Organisers cancelled a pro-Turkish rally in Rotterdam on Friday that had been called to protest against Dutch police who used horses, dogs and water cannon to break up a demonstration last weekend. "The organisers have cancelled the demonstration," the Rotterdam mayor's spokesman, Lennart de Jong, told AFP. He would not say why the planners were no longer going ahead with the event in the Netherlands' port city.
Dutch police on Saturday moved in to disperse stone-throwing pro-Turkish rioters, after about 1,000 people protested when Dutch authorities banned two Turkish ministers from attending pro-Ankara campaign events in the port.
Rotterdam's mayor Ahmed Aboutaleb, however, on Thursday had authorised a new rally to be held Friday for two hours from 1600 GMT. De Jong said "police will keep an eye" on the situation in case people turn up anyway Friday, "but we have broadcast widely that ... there will not be a demonstration because the organisers cancelled it."
A diplomatic crisis erupted when the Dutch banned one Turkish minister's plane from landing, and then expelled another envoy who had travelled by road across the border from Germany.
Both Germany and The Netherlands have blocked Turkish ministers from staging rallies to woo expatriate Turks to vote "yes" in an April 16 referendum on giving President Recep Tayyip Erdogan greater powers.
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