Turkey
Protesters light candles in memory of victims of the recent violent anti-government protests in Turkey in Istanbul's Taksim Square Friday. Three people, one a policeman, died, and about 5,000 thousand people were injured, according to the Turkish Medical Association. Reuters

After more than two weeks of occupying the space, the Gezi Park protestors in Turkey might have a light at the end of their tunnel: Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan has agreed to freeze the plans to build a shopping mall on Gezi park -- the plans that sparked the Occupy Wall Street-esque protests in the first place. A government spokesman told reporters that plans would be halted until a court decided whether the plans were legal, BBC reports.

"Gezi Park is a park at the moment, and there won't be any moves to change that until the legal process produces a decision and the result of a local public vote is out," Huseyin Celik, deputy chairman of the governing Justice and Development Party, the party that Erdoğan heads, told the Wall Street Journal.

But Erdoğan’s concession doesn’t come without requirements of the protestors. The prime minister also issued what he called a “final warning” that the protestors leave Gezi Park and nearby Taksim Square, which has also been occupied, as well as for all solidarity rallies in Ankara and Istanbul to end this weekend, AP reports. Protest leaders said they counted the meetings as a success and a “positive outcome.”

In response to the announced compromise, Turkey’s financial markets rose slightly overnight, but protest leaders remained unclear whether they would actually vacate the park. Reuters reports that the Turkish lira rose for its third straight day and market shares were up 2.7 percent, while bond yields and five-year credit default swaps dropped.

Five people have been killed and an estimated 5,000 injured across Turkey since the protests began.

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