Men in dark suits beat, kick anti-Erdogan protesters outside Turkish embassy in Washington

On Tuesday, hours after President Trump hosted Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan in the White House, a clash broke out outside Turkey's embassy in Washington, D.C. A D.C. Metropolitan Police spokesman said two people were arrested and nine taken to the hospital with injuries after the scuffle, and the violence appeared to start with opposing groups of demonstrators. Later, a D.C. police officer told BuzzFeed News that 10 people were arrested.

The Guardian, citing witnesses, said the fight started when members of Erdogan's security detail attacked protesters carrying the flag of the Kurdish PYD party, and Voice of America's Turkish service — which posted a video of the fighting, and D.C. police trying to keep the peace — similarly identifies the men in dark suits as Erdogan's security guards.

A local NBC News affiliate said Erdogan was inside the building when the fighting broke out, though he is staying in Blair House, across the street from the White House. The Washington Post says Erdogan was "apparently not at the embassy during the demonstration."

Subscribe to The Week

Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.

SUBSCRIBE & SAVE

Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

Sign up

"We are protesting (Erdogan's) policies in Turkey, in Syria, and in Iraq," protester Flint Arthur told CNN. "They think they can engage in the same sort of suppression of protest and free speech that they engage in in Turkey," he added. "They stopped us for a few minutes ... but we still stayed and continued to protest Erdogan's tyrannical regime."

In a press conference after their meeting, Trump and Erdogan agreed on the need to defeat the Islamic State. Trump did not agree to Erdogan's demand that the U.S. not arm Kurdish YPG fighters in Syria, but did vow to support Turkey's crackdown on a Kurdish insurgency inside Turkey by the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK), saying such groups will "have no safe quarter."