Several hundred people demonstrated against the Turkish government in Zurich on Saturday in protest at the "organised irresponsibility" of the government in Ankara, which is becoming more and more obvious in view of the way the effects of the catastrophic series of earthquakes in the south-east of the country are being dealt with. The demonstration started on Museum Street and led across the Walche Bridge to the Turkish Consulate General. The demonstration was promoted by a broad alliance of migrant initiatives, religious associations and left-wing groups with links to Kurdistan, Syria and Turkey.

Following a minute of silence for the tens of thousands of victims of the earthquakes that shook the Turkish-Syrian border region a month ago, Deniz Ay, representative of the Workers' Party of Turkey (TIP) in Switzerland, gave a speech. Ay recalled that in the very first days after the earthquakes, the Turkish Red Crescent (Kızılay) sold winter tents, which were urgently needed in the disaster area, to a private aid organisation for 2.3 million euros, instead of making them available to the victims free of charge as quickly as possible. This was an "inhuman impudence", Ay said.

Shortly after the scandal broke, the TIP protested outside the party's Istanbul headquarters, which is currently acting as a crisis coordination centre, against the tent sale, which was perceived to be profit-driven. Police cracked down and temporarily detained more than 100 party members, including earthquake victims as well as volunteers from the TIP's relief programme. The police also put barriers around the party headquarters. An aid van loaded on the sidelines of the protest could only leave after a considerable delay. "The government knows that the ground has slipped from under its feet, so it is exerting pressure accordingly. Repression is no longer enough to quell people's anger,” Ay said.

"We do not forgive, we demand accountability," Ay said, referring to a speech by long-term ruler Recep Tayyip Erdogan, who had recently asked for forgiveness for "delays" in earthquake relief in hard-hit Adıyaman. He argued that, due to the "devastating effects of the quakes, the bad weather and the difficulties caused by the damaged infrastructure", it was not possible to work as they would have wanted in the first few days. "We don't accept the apology. No one in Ankara will be able to escape responsibility,” Ay said.

A joint statement for the alliance was presented by Gamze Özkök, who is involved with the Party for Social Freedom (TÖP). “The Turkish government has a mentality characterised by hatred of nations. This fact can be seen, among other things, in the fact that there was practically no state aid in the disaster area in the first two days after the earthquakes. Thousands of survivors had to die of frostbite as they waited in vain for help under the rubble of collapsed buildings in temperatures far below freezing. This reflects this government's contempt for its people and the deeply dysfunctional relationship of an oppressor state with its citizens, who receive no appreciation whatsoever."

The Alliance also commented on Erdogan's talk of "fate" in relation to the earthquake disaster in the country. "Turkey is a country in the earthquake belt. But instead of equipping the country against it, the government has virtually invited this disaster with its profit-hungry construction policy. It has ignored scientific advice and built vital infrastructure on fault lines, privatised public land, abolished rescue routes to swamp the country with shopping malls - all with the proceeds of an earthquake tax that was introduced to make Turkey earthquake-proof, but has flowed into an incompetent, corrupt bureaucracy as well as a multibillion-dollar favouritism. Not only has it knowingly turned a blind eye to the widespread botched construction, but it has also legalised black construction through a so-called Construction Amnesty Law, generating further revenue. So, it is not the earthquake that is to blame for the death of tens of thousands of people, but the government and its system profiteers. They are responsible for turning a natural disaster into a man-made and state-sponsored massacre."

“Whole towns in the earthquake zone have turned into mass graves. And therefore, we will not forgive. We will turn our pain into anger, which we will channel into organising. As the oppressed, we will unite to build a democratic and free country against this darkness that has fallen upon us like a nightmare. The dismantling of this arrogant, tyrannical and genocidal system, whose existence we only feel when we open our mouths to demand our rights but never in difficult times, is not a loss but a gain for the peoples. We will not forgive, we will not make peace. Neither with tyrants nor with those who demand that we forget what has happened. We will accuse and demand accountability. For every life that has been taken from us," said the organisations and announced that they would continue their protests against Erdogan's government.