Mr. Erdogan’s missteps after the disaster explain much of the anger toward him. He visited Soma after the day of the incident and gave a press conference in which he repeated his longstanding line that such accidents are “in the nature of this profession.” He then cited similarly deadly mine accidents in other countries, such as in England in 1862 and 1866, in France in 1906 and in the United States in 1907. Many wondered, of course, why the prime minister was focused on the primitive conditions of previous centuries rather than modern-day standards and cutting-edge technology.
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