THE construction of a large hotel that will have a capacity of 1,000 beds in Milas has begun on top of burned forestland and looks to be finished in 2017.

The hotel is being constructed on land that experienced a large fire eight years ago, when 150 hectares of forest burned.

The hotel, whose construction began in November 2014, will be only 50 meters from the water and is expected to cost TL 60 million.

After the fire, Muğla Forest District Director İbrahim Aydın promised the area would be green, but only a year after the fire, the Günal Construction Company illegally began landfilling to create a port for the five-star hotel on five acres of land.

In response to harsh reactions from environmentalists, the construction site manager told the Cihan news agency: “Everyone [other companies] is [land] filling, and if we had waited for permission then we would have lost time. Now, we are just waiting to be fined.”

After intense reactions from environmental rights groups, the holding company was fined TL 45,500 and given a year to remove their landfill.