15:03

This has just come in from the Guardian’s Turkey and Middle East correspondent, Bethan McKernan:

Turkey’s interior minister, Süleyman Soylu, a close ally of President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, has resigned from his post after the bungled handling of a total lockdown across 31 Turkish cities over the weekend to contain Covid-19.

The government announced on Friday at 10.30pm that a 48-hour-long lockdown during which people would not be allowed to leave home would go into effect at midnight, causing panic across the country as people rushed to shops and bakeries to stock up before the curfew.

While officials rushed to reassure citizens that the lockdown would not affect basics such as groceries and pharmacies, the last-minute decision was heavily criticised by civilians and politicians alike. Istanbul – home to 16 million people – had a significant surge in panic buying and traffic backed up as people made late-night trips to check on loved ones.

Workers clean and disinfect surfaces in Taksim Square, Istanbul. Photograph: AP

The city’s mayor, Ekrem İmamoğlu of the opposition Republican Peoples’ Party (CHP), said in a video posted to Twitter that his municipality had not informed in advance of the expected shutdown.

Soylu addressed the criticism in remarks to Turkish media on Sunday morning, accepting “full responsibility” for Friday’s events, but announce his resignation via Twitter on Sunday evening.



“I acted in good faith ... to prevent the epidemic spreading,” Soylu wrote. “The scenes that occured before the lockdown began, even for a short time, are my responsibility. My actions should not have caused this.”

Political resignations are rare in Turkey. The last time a minister from the ruling Justice and Development (AKP) party stepped down was in 2013.



Turkey has become one of the countries with the fastest rising number of recorded cases, which stood at 56,956 on Sunday.

Erdoğan, usually no stranger to heavy-handed tactics, has resisted calls by doctors’ unions and opposition politicians to order people to stop going to work and stay home, insisting that the “wheels of the economy must keep turning”.