May 28, 2013

2013Viktor Kulikov, Russian commander (born 1921)^[†]

Viktor Georgiyevich Kulikov was the Warsaw Pact commander-in-chief from 1977 to 1989. He was awarded the rank of the Marshal of the Soviet Union on 14 January 1977.

2013Eddie Romero, Filipino director, producer, and screenwriter (born 1924)^[†]

Edgar Sinco Romero,, commonly known as Eddie Romero, was a Filipino film director, film producer and screenwriter.

2013Gerd Schmückle, German general (born 1917)^[†]

Gerd Schmückle was a German four-star general. Schmückle served in the 7th Panzer Division under Erwin Rommel during the Fall of France. With this division he later fought in the Soviet Union where he was wounded six times. In early 1944, he was promoted to the German General Staff, major and artillery battalion commander. After the surrender of the Wehrmacht in 1945 he operated a farm in Bavaria and worked as a journalist. In 1956, he joined the Bundeswehr where he was promoted to general in 1978.

2013Start of the Gezi Park protests in Turkey.^[†]

A wave of demonstrations and civil unrest in Turkey began on 28 May 2013, initially to contest the urban development plan for Istanbul's Gezi Park. The protests were sparked by outrage at the violent eviction of a sit-in at the park protesting the plan. Subsequently, supporting protests and strikes took place across Turkey, protesting against a wide range of concerns at the core of which were issues of freedom of the press, of expression and of assembly, as well as the AKP government's erosion of Turkey's secularism. With no centralised leadership beyond the small assembly that organised the original environmental protest, the protests have been compared to the Occupy movement and the May 1968 events. Social media played a key part in the protests, not least because much of the Turkish media downplayed the protests, particularly in the early stages. Three and a half million people are estimated to have taken an active part in almost 5,000 demonstrations across Turkey connected with the original Gezi Park protest. Twenty-two people were killed and more than 8,000 were injured, many critically.