Istanbul police on Tuesday launched operations against far-left terrorist groups ahead of May 1 Labor and Solidarity Day celebrations.
The operations were part of an investigation by the Chief Prosecutor’s Office into terrorist groups’ call for assembly at the city’s Taksim Square, which is closed to illegal gatherings.
A total of 76 suspects from 11 terrorist groups, including the Revolutionary People’s Liberation Party-Front (DHKP-C), were detained while a manhunt is underway for eight other suspects.
Authorities said suspects were planning to violate the gathering ban and attack the riot police guarding the banned venues on May 1.
May Day first emerged as an event commemorating the labor of workers worldwide on May 1, 1886, when a group of workers in the U.S. held a massive strike for an eight-hour workday.
Since the 1890s, May 1 has been celebrated as International Workers' Day in many countries.
In Türkiye, the first mass May 1 celebrations took place in the 1910s during the Ottoman era, with events held mainly by workers in the cotton, grape and port industries in Istanbul and Izmir.
In 1977, the first mass Labor Day celebrations in decades took place in Taksim Square, attended by hundreds of thousands of people, but ended tragically when unidentified assailants opened fire on the crowd, leading to the deaths of 36 people amid gunfire and the subsequent stampede. From 1979 on, a ban was introduced on May Day celebrations in Taksim, which caused the square and its surrounding areas to become a clash zone between security forces and mainly left-wing groups each year.
The military regime of the Sept. 12, 1980, coup d'etat banned Labor Day celebrations and removed May 1 as a national holiday. They were restored again in 2009, and the square was open for Labor Day celebrations in 2010. Rallies in 2010 were peaceful, but after the ban was reinstated in 2012, protests again turned violent. Taksim Square remained off-limits to mass rallies for fear of a repeat of the 1977 incident and riots by supporters of terrorist groups, which had exploited the Labor Day celebrations to stage riots in the past.
