Turkey plans to pave more of its coastline

When omer onal was a child the Cesme peninsula was a beautiful backwater. It was in the 1990s that developers began throwing up the hotels that have since made this spot on Turkey’s Aegean coast famous among middle-class tourists. Now Turkey’s government has set aside another sixth of the peninsula for the sorts of projects that developers hope will draw in the very rich. Golf courses, marinas, hotels and residences could replace more than 5,000 hectares of forest. Wetlands hosting more than a hundred types of bird are also to be filled in. “Everything is about making money,” sighs Mr Onal, a local historian.