemize bunu reva görenlere yazıklar olsun!#ikizderetasocağıolmasın pic.twitter.com/0C4NRvRnah

— Sevgi Kılıç (@avsevgikilic) April 25, 2021

The Ecology Union released a written statement against the project yesterday.

"While citizens struggle for their lives during the pandemic, the government continues to pillage and destruction projects all across our country," says the statement. "Curfews and pandemic measures are not applied for ravenous companies."

Twitter users have also supported the villagers' resistance, posting messages under the "İkizdere shouldn't be a stone quarry" (#ikizderetasocağıolmasın) 

Manzarayı şahane! #İkizdereTasOcağıOlmasın pic.twitter.com/onhTruunTs

— Yakup Ş.Okumuşoğlu (@AvOkumusoglu) April 27, 2021

Along with four other companies from Turkey, Cengiz Holding is one of the 10 companies that won the most public tenders in the world in a decade, according to the World Bank's 2018 figures.

Especially because of the guaranteed payments they receive in the public-private partnership projects, the five companies have faced public criticism and are dubbed as the "gang of five" by the opposition. (TP/VK)