İztuzu Beach

İztuzu Beach is a 4.5 km long beach near Dalyan, in the Ortaca district of the Province of Muğla in southwestern Turkey. The beach is a narrow spit of land, which forms a natural barrier between the fresh water delta of the Dalyan river and the Mediterranean. It is one of the main breeding grounds for loggerhead sea turtles (Caretta caretta) in the Mediterranean and is therefore often referred to as "Turtle Beach". The loggerhead turtle (Caretta caretta) is on the IUCN Red list of endangered animals. For this reason the beach has had a protected status since 1988 and is part of the Köyceğiz-Dalyan Special Environmental Protection Area.

The greatest threat to the survival of the loggerhead sea turtle is on these sandy beaches where its life begins. This has triggered an international conservation effort that began in the 1990s. The effort to protect loggerhead sea turtle eggs and to assure a safe breeding ground for this endangered species has made international headlines. This issue is one of the most critical items on Turkey's environmental agenda.

From 1984 onwards there had been rumours about developing the beach for mass tourism. Plans were discussed for building a hotel and a marina at the delta side and bungalows at Küçük Dalyan at the banks of Sülüngür lake.
In 1986 the owners of the beach huts were summoned to clear and dismantle their huts by October that year.
In April 1987 the rumours about a hotel complex came true, when building started on the Kaunos Beach Hotel, an 1800-bed holiday resort to be financed with German development aid funds.
Since this would have meant the end of an important nesting habitat for the loggerhead turtle, June Haimoff, together with fellow-environmentalists such as David Bellamy, Lily Venizelos, Günther Peter, Nergis Yazgan and Keith Corbett, launched a campaign to save the beach.
This started a grim international struggle between conservationists and developers. There were protests from -amongst others- the IUCN, Greenpeace, World Wildlife Fund and the Zoologische Gesellschaft Frankfurt.
Especially in the Federal Republic of Germany the building project caused great indignation, because German DEG (Deutsche Finanzierungsgesellschaft für Beteiligungen in Entwicklungsländern) wanted to claim a fund of 5 million euros worth from public means under the pretense of "development aid".
June Haimoff approached the WWF, upon which Prince Philip -then president- asked the Turkish Prime Minister Turgut Özal for a moratorium, while awaiting an Environmental impact assessment. This request was granted and building temporarily stopped. In the meantime the German Federal Government decided against the use of funds for the hotel by DEG. In July 1988 the Turkish government decided against development and gave İztuzu beach and its hinterland the Special Environmental Protection Area status.

...
Wikipedia