Turkish president vows to ‘destroy terrorists’

Named after Selim I, the 16th century sultan known for his expansion of the Ottoman empire, the bridge accompanies the July 15 Matryrs’ Bridge – previously the Bosphorus Bridge – and the Fatih Sultan Mehmet Bridge in crossing the Bosphorus. In the wake of last month’s failed coup attempt, the debate over the bridge’s name nearly seems quaint.

The country has also been hit by attacks this summer by Islamic State on a wedding party and Istanbul airport, while the Turkish army’s incursion this week in Syria to curb jihadist and Kurdish forces has unsettled nerves.

President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, the prime minister and a host of other Turkish leaders took part on Friday in an opening ceremony of a new bridge which connects the Asian and European sides of Istanbul, spanning the Bosphorus.

“This is not just a bridge, it is a work of art, and engineering miracle, the widest bridge in the world and the longest bridge to carry trains”.

A former mayor of Istanbul, Erdogan has often boasted of pet mega projects under his rule that also include a new airport and even a Panama-style canal to relieve pressure from the Bosphorus.

All trucks and heavy-duty vehicles are to be directed to the new bridge to ease traffic on the old ones and cut congestion and pollution in Istanbul, the Anadolu Agency said.

Turkey closed deals to secure $45 billion in private infrastructure investment past year, absorbing 40 percent of the global total, according to the World Bank.

“We are connecting continents”, Erdogan said.

It has a total of eight lanes for cars as well as two railway lines.

Turkey has opened the world’s biggest suspension bridge in Istanbul.

The bridge will ease traffic in the region, where around 135,000 vehicles are projected to cross the bridge each day. “This opens up hitherto pristine lands to more construction projects, because Turkey’s economy depends on construction. which paradoxically exacerbates traffic jams”. But Arslan, however, said about 382,000 trees had been relocated.

In 2013, when the name was announced at a groundbreaking ceremony, it sparked a great deal of controversy.

Environmental groups have criticized the destruction of forests to build approach roads to the bridge.

The bridge was built with a construction technique of “build-operate-transfer model”.

Many members of Turkey’s Alevi community, whose faith draws from Shi’ite, Sufi and Anatolian traditions, say Selim slaughtered tens of thousands of their forebears.