Women's protests in Turkey: We are fighting for our rights!

Women's protests in Turkey: We are fighting for our rights!

On Saturday, March 8, 2025, hundreds of people in various cities in Türkiye protested despite a state ban on international women's day. In Istanbul, 112 demonstrators were arrested, including a person who remained in custody while the others were released after interrogation. The protesting shouted slogans like "Long live our feminist struggle" and asked society to face violence against women and the discrimination against LGBTQI+. According to reports, the demonstration was prohibited on the grounds that it could endanger the "public order and social peace", as nau.ch

The Turkish Governance under President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan implements a policy that is directed not only against LGBTQI+ groups, but also against women. This year 59 women already died by violence of male perpetrators, a worrying problem that is documented by the platform "We will stop women's murders". The government has declared the "year of family" this year, which many interpreted as an attack on non-traditional ways of life. The state media supervision RTÜK also announced that measures to "combat" sexual minorities in the media and politics, which of Kleinezeitung.at is shown.

The demonstrations for World Women's Day in Turkey are not only the courage of the participants, but also the resistance to an increasingly repressive political agenda. While the protesters protest for their rights and against violence, the current situation shows how far the discrimination and the spiral of violence can go. Highly emotional scenes and a clear message accompanied the protests that came to the fore the urgency of the topic.