Bulent Kilic / AFP - Getty Images

People wearing Guy Fawkes masks stand on top of a public bus at the protest camp in Istanbul's Taksim Square late Friday.

ISTANBUL - Thousands of Turks dug in on Saturday for a weekend of anti-government demonstrations despite Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan's demand for an immediate end to the worst political unrest of his decade in power.

In central Istanbul's Taksim Square, where riot police backed by helicopters and armored vehicles clashed with protesters a week ago, activists spent the night in a makeshift protest camp, sleeping in tents and vandalized buses, or wrapped in blankets under plane trees.

What began as a campaign against the redevelopment of Gezi Park in a corner of Taksim Square spiraled into an unprecedented display of public anger over the perceived authoritarianism of Erdogan and his Islamist-rooted AK Party.

Police firing tear gas and water cannon have clashed with groups of protesters night after night in Istanbul, Ankara and other cities across the country for much of the past week, leaving three dead and some 4,000 injured.

Erdogan demanded on Friday an immediate end to the protests, saying they had been founded on a "campaign of lies." He has branded the demonstrators as looters and has said the protests are being manipulated by "terrorist" groups.

Erdogan gave no indication of any immediate plans to remove the tent villages that have appeared in Taksim and a park in the capital, Ankara. But the gatherings mark a challenge to a leader whose authority is built on three successive election victories.

"Let them attack, they can't stop us," shouted a member of the Turkish Communist Party, shouting through loudspeakers to a cheering crowd from on top of a white van in Taksim Square. "The AK Party will go. This will be the end."

The protesters have built barricades of paving stones and corrugated iron on access roads to Taksim to try to protect themselves against a potential police assault. But their actions have brought gridlock to part of central Istanbul and it is unclear how long the authorities will tolerate their presence.

The square is lined by luxury hotels that should be doing a roaring trade as the summer season starts in one of the world's most-visited cities. But a forced eviction could trigger a repeat of the clashes seen earlier in the week.

Erdogan takes the protests as a personal affront.

He has enacted many democratic reforms, taming a military that toppled four governments in four decades, starting entry talks with the European Union, reining in rights abuses by police and forging peace talks with Kurdish rebels to end a three-decade-old war that has cost 40,000 lives. Per-capita income has tripled in nominal terms and business has boomed under his rule.

But in recent years, critics say his style, always forceful and emotional, has become authoritarian.

Media have come under pressure, and the arrests of military and other figures over alleged coup plots as well as moves such as restrictions on alcohol sales have unsettled especially secular middle-class Turks who are sensitive to any encroachment of religion on their daily lives.

The fierce crackdown, condemned by foreign powers, on what started as peaceful protests in Gezi Park were the final straw, has caused simmering frustrations with Erdogan's leadership to boil over.

"These protests are partly a result of his success in economic and social transformation. There's a new generation who doesn't want to be bullied by the prime minister and who is afraid their lifestyle is in danger," said Joost Lagendijk, a former European parliamentarian and Istanbul-based academic. 

Related:

• Turkey's prime minister invokes Allah, demands protests end immediately
• Taksim Square and the battle for Turkey – What's next?
• 'Woman in red' sprayed with teargas becomes symbol of Turkey protests

Charles Emir Richards via Facebook

Part-time photographer Charles Emir Richards posted this and dozens of other photos from protests in Besiktas on June 2 on his Facebook page, with the message, "You don't need my permission to share the photos. I think it is especially important that people outside of Turkey share them to let it be known what is going on here."

Charles Emir Richards via Facebook

Taksim, Istanbul on June 4

Charles Emir Richards via Facebook

Besiktas, Istanbul on June 2

Charles Emir Richards, an American living in Turkey, took to the streets of Taksim and Besiktas in Istanbul on June 1-4 not to join protesters, but to document the events between demonstrators and police in what he describes as a "war zone." The images in this blog post come from Richards’ Facebook page and are used with permission. NBC News’s Director of Photography, Jim Collins, contacted Richards via email to collect first-person reaction to his photos and the events that are occurring in his backyard.

Do you live in Istanbul full-time and is the area where you’ve been shooting near to where you live?
Yes, I do. I am half-Turkish and have been living here on and off for the past 15 years. Taksim is about a kilometer southeast from where I live. Akaretler, Besiktas a little less than a kilometer northeast. I am at a vortex of a triangle.

Are you a photographer?
I am a part-time photographer. It is my hobby gone crazy. I started shooting celebrity portraits for Rolling Stone over here and then, more recently, for Vogue and GQ. I don't take photographs as much as I should. Shooting the protests here for the past few days has convinced me that I was just wasting time, eating cake.

Would you consider yourself a protester?
 I wish I was brave enough to be a protester, but I am not. I agree with what they are fighting for and felt it was important to document it.

Are you concerned that the disturbances may threaten your home, property or safety in general?
Right now it is impossible to say what is going to happen. The prime minister is not bending, nor are the protesters. Everyone is meeting again in Gezi Park tonight (Editor's note: Friday). If (Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip) Erdogan had made even minor concessions I think a lot of people were ready to declare a victory for democracy, and go home. Now I don't know, I think the weekend will tell what direction things will take.

One thing I can say is that the protesters, even the most violent, have been extremely careful not to harm anyone's personal property. At any point they could have blocked the roads with private citizen's cars and burned them to block the police. They did not, and they did not entertain the idea of raiding or looting. If a store owner wanted to open shop and help they appreciated it, if not, fine.

Charles Emir Richards via Facebook

Taksim, Istanbul on June 4

For my personal safety, I have very practical concerns, the top of the list being hyperventilating in my gas mask and it fogging up. Not seeing anything during a police raid is the worst thing I can imagine right now. I have been detained by the police twice already. I got shot twice by projectile gas canisters, which brought tears to my eyes, but is actually OK because adrenaline doesn't let you feel more than a sting until hours later. One girl I talked to (said) she was hit by a plastic bullet, and that it hurts so much that you can't move. I find that both very disturbing and threatening.

Charles Emir Richards via Facebook

Charles Emir Richards posted this image on his Facebook page on June 3 with the following comment: "The police brutally beat this man with a baton and shield. I don't know what happened to him as I was detained and released by the police soon after I took this photograph. Akaretler was a war zone tonight."

What are the latest developments that you see on the streets there? Are the protests intensifying?
Last night, the crowd was ready to greet the prime minister with a wave of hostility on his flight back from Tunisia. People were really keyed up where I was last night. There were professional protesters in the crowd from Palestine handing out double-sided photocopies of safety guidelines for gas attacks by the barricades. Everyone was on the lookout for police provocateurs in the crowd.

The people at the barricades are growing in numbers and they are ready to fight. Inside Gezi Park, people are even more determined to continue peaceful protest.

Charles Emir Richards via Facebook

Charles Emir Richards posted this photo from Taskim, Istanbul on June 4 with the following comment: "The sad thing is that the evening started like this."

There were reports of massive police movement all last night and rumors that police reinforcements were being bused in from other cities. Despite this, I never saw a single officer the entire night.

What have you been doing with your photographs besides posting them to Facebook?
Nothing. I have been posting them on Facebook as it has been the only means to get the word out about what is going on here recently. The news media here went blank on the issue, that's when I thought I should go out and shoot and post on Facebook, I felt that a document should get out from somewhere, anywhere. Until yesterday, the local media pretended that nothing was going on. On June 2, when everyone was on the streets engaging the police, CNN Turk was broadcasting a documentary about penguins.

People went and protested in front of media buildings and pasted money on their walls and doors saying if you love money that much here it is, now do your jobs. Even after that they are reporting a very light version of the protests.

Editor's Note: This interview has been edited and condensed.

Charles Emir Richards via Facebook

Besiktas, Istanbul on June 1

ISTANBUL -- Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan flew back to a Turkey rocked by days of anti-government unrest on Friday and declared before a sea of flag-waving supporters at Istanbul airport: "These protests must end immediately."

"No power but Allah can stop Turkey's rise," he told thousands who gathered in the early hours to greet him in the first pro-Erdogan rally since demonstrations began a week ago.

At Istanbul's Taksim Square, the center of the protests and now occupied by thousands around the clock, some chanted "Tayyip resign" as they watched a broadcast of the address. In the capital, Ankara, the Kugulu Park echoed with anti-government slogans, while protesters danced or sang the national anthem.

Kayhan Ozer / Anadolu Agency via EPA

Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan greets supporters in Istanbul on Friday upon his return to a protest-rocked country. "These protests must end immediately," he declared in front of the crowd.

Speaking from an open-top bus at the airport, his wife at his side, Erdogan acknowledged police might have used excessive force in crushing a small demonstration against a building project last Friday -- the action that triggered nationwide protests against his 10-year rule.

"However, no one has the right to attack us through this. May Allah preserve our fraternity and unity. We will have nothing to do with fighting and vandalism. ... The secret to our success is not tension and polarization," Erdogan told the crowd.

"The police are doing their duty. These protests, which have turned into vandalism and utter lawlessness, must end immediately," he added.

He gave no indication of any immediate plans to remove the makeshift protest camps that have appeared on Taksim Square and a park in Ankara. But the gatherings mark a clear challenge to his declarations.

Western governments including the United States, which sees Turkey as a key NATO ally in the Middle East, bordering Iran, Iraq and Syria, have expressed concern about heavy-handed police action.

Washington in particular has projected Turkey under Erdogan as an example of a Muslim democracy that could be emulated by other countries in the region, such as Egypt.

Erdogan set his sights also on financial institutions and markets, which have fallen on the troubles.

"We have come to this level despite the interest rate lobby," he said. "The interest rate lobby thinks they can threaten us by entering into speculations in the stock exchange. They should know we will not let them abuse the nation's wealth."

Supporters of Erdogan, who enjoys strong support in Turkey's conservative heartland, chanted "Don't rest our patience" and "Istanbul is here" and waved the Turkish flag -- a white crescent moon and star on a red background -- and the banner of Erdogan's AKP party, the image of a light bulb.

Erdogan swept to power in 2002 shortly after founding the AKP from conservative Islamists, nationalists and center-right elements. In a decade he has transformed the economy, tripling per capita income, introduced some rights reforms and reining in an army that had toppled four governments in 40 years.

But critics say more recently he has become increasingly authoritarian and has pursued by stealth an Islamist agenda challenging nine decades of state secularism, something he denies. They accuse him of arrogance born of three election victories, the last built on a 50 percent vote.

Erdogan has no clear rivals inside the AKP or outside, where the opposition, both on the streets and in parliament, is fragmented.

Among the demonstrators are nationalists, leftists, students, unionists and middle-class professionals who accuse Erdogan of adopting an authoritarian style of government.

The government says militant leftists associated with terrorist attacks have also been involved in skirmishes with police that have spread to dozens of cities.

Six newspapers carried the same headline backing Erdogan on Friday: "We'll lay down our lives for democratic demands" -- a comment he made to reporters in Tunisia.

The Leftist Sol's headline read: "The Deaf Sultan," accusing Erdogan of refusing to understand protesters' demands.

At Taksim, the mood remained defiant.

"It's all up to Erdogan and what he says right now. He will decide the fate of this resistance, whether it will calm (down) or escalate," said Mehmet Polat, 42, a ship captain who had not worked all week, coming instead to protest at Taksim. "These people have been here for days. He has to understand.”

Related:

• Taksim Square and the battle for Turkey – What's next?
• Defiant Turkish prime minister accuses protesters of wanting to 'burn and destroy'
• 'Woman in red' sprayed with teargas becomes symbol of Turkey protests

Aris Messinis/AFP - Getty Images

Demonstrators waving Turkish flags shout slogans against Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan during a protest on Taksim Square in Istanbul Thursday.

TUNIS/ISTANBUL - Turkish Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan on Thursday denounced those behind a week of violent demonstrations, saying he would not allow people to "burn and destroy."

Speaking during a visit to Tunisia, Erdogan vowed to press ahead with plans for construction in an Istanbul park which triggered the unrest across the country.

Three people have been killed and more than 4,000 injured in demonstrations that have seen police fire tear gas at angry crowds.

Erdogan, out of the country for days on a tour of North Africa but due to return late Thursday, has consistently maintained a hard line in public comments since the unrest began, which the protesters say has poured fuel on the fire.

In Thursday's remarks, he said "terror groups" - including one that claimed responsibility for a February 1 bombing at the U.S. Embassy in Ankara - were manipulating the crowds. Seven foreigners were among those arrested, he said.

"If you say: 'I will hold a meeting and burn and destroy,' we will not allow that," he told reporters after meeting his Tunisian counterpart. "We are against the majority dominating the minority and we cannot tolerate the opposite."

Nevertheless, by confining his comments to a group of protesters, Erdogan sounded arguably softer in tone than before he left for North Africa at the start of the week, when he described the demonstrators in blanket terms as looters.

What began as a campaign against the redevelopment of a leafy Istanbul park has grown into an unprecedented show of defiance against the perceived authoritarianism of Erdogan and his Islamist-rooted AK Party.

Police backed by armored vehicles have clashed with the protesters night after night, while thousands have massed peacefully in recent days on Taksim Square and the adjoining Gezi Park, where the demonstrations first began.

A policeman who fell from a bridge in the southern city of Adana while chasing protesters died of his injuries, Turkish television stations reported -- the third death in the protests.

AK Party Deputy Chairman Huseyin Celik called on members not to welcome Erdogan home at Istanbul airport to avoid stirring trouble. "The prime minister does not need a show of strength," Celik said in a television interview.

At Taksim, protesters remained defiant. "We have the momentum, with people like me going to work every day and coming back to attend the protests," said Cetin, a 29-year-old civil engineer who declined to give his surname because he works for a company close to the government.

"We should keep coming here to protest until we really feel we've achieved something," he said, one of thousands gathered on Taksim Square until late into the night.

Protesters are of a variety of political stripes, including far leftists, soft nationalists, environmentalists and secular Turks, and their numbers at Taksim have swollen at points to more than an estimated 100,000.

Erdogan said they included the outlawed organization behind the U.S. Embassy suicide bombing that also killed a Turkish security guard. The outlawed Revolutionary People's Liberation Party/Front, said it was behind the U.S. Embassy bombing earlier this year.

Related:

• Taksim Square and the battle for Turkey – What's next?
• Biden urges Turkey's government to respect dissent as protests rage on
• Turkey's deputy PM apologizes for police crackdown as second protester dies

Bulent Kilic / AFP - Getty Images

Turkish youth chant as they protest on the way between Besiktas and Taksim on June 6, 2013.

ISTANBUL — Emir Ay doesn’t live on the fringe of Turkish society. Nor does he cavort with terrorists.

He does go to graduate school, majoring in information technology. And he’s been on Taksim Square every day — and night — since he began a sit-in with a couple of dozen others, in late May, to protest the planned demolition of the iconic square’s leafy park to make room for yet another shopping mall and mosque.

"[Prime Minister Tayyip] Erdogan calls us 'hooligans.' If I'm a hooligan then I’m a peaceful one who helps clean up the park after everyone goes home at 4 a.m.," he said.

But, when the riot police started to violently break up the Taksim sit-in, Ay — like many others — snapped.

The national paroxysm of anger and frustration that followed has shaken Turkey to its core. Like many others, Ay had never demonstrated in the streets before.

Now, he said, he’s already mentally moved beyond the police’s thick tear gas and water cannons, which left two protesters dead and thousands injured.

"It's no longer about the police," he said. "It’s actually about freedom."

Erdogan was right when he quipped — just before he gave Taksim protesters the ultimate brush-off and flew to North Africa on an official trip — that Turkey doesn’t need an “Arab Spring” because it already has a "Turkish Spring": free elections, an inclusive constitution, and a booming economy.

But even before you step into the square, you stumble over barricades blocking all access roads.

Then there’s the tents, the banners, the blasting speakers, the makeshift clinics, the ubiquitous graffiti like enormous tattoo — and everyone connecting on Facebook or Twitter. You can’t help feeling you’ve witnessed all this before. In Tunis. Or Cairo.

Slideshow: Clashes in Turkey

Stringer / AFP - Getty Images

Protests that started as an outcry against a local development project in Taksim Square have snowballed into widespread anger against what critics say is the government's increasingly conservative and authoritarian agenda.

Launch slideshow

Until you speak to the Turks in the square. The families. The school groups. The singers and dancers. None of them talk about bringing down a government. Instead they want to reform their democracy, which they see as severely skewed towards Erdogan's “own people” — the conservative, religious, middle class — and away from the young and secular-minded who didn’t vote for him.

Begum Uzun has practically lived on Taksim Square for the past week. Neither a looter nor an extremist — as Erdogan seemed to suggest — she’s an "ordinary activist" and a PhD student who’s lived and worked in Canada.

"We are all fighting for something different,” she explained. “Some for the trees. Another to lift alcohol restrictions. Or to end the crackdown on dissent. Or on the media. But we all share one goal — to get Erdogan to listen."

Emir Ay agrees. Ironically, the more Turkey’s influence has grown in the West, the less he’s felt a part of the "New Turkey."

It's as if the 49 percent of Turks who don’t support Erdogan just don’t exist, he says. "Erdogan said that we don’t have the right to say anything. But we said we do have that right. And here we are!"

Now protesters — and everyone else — are asking, "What happens next?"

Erdogan flies back today and will find that Taksim Square has become a liberated zone — a direct challenge to his authority. Will he engage with the protesters, or crackdown again? "He’s got a confrontational mind," said Cengiz Aktar, a Turkish political analyst.

"His instinct is to never yield. And he has plenty of crazy supporters who are ready to charge the square and badly beat up protesters."

In its vitality, it's street art, it's sights and sounds, Taksim inspires comparisons to the best of the "peoples" squares.  But there could be dark, deadly, Tiananmen-like days ahead.

Related stories:

• Biden urges Turkey's government to respect dissent as protests rage on

• Turkey's deputy PM apologizes for police crackdown as second protester dies

• 'Woman in red' sprayed with teargas becomes symbol of Turkey protests

Vice President Joe Biden has urged Turkey's government to respect its opponents amid ongoing clashes between protesters and police.

American citizens in Turkey -- a NATO member and key ally in the Middle East -- have been warned to stay clear of demonstrations and large gatherings following violence that has seen at least two people die.

Clashes between protesters and police continued across the country late Tuesday and early Wednesday.

Police fired tear gas and water cannons at protesters who set up barricades and threw stones at them in the eastern province of Tunceli, witnesses told Reuters. There were also clashes in the capital, Ankara, and Hatay province.

In the western port city of Izmir, police raided 38 addresses and detained 25 people on suspicion of stirring insurrection on social media with comments on the protest, opposition CHP party deputy Alaattin Yuksel said. Police declined to comment.

The protests began in Istanbul over a plan to remove trees in a park to make way for a new building but escalated into wider demonstrations against Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan's government. His AK Party has its roots in Islamist parties that were banned in the past.

Biden urged the Turkish government to show its commitment to democratic principles.

Slideshow: Clashes in Turkey

Stringer / AFP - Getty Images

Protests that started as an outcry against a local development project in Taksim Square have snowballed into widespread anger against what critics say is the government's increasingly conservative and authoritarian agenda.

Launch slideshow

"Today's Turkey has a chance to demonstrate that there's no need to choose between economic advancement and democracy, the system that empowers the winners of elections and yet protects those who are in opposition," Biden said, according to Reuters.

The State Department issued a travel alert that highlighted “numerous reports of violence, injuries, and at least two confirmed deaths resulting from or related to clashes between protestors and Turkish law enforcement authorities."  

"U.S. citizens are urged to remain alert to local security developments and to be vigilant regarding their personal security," it said.

“Violent altercations have occurred in areas of Ankara, Istanbul, Izmir, Adana, Mersin, and elsewhere,” the alert added. “The Turkish National Police and protestors continue to clash in some locations. Individuals caught in the vicinity of violence have been injured and/or detained, including U.S. citizens.”

It said that U.S. citizens “should be alert to the potential for violence” and “strongly” urged them to avoid demonstrations and large gatherings.

“Even demonstrations intended to be peaceful can turn confrontational and escalate into violence,” the alert said.

It noted, however, that there had been no direct attacks on U.S. citizens.

Reuters contributed to this report.

Related:

• Turkey's deputy PM apologizes for police crackdown as second protester dies
• 'Woman in red' sprayed with teargas becomes symbol of Turkey protests

ISTANBUL/ANKARA - Turkey's deputy prime minister sought to mollify tens of thousands of anti-government demonstrators on Tuesday by apologizing for a police crackdown on a peaceful protest that triggered five days of rioting across the country.

The comments by Bulent Arinc, who took charge of the government after Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan left on a visit to North Africa on Monday, contrasted with Erdogan's defiant dismissal of the protesters as "looters." 

"The excessive violence that was used in the first instance against those who were behaving with respect for the environment is wrong and unfair. I apologize to those citizens," Arinc told a news conference in the capital Ankara.

"But I don't think we owe an apology to those who have caused damage in the streets and tried to prevent people's freedom," he said.

Arinc said he would meet some of the organizers of the original Istanbul protest, which has spiraled into an unprecedented show of anger at the ruling party.

It appeared to be too little, too late.

Shops were shuttered on a main avenue leading to Istanbul's Taksim Square, the focus of the protests, as thousands of demonstrators chanting anti-government slogans marched by.

Barricades of rubble blocked other streets leading to the square and the acrid smell of tear gas hung in the air.

Yannis Behrakis / Reuters

An anti-government protester shouts for help with extinguishing a burning container in Istanbul's Taksim Square on Tuesday.

A 22-year-old member of the main opposition youth wing was killed after being hit in the head at a rally in the southern town of Antakya near the Syrian border late on Monday, the second death after a taxi hit a demonstrator in Istanbul on Sunday. Officials initially said the Antakya victim had been shot.

The ferocity of the crackdown on the initial protests on Friday, which began over government plans to build over a Gezi Park in Taksim Square, shocked even Erdogan loyalists and drew international condemnation. U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry said he was concerned by reports of excessive police force.

The main public sector union federation, the leftist KESK which represents 240,000 members, launched a two-day strike, originally called over workers' rights, to protest at the police crackdown on what had begun as peaceful protests.

AFP - Getty Images

Turkish Deputy Prime Minister Bulent Arinc talks at a press conference on Tuesday in Ankara in which he apologized on behalf of the government to protesters hurt in clashes with police during days of demonstrations and called for an immediate end to the protests.

"These operations have drowned the country in gas bombs. The prime minister has become so thoughtless as to describe the millions who exercise their democratic rights ... as a 'handful of marginal looters,'" KESK said in a statement.

Erdogan has dismissed the protests as the work of secular enemies never reconciled to the election success of his AK Party, which has roots in Islamist parties banned in the past but which also embraces center-right and nationalist elements. The party has won three straight elections and overseen an economic boom, increasing Turkey's influence in the region.

The U.S. Department of State told U.S. citizens traveling to or residing in Turkey to remain alert.

"We strongly urge U.S. citizens to avoid demonstrations and large gatherings," a statement read. "Even demonstrations intended to be peaceful can turn confrontational and escalate into violence."

Related content:

'Woman in red' sprayed with teargas becomes symbol of Turkey protests

Osman Orsal / Reuters file

A sequence of photos shows riot police using tear gas against an unidentified woman in Istanbul's Taksim Square on May 28.

ISTANBUL - In her red cotton summer dress, necklace and white bag slung over her shoulder she might have been floating across the lawn at a garden party; but before her crouches a masked policeman firing teargas spray that sends her long hair billowing upwards.

Endlessly shared on social media and replicated as a cartoon on posters and stickers, the image of the "woman in red" has become the leitmotif for female protesters during days of violent anti-government demonstrations in Istanbul.

"That photo encapsulates the essence of this protest," said math student Esra at Besiktas, near the Bosphorus strait and one of the centres of this week's protests. "The violence of the police against peaceful protesters, people just trying to protect themselves and what they value."

In one graphic copy plastered on walls the woman appears much bigger than the policeman. "The more you spray the bigger we get" reads the slogan next to it.

The United States and the European Union as well as human rights groups have expressed concern about the heavy-handed action of Turkish police against protesters.

Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan branded the protesters on Monday extremists "living arm in arm with terrorism," a description that seems to sit ill with the image of the woman in red.

There were others dressed in more combative gear and sporting face masks as they threw stones, but the large number of very young women in Besiktas and on Taksim Square where the protests began on Friday evening is notable.

With swimming goggles and flimsy surgical masks against the teargas, light tasseled scarves hanging around their necks, Esra, Hasine and Secil stood apprehensively in the Besiktas district on Monday evening, joined by ever growing numbers of youngsters as dusk fell and the mood grew more sombre.

They belong, as perhaps does the woman in red, to the ranks of young, articulate women who believe they have something to lose in Erdogan's Turkey. They feel threatened by his promotion of the Islamic headscarf, symbol of female piety.

Slideshow: Clashes in Turkey

Stringer / AFP - Getty Images

Protests that started as an outcry against a local development project in Taksim Square have snowballed into widespread anger against what critics say is the government's increasingly conservative and authoritarian agenda.

Launch slideshow

Many of the women point to new abortion laws as a sign that Erdogan, who has advised Turkish women to each have three children, wants to roll back women's rights and push them into traditional, pious roles.

"I respect women who wear the headscarf, that is their right, but Ä° also want my rights to be protected," said Esra. "I'm not a leftist or an anti-capitalist. Ä° want to be a business woman and live in a free Turkey."

Mustafa Kemal Ataturk, founder of the secular republic formed in 1923 from the ruins of the Ottoman Empire, encouraged women to wear Western clothes rather than headscarves and promoted the image of the professional woman. Ironically, Erdogan is seen these days as, for better or worse, the most dominant Turkish leader since Ataturk.

Erdogan was first swept to power in 2002 and remains unrivalled in popularity, drawing on strong support in the conservative Anatolian heartland.

The weekend demonstrations in dozens of cities suggest however his popularity may be dwindling, at least among middle classes who swung behind him in the early years of political and economic reform that cut back the power of the army and introduced some rights amendments.

Aris Messinis / AFP - Getty Images

A couple wearing gas masks walk at a street in Istanbul on Tuesday as the demonstrations continue.

"Erdogan says 50 percent of the people voted for him. I'm here to show I belong to the other 50 percent, the half of the population whose feelings he showed no respect for, the ones he is trying to crush," said chemistry student Hasine.

"I want to have a future here in Turkey, a career, a freedom to live my life. But all these are under threat. I want Erdogan to understand," she added.

Erdogan, a pious man who denies Islamist ambitions for Turkey, rejects any suggestion he wants to cajole anyone into religious observance. He says new alcohol laws, also denounced by the women, have been passed to protect health rather than on religious grounds.

Protesters are coming better prepared now than when the unrest first began. Some have hard-hats, some are dressed all in black, most wear running shoes. But many are dressed as femininely as the girl in the red dress snapped on Taksim Square.

"Of course I'm nervous and I know I could be in danger here. But for me that is nothing compared to the danger of losing the Turkish Republic, its freedoms and spirit," said 23 year-old economics student Busra, who says her parents support her protest.

Related stories:

• Riots are making Turkey too dangerous - says war-torn Syria
• Tear gas, pepper spray fired at youths as thousands riot in Turkey

ISTANBUL - War-torn Syria has warned its citizens not to travel to neighbor Turkey, Reuters reported Monday as Istanbul prepared for a fourth day of violent public demonstrations in which more than 1,000 have been injured.

Syria's Foreign Ministry said it advised Syrians "against travel to Turkey for the time being for their own safety, because of the deteriorating security situation in several Turkish cities...and the violence of (Prime Minister Tayyip) Erdogan's government against peaceful protesters," according to Reuters.

Reuters

Anti-government protesters behind barricades clash with riot police on Istanbul, early Monday.

In Istanbul, hundreds of young men and women gathered on Ä°stiklal Avenue, one of the city's main streets, early Monday. The crowds, which clapped and whistled as they headed toward the city's main Taksim Square, were smaller than those seen over the weekend.

The private Dogan news agency said police fired tear gas at the group in an area close to Erdogan's Istanbul offices. The protesters responded by hurling stones, it reported.

The government of Syria is fighting a two-year uprising in which an estimated 80,000 people have died. In Turkey, more than 1,000 people have been hurt in its largest city Istanbul, capital Ankara and other cities after protesters clashed with police over the last three days.  

Erdogan, a former close ally of Syria's Bashar Assad, turned against Damascus after the Syrian president cracked down on mainly peaceful protests which broke out in March 2011 and have since descended into a brutal civil war.

Turkey is hosting around 370,000 Syrian refugees. It has also been a base for Assad's military and political foes, as well as a transit point for weapon supplies flowing into northern Syria.

On Saturday Syria called on Erdogan to halt what it called his violent repression of protests or step aside -- an echo of the appeals to Assad in the early days of Syria's uprising.

Thanassis Stavrakis / AP

High school students chant slogans during a protest at Gezi park, Taksim square in Istanbul, Monday.

According to Reuters, Syrian Information Minister Omran Zoabi said:  "The demands of the Turkish people don't deserve all this violence ... If Erdogan is unable to pursue non-violent means, he should resign." 

The recent unrest in Turkey broke out when trees were torn down at a park in Taksim as part of government plans to develop the area.  The demonstrations have broadened into a show of defiance against the Islamist-rooted Justice and Development Party (AKP).

Erdogan has so far stood firm on plans to remake the square, and maintained that the protests were not actually related to the redevelopment.

"It's entirely ideological," he said in an interview on Turkish television. "The main opposition party which is making resistance calls on every street is provoking these protests ... This is about my ruling party, myself and the looming municipality elections in Istanbul and efforts to make the AK Party lose votes here."

Reuters contributed to this report.

This story was originally published on Mon Jun 3, 2013 6:29 AM EDT

Murad Sezer / Reuters

Anti-government protesters clash with riot police near Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan's office in Istanbul, Turkey, June 2.

ISTANBUL/ANKARA — Tens of thousands of people took to the streets in Turkey's four biggest cities on Sunday and clashed with riot police firing tear gas in the third day of the fiercest anti-government protests in years.

Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan blamed the main secular opposition party for inciting the crowds, whom he called "a few looters", and said the protests were aimed at depriving his ruling AK Party of votes as elections begin next year.

The unrest erupted on Friday when trees were torn down at a park in Istanbul's main Taksim Square under government plans to redevelop the area, but widened into a broad show of defiance against the Islamist-rooted Justice and Development Party (AKP).

Erdogan said the plans to remake the square, long an iconic rallying point for mass demonstrations, would go ahead, including the construction of a new mosque and the rebuilding of a replica Ottoman-era barracks.

Erdogan said the protests had nothing to do with the plans.

"It's entirely ideological," he said in an interview broadcast on Turkish television.

"The main opposition party which is making resistance calls on every street is provoking these protests ... This is about my ruling party, myself and the looming municipality elections in Istanbul and efforts to make the AK Party lose votes here."

Gurcan Ozturk / AFP - Getty Images

Protestors clash with riot police between Taksim and Besiktas in Istanbul late Saturday.

Turkey is due to hold local and presidential elections next year, in which Erdogan is expected to stand, followed by parliamentary polls in 2015.

The main opposition Republican People's Party (CHP) denied orchestrating the unrest, blaming Erdogan's policies.

"Today the people on the street across Turkey are not exclusively from the CHP, but from all ideologies and from all parties," senior party member Mehmet Akif Hamzacebi said.

"What Erdogan has to do is not to blame CHP but draw the necessary lessons from what happened," he told Reuters.

The protests, started by a small group of environmental campaigners, mushroomed when police used force to eject them from the park on Taksim Square. As word spread online, the demonstrations have drawn in a wide range of people of all ages from across the political and social spectrum.

Protests on Sunday were not as violent as the past two days but police used tear gas to try to disperse hundreds of people in Ankara's main Kizilay square. There were similar clashes in Izmir and Adana, Turkey's third and fourth biggest cities.

In Istanbul's Taksim Square, the atmosphere was more festive with some chanting for Erdogan to resign and others singing and dancing. There was little obvious police presence. But there were later clashes between police and protesters near Erdogan's office in a former Ottoman palace in the city.

FEROCITY

There were more than 90 separate demonstrations around the country on Friday and Saturday, officials said. More than 1,000 people have been injured in Istanbul and several hundred more in Ankara, according to medical staff.

The ferocity of the police response in Istanbul shocked Turks, as well as tourists caught up in the unrest in one of the world's most visited destinations. It has drawn rebukes from the United States, European Union and international rights groups.

Helicopters fired tear gas canisters into residential neighborhoods and police used teargas to try to smoke people out of buildings. Footage on YouTube showed one protester being hit by an armored police truck as it charged a barricade.

Erdogan has overseen a transformation in Turkey during his decade in power, turning its once crisis-prone economy into the fastest-growing in Europe.

Erdogan remains by far the most popular politician, but critics point to what they see as his authoritarianism and religiously conservative meddling in private lives in the secular republic.

Tighter restrictions on alcohol sales and warnings against public displays of affection in recent weeks have also provoked protests. Concern that government policy is allowing Turkey to be dragged into the conflict in neighboring Syria by the West has also led to peaceful demonstrations.

On Sunday, Erdogan appeared on television for the fourth time in less than 36 hours, and justified the restrictions on alcohol as for the good of people's health.

"I want them to know that I want these (restrictions) for the sake of their health ... Whoever drinks alcohol is an alcoholic," he said.

This story was originally published on Sun Jun 2, 2013 2:15 PM EDT

Gurcan Ozturk / AFP - Getty Images

Protestors run from tear gas at the Taksim Gezi park in Istanbul, Turkey, after clashes with riot police, June 1.

ISTANBUL - Turkish Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan made a defiant call for an end to the fiercest anti-government demonstrations in years on Saturday as authorities arrested almost a thousand people in protests across the country. 

Riot police backed by armored vehicles and helicopters fired tear gas and water cannons in Istanbul and Ankara for a second day. Interior Minister Muammer Guler said 939 arrests had been made in more than 90 separate demonstrations. 

The unrest was triggered by government plans for a replica Ottoman-era barracks housing shops or apartments in Istanbul's Taksim Square, long a venue for political protest, but has widened into a broader show of defiance against Erdogan and his Islamist-rooted Justice and Development Party (AKP). 

Crowds of protesters chanting "shoulder to shoulder against fascism" and "government resign" marched on Taksim, where hundreds were injured in clashes the day before. Broken glass, rocks and an overturned car littered the square as night fell. 

A helicopter buzzed overhead as groups of mostly young men and women, bandanas or surgical masks tied around their mouths, used Facebook and Twitter on mobile phones to try to organize and regroup in side streets. Police clashed with protesters who lit fires in the streets leading to Erdogan's Istanbul office. 

"If this is about holding meetings, if this is a social movement, where they gather 20, I will get up and gather 200,000 people. Where they gather 100,000, I will bring together one million from my party," Erdogan said in a televised speech. 

"Every four years we hold elections and this nation makes its choice," he said. "Those who have a problem with government's policies can express their opinions within the framework of law and democracy." 

Earlier, police pulled back from Gezi Park in Taksim, where the demonstration started peacefully on Monday with people pitching tents in protest at trees being torn up for the redevelopment. 

Waiters scurried out of luxury hotels lining the square, on what should be a busy weekend for tourists in one of the world's most visited cities, ferrying lemons to protesters, who squirted the juice in their eyes to mitigate the effects of tear gas. 

"People from different backgrounds are coming together. This has become a protest against the government, against Erdogan taking decisions like a king," said Oral Goktas, a 31-year old architect among a peaceful crowd walking towards Taksim. 

This story was originally published on Sat Jun 1, 2013 5:58 AM EDT

Mike Hewitt / Getty Images

Switzerland ranks No. 1 in the "life satisfaction" category of the latest Better Life Index. Pictured is Geneva.

You might not think it from listening to politicians, but the United States is one of the happiest places on Earth.

In fact, according to this year’s Better Life Index, released Tuesday by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, the U.S. is the sixth-happiest of the 36 countries rated, falling just behind such perennially cheerful nations as Sweden and Australia, which grabbed the top spot.

If money were the key to happiness, America would be No. 1 based on its top ranking for disposable income and total household wealth. But that’s not the only thing that matters.

The Paris-based OECD says that gross domestic product, often used to measure a country’s success, isn’t a sufficient indicator of people’s sense of well-being. So the organization takes 11 factors into account, including security, work-life balance, environment and housing.

The U.S. ranks sixth with all 11 factors weighted equally. But if you give the most weight to the elusive “life satisfaction” category, northern European countries are atop, with Switzerland, Norway and Sweden taking the top three spots and the U.S. dropping to 12^th.

Work-life balance? Denmark, Norway and Sweden come out on top, and the U.S. is a middling 15^th.

Romina Boarini, the OECD’s head of monitoring well-being and progress, sees a pattern in the data. The countries that do best are not only the richest, they’re often the ones that have the smallest gaps between the rich and poor.

Significant inequalities in such areas as health, education and housing can have a major impact, she said.

“We actually see that the lower the social gaps are, the higher the average well-being outcomes,” Boarini said.

The OECD’s study documentation notes that the U.S. has “a considerable gap between the richest and the poorest – the top 20 percent of the population earn approximately eight times as much as the bottom 20 percent.”

Many of the happiest countries overall also score well in work-life balance, which Boarini finds unsurprising.

“People need not just to have money,” she said. “They need to have different things in life. What is important for them is to have sort of a balance. Perhaps it’s better to sacrifice a little bit of income to have a little bit more [in terms of] friends and community.”

Not that she dismisses the value of money. The top-ranked countries tend to have healthy, well-developed economies, leaving them better able to invest in health and education, both of which are critical factors when it comes to a sense of well-being, she said.

Countries that rank at the bottom of the list tend to have weaker economies, with their citizens suffering high unemployment, social problems such as high crime, and little feeling of connection with their governments.

In virtually every category, Turkey and Mexico are at the bottom of the list, and Chile, Brazil and Russia aren’t far ahead.

When it comes to being satisfied with life, however, Mexico, Brazil and Chile climb, leaving Turkey at the bottom, trailing Hungary, Greece, Portugal, Estonia and Russia.

Boarini said one thing she has learned in studying the data is that “there is no unique recipe.”

“It’s not just having one thing that makes your happiness. It’s a combination,” she said. “And you need a little bit of all those things to be OK.”

She added that the Better Life Index sends a “strong message” to member nations: “Target people’s happiness. It’s more about creating the conditions for people to find their own way to a happy life.”

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