A group of workers has protested the series of fatal work-related accidents at shipyards in İstanbul's Tuzla district, where most recently three workers were killed while testing out a lifeboat.

Approximately 200 workers walked from Taksim Square to Galatasaray in İstanbul on Sunday with a coffin to protest the deaths of the three workers on Aug. 11 during a lifeboat test and the numerous other work-related deaths that have occurred in Tuzla.
Their signs read "We no longer want to die," "Shipyard workers not slaves," "Safety measures for dangerous work should be implemented" and "Contractor system should be abolished."

Meanwhile, four people, including a woman holding a sign on the Bosporus Bridge saying "End murders at shipyards," were detained Sunday as they attempted to block traffic on the bridge.

In a lifeboat freefall test on a tanker that had recently been built at Tuzla's Gisan shipyard, 16 workers were placed on the lifeboat while it was lowered to the water. But one of the cables supporting the lifeboat snapped and the boat crashed into the tanker, killing Ramazan Ergün, Ramazan Çetinkaya and Emrah Varol and injuring the rest. A prosecutor has launched an investigation into the accident while the Labor and Social Security Ministry appointed an inspector to investigate it.

Several workers at other shipyards in Tuzla claimed that refusing to take part in such tests is considered by their employers as reason for dismissal. Mehmet Oyar, founder of the Gisan shipyard, said his staff take precautions but "accidents happen." He noted that he has been in the shipyard business for 48 years and has never seen sandbags placed in the lifeboats for testing, as some claim should have been done instead of using people.

"Accidents occur because employers are uninformed," he was quoted by NTV-MSNBC as saying. The Gisan shipyard resumed operations only two days after three of its workers were killed during the lifeboat test. The accident of the three workers took place shortly after a parliamentary commission investigating industrial accidents indicated that most shipyards disregard safety regulations and force their employees to work in unsafe conditions. More than two dozen workers have died this year at the Tuzla shipyards.

Todays Zaman