16. August 2000

1. - AFP - "Turkish trade fair to open in Baghdad":

BAGHDAD

Some 151 Turkish companies will take part in a trade fair in Baghdad opening Monday, the Turkish embassy here said Thursday. The fair, the third of its kind in Baghdad since 1998, aims "to make Iraqi people aware of Turkish products and the capacities of Turkish businesses," an embassy source told AFP.

Companies taking part in the three-day fair will try to seal contracts under the UN oil-for-food programme, which authorises Baghdad to sell a limited amount of oil abroad in exchange for food and other essentials such as medicine, the source said. Turkish Trade Secretary Kursad Tuzman said in March that Ankara wanted to boost trade with Baghdad to pre-1990 levels of more than 2.5 billion dollars a year from the current 800 million dollars.

According to Tuzman, the crippling UN embargo imposed on Iraq after it invaded Kuwait in 1990 "has already cost Turkey more than 40 billion dollars because of loss of access to the Iraqi market." Baghdad regularly criticises Turkey for extending facilities to US and British warplanes patrolling a no-fly zone imposed over northern Iraq since Iraq's defeat in the 1991 Gulf War.

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2. - CNN / AP - "Turkey to pull out of economic crisis soon, prime minister says":

ANKARA

Turkish Prime Minister Bulent Ecevit said Sunday Turks would feel the pinch of the economic crisis for a while longer but that the country would recover from the slump soon.

Ecevit was addressing his center-left Democratic Left Party's congress just days after the International Monetary Fund announced it was close to reaching an agreement on dlrs 10 billion in loans.

The loans are designed to support the country's new economic recovery program after the collapse of the Turkish lira in February led to soaring interest rates, price hikes, massive layoffs and angry street protests.

"As a nation we will suffer for a little while, but we will reach a sound (economy) in the end," Ecevit said.

"We are waging an economic war of salvation," he told some 1,200 cheering delegates at a packed sports hall. "This war will be won."

Earlier this month, Turkey announced the outline of a program to recover from the crisis, including moves to restructure the banking sector and speed privatization.

The country has agreed to undertake sweeping economic reforms in return for international support. Parliament has already passed seven of the 15 emergency measures needed to underpin the program.

Ecevit has faced numerous calls for his resignation since his public rift with President Ahmet Necdet Sezer sparked the crisis. But Ecevit reaffirmed Sunday that his government had no intention of resigning.

"Despite the difficulties of the past few months, there is no government that is as effective, harmonious or reassuring on the horizon," Ecevit said.

Delegates voted overwhelmingly to re-elect Ecevit as head of the party.

Sema Piskinsut, one of the few women in parliament and a strong human rights advocate, had challenged Ecevit's leadership, but received only 86 votes to Ecevit's 963.

Delegates on Sunday refused to let her even address the congress. Her son was beaten during scuffles with young party supporters while delegates booed her and shouted "Traitor go out!"
Ecevit, 76, has led the Democratic Left Party for more than a decade.

The party was founded by his wife Rahsan, who ran the party while her husband was banned from politics after a military coup.

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3. - Kurdish Observer - "US softens its report":

The year 2001 report on terrorism prepared by the US State Department continued its softened trend of the past two years. This was also reflected in the language it used concerning the PKK.

CEMAL UCAR

This year's "Global Terrorism Report" prepared by the US State Department continued its trend of the past two years using softer language concerning the PKK. Terms such as "terrorist," which were used concerning the PKK until 1999, did not occur in direct connection with the PKK in the report that was released early this week in Washington. However, the fact that the PKK is still found on the list of "terrorist organizations," a legacy from Bill Clinton's administration, tarnishes the softened image. Because the year 2001 report is considered the last report of the Clinton period, the report that will be announced next year and will be fully a product of the Bush administration is already being awaited with great curiosity. Some diplomatic observers, in view of this year's report, are asking when the US will remove the PKK from the "terrorist" list in question.

The report exhibited the same general approach to the other 28 national liberation movements and political/religious groups it discussed. The amount of space given to the PKK in comparison with past years was noteworthy, with the broad coverage given to its change in strategy one of the most attention-grabbing features.

The PKK was discussed in the section of the report on Europe, in which France was criticized for avoiding cooperation with the US in the field of terrorism, while Germany and Turkey received praise. The US report noted that the PKK had abandoned acts of violence in Germany, recalling that in spite of this, the ban on the PKK in that country, which has been in effect since 1993, was still continued. While Greece had come in for heavy criticism in last year's report, this year's report noted that Athens had taken some steps in the struggle against terrorism. The report expressed that the Greek government had in particular begun to take some important steps in the framework of preparing for the 2004 Olympics in Athens and following the assassination of British defense attache Stephen Saunders last June by the November 17 organization. In last year's report, Greece had been termed the "weak link in Europe's struggle against terrorism."

PKK changed its strategy

Views concerning the PKK, which were covered in the sections of the report dealing with Turkey, Germany, and Austria, were as follows: "The Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK), which aimed for years to establish an independent Kurdish state through violence, has been defending since the capture of its leader Abdullah Ocalan that it will continue its struggle though political means only for the political, economic, social, and cultural rights of the Kurds to be guaranteed in a democratic Turkey. The government, for its part, has not responded to the change in tactics and aims announced by the PKK. While the European Court of Human Rights is evaluating Ocalan's application, Prime Minister Ecevit has warned that the government could review its stance on implementation of the death penalty should the PKK resort to violence once again."

Clashes reduced

The report underscored that there had been a serious decline in incidents of violence as a result of the PKK's change in strategy, and included the following determination: "According to the Turkish Chief of General Staff, while the number of violent clashes in previous years were in the thousands, this number had fallen to 45 in the first 11 months of the year 2000. The Turkish armed forces have begun comprehensive operations against the few hundred guerrillas that remain in the southeast of the country and, with the support of the Iraqi Kurdish groups in northern Iraq who have struggled against the PKK for years, against the few thousand guerrillas which had withdrawn to that region."

The report recalled that PKK President Abdullah Ocalan had begun his peace initiative in August 1999 and that the PKK had adopted this position officially at its 7th Congress held in January 2000.

Powell: International support is increasing

Meanwhile, during a press conference arranged to announce the report, US Secretary of State Colin Powell asserted that they had won a great victory in international cooperation with the UN Security Council decision no. 1333, aimed against the Taliban administration in Afghanistan because it continues to harbor Saudi Osama bin Laden and refuses to close his camps. Powell said that the Taliban had been given a forceful message through this decision, and added that cooperation between the US and its allies was continuing and increasing, including the sharing of information. Powell said that state-supported terrorism was gradually decreasing worldwide.

Approach to other countries

The US State Department Global Terrorism Report continued its same position on Iran as the year before, stating that it was the state which was most active in supporting terrorism. The report asserted that the Iran Revolutionary Guards, intelligence, and security ministry took part in the planing and execution of operations, and that they continued to support groups using terrorism in order to achieve their aims. The report asserted that Iran was particularly active in supporting Hizbullah guerrillas in Lebanon and Palestinian groups opposed to the peace process.

The report stated that there were 423 violent attacks in the year 2000, meaning an 8-percent increase from the year 1999, and said that the greatest decrease in incidents had occurred in Western Europe. The US State Department, under pressure from pro-Israeli groups, did not confirm the allegations concerning Israel against the Palestinian administration. It did note that "Israelis accused Palestinian security officials and members of Fatah of taking part in assaults against Israeli targets" but did not note whether or not the US had accepted these allegations. The report likewise noted that Islamist were using Afghanistan as a training center and base of operations, and also that membership in the "Real IRA" faction in Northern Ireland had increased from 70 the year before to 150-200 in the year 2000.

The US State Department added the paramilitary United Defense Forces active in Columbia, the Ruanda Liberation Army, the leftist GRAPO in Spain, the United Revolutionary Front in Sierra Leone, and two Islamist groups in Pakistan to its list of "other terrorist organizations" for the first time in this report. The Kmer Rouge of Cambodia, meanwhile, was removed from the list of terrorist organizations. There were no changes to the list of countries which sponsor terrorism, which were listed as Cuba, Iran, Iraq, Libya, North Korea, Sudan, and Syria.

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4. - Turkish Daily News - "Court sentences members of PKK`s alleged peace delegation":

ANKARA

A Turkish court on Wednesday sentenced five members of a self-styled terror organization PKK peace delegation who surrendered to authorities to up to 18 years in prison.

The five arrived in Turkey from Vienna in 1999 carrying letters from the terrorist Kurdistan Workers Party or PKK offering peace but were arrested on arrival.

Turkey has said repeatedly that it will never compromise with the terrorists, who have led a 15-year war for autonomy in southeastern Turkey. Some 37,000 people have died as a result of that conflict.

The terrorists declared a unilateral cease-fire in August 1999 after Turkish commandos captured PKK leader Abdullah Ocalan.

The PKK said it ordered the group to come to Turkey to show their sincerity in offering peace.
The court sentenced one group member to 18 years and nine months in prison for being an official of the political wing of the group. Four others were sentenced to 12 years and six months in prison for PKK membership.

Three other members of the group, including leader Ali Sapan, a member of the defunct Kurdish parliament-in-exile, are still on trial on other charges related to their political activities in Europe.

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5. - Turkish Daily News - "Turkey will get excellent planes say Israelis":

The Israeli Embassy in Ankara has stated that Turkey will receive excellent F-4s warplanes after being fixed by Israeli experts. Commenting on the press reports that Israel had modernized Turkish F-4s badly, an Israeli diplomat told Turkish Daily News that Israel is committed to do everything to satisfy Turkey's needs.

" Turkey will get planes in the most advanced and modernized shape. Turkish Ministry of National Defence has already indicated in a written statement that they are fully satisfied by the agreement reached with the Israeli side." said the Israeli diplomat.

Remarking that the Israeli side would pay everything for the repair, the Israeli diplomat said:" In this kind of huge projects, this kind of problems can always occur but everyone in Turkey should be assured that Israeli Aircraft Industry will do whatever it takes to satisfy Turkey." He added that the characterization of problems with F-4s as `being poorly modernized' was not depicting the real picture.

26 F-4s are modernized in Israel and the other 28 were done in Turkey.

The National Defence Ministry had announced that Israel would pay for the F-4 fighter planes whose modernization renovations have been improperly made.

In a written statement from the Secretariat General of the Ministry, it was stated that 15 of the F-4s modernized by Israeli IAI had some complications with the isolation of the fuel tanks and their flights had been temporarily suspended. The statement said 4 warplanes have been repaired and the remaining 11 are expected to be fixed within the next 3 weeks.

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6. - Ozgur Politika - "Exited May 1":

Hundreds of thousands Kurdish and Turkish workers met at squares, shouting slogans on economic and political crisis, death fasts and peace demands. Intensive participation of HADEP (People's Democracy Party) in Istanbul, Ankara and Izmir attracted attention.

Labor Day was congratulated with masses exceeding hundreds of people in Turkey. 1st of May was observed with a more crowded participation than the past years.

Approximately 80 thousand people consisting of HADEP, ODP, EMEP, SYP, KP, DBP, CHP, students and women associations, closed ones of relatives, IHD, unemployed people, building workers and a number of magazine circles participated in the meeting in Caglayan Square organized by Turk-Is, DISK, KESK and Hak-Is unions. The masses shouted common slogans on death fast, peace, labor and democracy, and against IMF and impropriety.

HADEP attracted attention

To the meeting nearly 20 thousand people from HADEP attended. Youth in particular put on "white" T-shirts and women carried purple banners and wore national clothes. A group of people wearing aprons on which "Where are Serdar and Tanis?" was written and black masks on their heads carried banners asking for the fate of missing HADEP administrators Serdar and Tanis. HADEP masses frequently cried slogans "The Sun of Socialism Rises from Imrali", "Greetings, Greetings, A Thousand Greetings to Imrali", "Biji Serok Apo (Long Live Leader Apo)" marching under the banner of "Socialism is The Brilliant Future of Middle-East Peoples". After the speeches by representatives of DISK, KESK and Turk-Is, singers Ali Ekber Eren, Ferhat Tunc and Onur Akin performed on the stage.

On the other hand union administrators put carnations on Kazanci Yokusu in the memory of fallen people on 1 May 1977.

Labor Day was banned in Kurdistan

Applications for observing the day in Kurdistan was declined by governors. Thousands of people participated to the observations in Antep, Adiyaman, Dersim, Malatya, Izmir, Samsun, Sivas and Batman.

Kurds chanted the peace

Kurdistanis participating in the activities in Germany chanted slogan "Freedom to Ocalan, Peace to Kurdistan".

In Germany Kurdistanis expressed their views and demands, attending to the meetings massively.

In Frankfurt which Nazis declared a strategic province of the year the march took place in a tense atmosphere. The march organized by DGB was supported by Protestant and Catholic churches, Jews, Frankfurt Municipality Youth Circle as attempt of Nazis to march in the center caused stress.