CCTV footage shows former Turkish minister punching security guard
A video appearing to show a former Turkish government minister punching a security guard has gone viral online.
CCTV footage released online - published below by Timeturk - appears to show Erdogan Bayraktar, a former minister of environment and urban planning in the Justice and Development party (AKP) government, hitting a security guard.
The guard was apparently asking Bayraktar to identify himself:
Bayraktar had been on his way to visit someone at a gated residential compound in Istanbul on Sunday night, according to local media, when his driver and bodyguard got into an argument after being asked by private security for his name and who he was visiting.
The argument eventually descended into violence.
Bayraktar resigned from the government and from parliament in 2013 when he and his son were implicated in a corruption scandal which saw scores of government officials arrested.
Denying his guilt, he called on then-prime minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan to resign as well, implying his involvement in the scandal.
Sunday's incident is the latest in a line of violent altercations in recent years involving AKP officials.
In May 2014, following the Soma mining disaster in which over 300 people lost their lives, an aide to Erdogan was photographed kicking the relative of one of the victims, who was lying on the floor after taking part in a protest which was broken up by police:
Erdogan himself was accused of slapping a protester during the visit to Soma with footage appearing to show the incident. However, the man filming the tape reportedly said Erdogan did not mean to hit him.
Oktay Saral, an AKP deputy from Istanbul, threw punches and a gavel at opposition deputies during a parliamentary session last February.
"I threw four or five punches. I don't lie. I speak frankly," Saral reportedly told Star television station.
Earlier this month, video footage of a parliamentary committee meeting also went viral after MPs from all political parties began trading blows and throwing water:
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