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The Independent UK
The Independent UK
National
Megan Townsend

Thousands of protesters shut down central London in solidarity to the victims of the Ankara blasts

Protesters in their thousands took to the streets of central London on Sunday to call for an "end to state terror". 

The demonstration began as over 3,000 Kurdish protesters rallied outside Downing Street, before marching through central London, blocking Picadilly Circus and Oxford Circus.

Protesters gathered before the BBC broadcasting house, whom many have accused of biased reporting of the attack and Turkish PM Recep Tayyip Erdogan.

The organisers insisted that Erdogan has turned their country into a "bloodbath" after the AKP (Justice and Development party) were ousted in Mays elections.

Aysegul Erdogan, one of the protests organisers says in the video "We are very angry, we know that this attack was affiliated by the Turkish state and actually fabricated by the current Turkish government, the AKP, the justice and development party"

It is now thought that over 100 people were killed and 245 injured in the double explosions in Ankara on Saturday morning. The blasts had targeted areas around a planned "Labour, Peace, Democracy" rally and was set to be the biggest protest in the country against the Turkish government's actions towards the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PPK).

Similar scenes were seen in Paris, as organisations such as Federation of Kurdish associations of France, among others, took to the streets in solidarity for those who lost their lives in the attack

 

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