Turkish Justice Minister Yılmaz Tunç said on Tuesday that prosecutors have opened investigations into 356 people in Turkey protesting a Damascus offensive against Kurdish militants in Syria, with 35 people arrested, 45 released under judicial supervision and 77 still in police custody.
Tunç said investigations are continuing over demonstrations that authorities say were carried out “under the pretext” of clashes in Syria between government forces and the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), a group Ankara sees as an offshoot of the outlawed Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK).
The minister also said prosecutors in the southeastern province of Mardin had launched a separate criminal investigation after the Turkish flag was lowered at the Turkey-Syria border, which he described as a provocation by supporters of the Kurdish militants.
Tunç said no provocation aimed at Turkey’s sovereignty or public order would go unpunished.
Protests have spread in Turkey’s mainly Kurdish southeast in recent days as Syria’s transitional government presses an offensive against Kurdish-led forces in northeastern Syria, triggering anger among Kurds in Turkey and raising tensions at border towns such as Nusaybin.
Protesters in Nusaybin tried to reach the Syrian border, and some attempted to cross into Syria, but police used tear gas and water cannon to stop them. Separate videos shared online claimed demonstrators broke through barriers, though the scale and outcome could not be independently confirmed.