Dust and rubble fill the street as an excavator tears off chunks of concrete from an old apartment building. Bystanders and former residents watch from afar as construction equipment tears down the structure. Among the bystanders is Ibrahim Ozaydin, 30, a former resident. He watches the demolition not with worry, but with relief, as his building was marked by officials as unsafe months ago.
Ozaydin and his family were shocked to learn that the municipality deemed his building uninhabitable. “We decided to build our own house,” he told The Associated Press as he watched his former home being torn down. “Instead of living in a poorly built house, let us take our own precautions.”
