Radiohead fans attacked at Istanbul event; Band issues statement
Radiohead just sent out the following statement:
Our hearts go out to those attacked tonight at Velvet IndieGround in Istanbul. We hope that someday we will be able to look back on such acts of violent intolerance as things of the ancient past. For now, we can only offer our fans in Istanbul our love and support.
The horrible incident was first reported around 5pm EST by a user on Reddit. This is what they wrote:
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“This is just happened one hour ago.
There is an AMSP promotion event at Velvet Indieground (record store) in Istanbul Turkey today. Around 21:00 (local time) a group of motherfuckers attacked and beaten up the shop owner, manhandled the visitors and vandalized the store. And their reason: just because of Turkey is in Ramadan (fasting) month and that crowd drinking beer, having fun around the store and it’s forbidden to drink alcohol and stuff in Ramadan time for fucking muslims!
I was watching the Periscope live stream and when this situation occurs I really shocked and started to shaking because of anger and despair!
Here is the link I just downloaded, cutted and uploaded to Youtube:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XJMv_XPmvfQ
Original Periscope stream:
https://www.periscope.tv/w/1LyxBlzZBeEGN
Here’s one of our fans got beaten by the fascists:
https://twitter.com/emancipatedcity/status/743916238896791552
Please tell the Radiohead and to your friends, family that do not visit Turkey never ever. And please share this with everyone and let everybody see Turkey’s real face.
I’m sick and tired of this country and it’s fucking people and really really want to escape from here forever…”
One person also commented on Reddit:
i was one of the hosts. i am the person that’s speaking in that video. i am the owner of that periscope account. they were determined to kill us. we were beaten by more than 20 men with pipes in their hands, beer bottles were broken on our heads, i don’t even know how we made it out. i will share the details later guys. just hoping that noone will die
edit: thank you for your support. i love you all. looks like everyone at our event is fine. for the first time in my life, i was scared of being killed. can’t even think right now, just a blank stare at the walls. weird fishes is my favourite song in the world, and i was dancing to it outside when it all started. now it has so much more meaning for me.
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