Six activists who chained themselves to a crane to protest the destruction of an ancient city in western Turkey by a hydroelectric dam project were taken into custody Monday morning by the gendarmerie.
The members of the Doğa Derneği (Nature Association), including the group’s chairman, were attempting to prevent the ancient city of Allianoi from being covered with sand and then submerged underwater once the Yortan Dam becomes operational.
A preservation board, the Allianoi Ancient City Commission for the Protection of Cultural and Natural Riches, ruled last month that the ruins in İzmir’s Bergama district should be covered with sand to preserve them underwater, a procedure activists said is not being properly implemented.
“This is a massacre of nature and a violation of the law,” Doğa Derneği chair Güven Eken said, according to Anatolia news agency.
Group members had been protesting at Allianoi to prove that a crime was being carried out, Eken said, adding that they would have continued their efforts if the gendarmerie had not removed them from the site.
“The ancient city is being covered with cement, which contains brick dust. This cannot be done for [ancient] ruins and is also inconsistent with the commission’s decision,” Eken said, claiming also that the commission’s order that four scientists must be present at the site to monitor the covering operation was not being implemented.
“The place resembles more a construction site,” the Doğa Derneği chair said, calling for the work to be stopped if it does not come into compliance with the commission’s orders.
Eken also urged the minister responsible for culture and tourism to take action. “The minister could even solve this issue by sending a telegraph, but it would be better for him to come here and observe,” he said.
Keeping watch on the ancient site
Environmental activists with the Allianoi Initiative Group, or AGG, have meanwhile begun to keep watch on the ancient hot-springs settlement, a prominent site during the Roman Empire, Doğan news agency reported Sunday.
Members of the initiative, which aims to prevent Allianoi’s submersion, erected tents near the site after the cranes were brought in and a church building in the southwest part of the ancient city was covered with sand. Nearly two dozen people, including members of the AGG and Doğa Derneği, as well as archaeologists who have worked on the excavation of the site, spent Saturday night in tents near the bridge at the entrance to Allianoi.
Members of the group also said the covering process was not being conducted in a way that would protect the ruins.
Ahmet Yaraş, chair of the AGG’s Allianoi Excavations Team, said the historical remains were being covered with concrete, leading the initiative to announce plans to file a criminal complaint.
Allianoi has been a major discussion point recently, with the Minister of Environment and Forest Veysel Eroğlu getting in a spat with Turkish pop star Tarkan.
Tarkan made it known that he thinks that Allianoi should be protected.
Tarkan’s stance on the highly controversial dam project earned him the wrath of the minister for the environment, Eroğlu.
Eroğlu criticized Tarkan, saying, “The singer should deal with his art, and he shouldn’t poke his nose into issues he doesn’t understand. His comments on the construction of a dam, or the protection of a historical artifact, are extremely wrong.”
Source: Hurriyet [September 20, 2010]