U.S. officials and lawmakers may have been outraged when Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s bodyguards attacked and beat peaceful protesters in Washington as their leader watched. Back in Turkey, however, that hard-line approach is welcomed by many of the president’s nationalist supporters.

The clash Tuesday began when Erdogan’s motorcade pulled up in front of the Turkish ambassador’s residence, returning from a visit to the White House and a meeting with President Donald Trump.

Erdogan, emerging from his limousine, stood and watched as his guards and supporters began punching and kicking their way through a group of mostly Kurdish protesters across the street. Eleven people were injured.

Two senators protest

Two U.S. senators protested to Erdogan Thursday about his guards’ behavior.

“The violent response of your security detail to peaceful protesters is wholly unacceptable,” Senators Dianne Feinstein and John McCain said in a letter to Erdogan. They added that the incident was “unfortunately reflective of your government’s treatment of the press, ethnic minority groups and political opponents.”

U.S. Senators John McCain and Dianne Feinstein wrote a letter to the Turkish government, demanding it take responsibility for a clash involving protesters and President Recep Tayyip Erdogan's guards near the Turkish Embassy in Washington on Tuesday.

While some Turks also decried the use of force to quash a peaceful protest, calling it a blemish on the country’s international reputation and a violation of free speech, those who support Erdogan’s increasingly authoritarian rule felt it was justified.

Protesters ‘deserved to be beaten’

“Those terrorists deserved to be beaten,” Atakan, a taxi driver from the city of Erzurum, told a VOA reporter. “They should not be protesting our president. They got what they asked for.”

Yusuf Kanli, a newspaper columnist and political analyst, said no matter how bad it may have looked, the scene played right into Erdogan’s image.


https://www.voanews.com/a/erdogan-watched-guards-beat-protesters/3861496.html




https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g_yZ1IG-9Wo

I very certain no group in a foreign soil will be allowed to protest so closely to a US president. The video didn't prove anything except that there was no security presence in a protest so close to a foreign leader. McCain should muster the balls to finally demand the U.S. cease killing entire family with drone strikes ... Freedom should be for all.