Nine detained in student housing protests in Ankara

Photo: Fatoş Erdoğan/Twitter

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Nine people detained last night (September 20) in the capital city of Ankara during a student protest against high housing prices.

Students wanted to spend the night at İlhan Erdost Park in Ankara's 100. Yıl neighborhood. However, police officers came and asked them to remove the tent they had set up. When they refused to do so, police detained nine students and removed the tent.

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The night protests started in İstanbul on the weekend and spread to other cities, including Ankara, İzmir, Kocaeli and Gümüşhane, according to the Movement of the Unsheltered, a student group established earlier this month. No police interventions took place except for Ankara.

Over the past year, rent prices have significantly increased in Turkey, especially in greater cities. With the start of the academic year, students who returned to their schools after one and a half years of online education faced exorbitant rent prices.

Since early September, they have been protesting, demanding affordable housing. Some 815,365 students enrolled in universities in Turkey this year. The total number of university students in the country is over eight million. (TP/VK)