.............The police fired tear gas into the crowd and drove people down with tanks.

One woman is in a critical condition after being hit in the head with a tear gas canister. Another two have been killed by tanks.

Hali said the protest was about so much more than the park.

"The government control over its people's personal lives has become unbearable as of late," she wrote.

"The state, under its conservative agenda passed many laws and regulations concerning abortion, caesarean birth, sale and use of alcohol and even the colour of lipstick worn by the airline stewardesses."

Worse, no media outlets within Turkey are able to report on it without fearing for their lives.

"Mainstream media kept showing Miss Turkey and 'the strangest cat of the world'," she wrote.

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Follow Claire on Twitter: @ClaireRPorter....