Turkey’s leaders accused of ‘playing political games’ over Covid response

Anger has grown as politicians have seemingly prioritised political and economic issues over public health

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On a boiling hot day in Istanbul last July, hundreds of thousands of people gathered outside the Hagia Sophia to celebrate President Recep Tayyip Erdoan's declaration that the historic building the modern state's secular founders had made a museum would be turned back into a mosque.

The decision was widely perceived outside the country as a turning point in Turkey's relationship with the west. In retrospect, the crowds in Sultanahmet Square represented another cultural shift - a change in how Turkey's government dealt with the coronavirus pandemic after months of closed borders, and weekend and evening curfews.