ANKARA
Following allegations that Turkey’s Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan punched a man in a shop near the disaster-hit coal mine in western Turkey, a photograph circulated in Turkish media on Thursday which allegedly depicts the PM taking shelter in the shop is demonstrably false.
The photograph appearing in some newspapers was taken on February 20, 2011, by Anadolu Agency correspondent Kayhan Ozer, and shows Erdogan sitting on a stool in a supermarket in Istanbul while holding a phone conversation. The particular shot received a photography prize in Vakifbank-TFMD Press Photo Awards in 2011.
Huseyin Celik, spokesperson of the ruling Justice and Development Party, criticized on Friday the use of the photograph by some media outlets, considering it as an evidence to prove the claim that Erdogan took shelter in a supermarket.
“This is merely a claim. Somebody makes a claim and he starts to believe it himself … You are giving credit to a person who claims he was slapped by the prime minister, but you disbelieve the prime minister and people around him,” Celik said.
Erdogan is accused of being involved in a scuffle which erupted while he and his entourage were in a supermarket in Soma, a western town where Tuesday's mining disaster has claimed 284 lives.
englishnews@aa.com.tr
