Turkish police fired tear gas and used water cannons to disperse thousands of demonstrators as the country’s biggest wave of anti-government protests in decades entered its second week with no signs of waning.

Three women have been shot dead at a Kurdish centre in Paris, police said, in what the French interior minister called an “execution”.

Thirty-five people killed in Turkish air strikes in Iraq are smugglers whom the military mistook for Kurdish rebels, Turkey said today.

Turks were sharply divided today over the government’s surprise proposal to open a major port and airport to long-time foe Cyprus and save the country’s troubled EU membership talks.