Five held in protest over Charlie Hebdo's Turkish issue

ISTANBUL

Five people have been detained in Istanbul after a protest against Turkish daily Cumhuriyet which published the French satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo in Turkish on Wednesday.

A group of protesters gathered outside the premises of the daily in Istanbul on Wednesday evening, chanting slogans such as "Cumhuriyet will answer," and "This is Turkey, not France."

Three people were detained by the police, an act which led the remaining members of the group to sit in protest. The group dispersed after being informed that their friends had been released.

Following the incident, police closed off Istiklal Street, where the daily's premises are located. 

Five people, who were carrying banners and burning copies of the daily in protest right before the street was closed, were detained by police. 

Similar protests also broke out in other cities throughout the day including the capital Ankara, Edirne, Sakarya and Konya. The protests in the four provinces were organized by an anti-communist action group called the National Turkish Student Union, or MTTB. 

In Sakarya, MTTB members were joined by other groups such as Young MUSIAD, an independent industrialists’ and businessmen’s association.

Turkish daily Cumhuriyet published Wednesday a four-page selection of cartoons and articles from the latest 16-page edition of Charlie Hedbo "with the aim of criticizing the attack on a media corporation and showing solidarity," the daily said in a statement.

Cumhuriyet said that some of its columnists had also been killed in its publishing history. 

"With the responsibility of protecting the freedom of expression and to be a part of solidarity (for Charlie Hedbo)," the paper decided to publish those four pages, the statement said. 

The daily also condemned last week’s deadly attack, and said it has always respected the sacred values of all people. 

French satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo released its first issue Wednesday since the brutal attack on its offices that killed 12 people last week, with a new cartoon showing the Prophet Muhammad on the cover. 

The Prophet Muhammad, dressed in white, can be seen shedding a tear and holding a “Je suis Charlie (I am Charlie)” sign, below the headline "All is forgiven." 

The slogan "Je suis Charlie" spread worldwide, mere hours after the attack, to become the rallying cry of all who wished to mourn the victims, condemn the attacks or support freedom of the press and expression.

The magazine also features work from the cartoonists and editorialists who died last Wednesday when two men - the Kaouchi brothers who are also caricatured in the weekly - burst into their weekly meeting and gunned them down to the cries of "God is great," according to eyewitnesses speaking to French media.

Wednesday's issue was printed in Turkish, French and Italian while its digital version is available in English, Spanish and Arabic.

Charlie Hebdo generally had a weekly circulation of 60,000 copies, but this week around three million copies were printed in anticipation of soaring demand.

The two suspects, brothers Said and Cherif Kouachi, were killed on Jan. 9 in a warehouse in Dammartin-en-Goele, a small town north of Paris.

On the same day, four people were killed by Amedy Coulibaly inside a kosher supermarket in Paris.

Coulibaly was linked to the Kouachi brothers and was said to have been involved in the murder of a policewoman the previous day. He was also killed by police.