Turkey Talks Go Up in Smoke (and Tear Gas)

Protest leaders are bailing on today's planned meeting with Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, after a violent day and night of clashes with police. Protest leaders tell CNN that they now believe negotiations would be "fruitless." They say all the people still meeting with Erdogan—including celebs like a singer, actress, and writer—are already friendly to his government.

Erdogan hasn't sounded terribly interested in reconciliation either. "As of now we have no tolerance" for "the provocateurs and terrorists," he said yesterday, according to Deutsche Welle. "Were we supposed to kneel before them and say please remove your pieces of rags?" There's currently what the BBC describes as "an uneasy calm" in Taksim Square in Istanbul, which police cleared yet again overnight with tear gas and water cannons, after protesters returned yesterday evening. (More Recep Tayyip Erdogan stories.)