Thousands of people in Turkey took to the streets on Saturday in protest at the murder of a young woman who allegedly resisted an attempt by a bus driver to rape her.
Hundreds of women gathered in Istanbul’s Taksim square chanting slogans such as “You will never walk alone.”
Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu promised the family to hunt those responsible for the crime and punish them, AFP reported.
Police on Friday discovered the burned body of 20-year-old Ozgecan Aslan in a riverbed in southern Turkey.
She had been missing since Wednesday when she was reported to have boarded a minibus to go home, the Hurriyet newspaper said in a report.
Three suspects including the driver of the minibus were detained and are said to have admitted to having stabbed Aslan.
A motive for the alleged murder was not immediately clear but the private Dogan news agency reported that the driver attempted to rape Aslan after she was left alone in the minibus.
She resisted by spraying pepper gas at the driver who stabbed her to death, according to Dogan. The driver later sought help from two other people -- his father and friend -- to hide the body.
There were protests in thousands in several cities on Saturday, including Ankara, Istanbul, and Mersin - Aslan’s hometown in southern Turkey.
