16 September 2002

1. "Turkish court places new hurdle in the way of Islamist's election bid", Turkey's top judicial court Monday overturned a decision to scrap the criminal record of a moderate Islamist leader and front-runner in upcoming elections, further complicating his bid to stand in the November polls, local media reported.

2. "Turkish businessmen to lobby European leaders on EU membership", Turkey's most powerful business group will meet European Union leaders over the coming weeks to urge them to start EU membership negotiations with Ankara, the group's vice chairman said on Saturday.

3. "Turkey explicitly demands a negotiation date in 2003 from EU", diplomatic sources quoted EU officials as saying, 'EU will make a decision that promotes a positive process in Turkey'.

4. "KADEK: The Leftist Block will succeed", Osman Ocalan, member of KADEKCouncil of Leaders, stated that the Turkish politics had been experiencing biggest turmoil in its history, pointing out that November 3 elections would be the biggest opportunity for Turkey to change.

5. "Ecevit reaffirms Turkish election for November 3", Turkish Prime Minister Bulent Ecevit said on Sunday reaffirmed that Turkey's general election will be held on November 3, brushing aside a call by one of his government partners to postpone the poll. In July, parliament brought elections forward from April 2004 to November 3 in a move stiffly opposed by Ecevit but strongly supported by his two coalition partners.

6. "Constitutional Court to hear MHP application case against EU laws", the Constitutional Court announced that no date had been set to examine the prosecution case demanding the closure of the pro-Kurdish Peoples Democracy Party (HADEP).

1. - AFP - "Turkish court places new hurdle in the way of Islamist's election bid":

ANKARA / 16 September 2002

Turkey's top judicial court Monday overturned a decision to scrap the criminal record of a moderate Islamist leader and front-runner in upcoming elections, further complicating his bid to stand in the November polls, local media reported.

The Appeals court annuled a ruling by a lower court, which had said the criminal record of Recep Tayyip Erdogan, the head of the opposition Justice and Development Party (AK), should be erased following changes to legislation under which he was convicted for sedition in 1998. AK members said the earlier ruling cleared all obstacles in the way of Erdogan's bid to stand in the November 3 elections. Under Turkish electoral law, a candidate cannot run for office if he has a criminal record.

The final decision on Erdogan's eligibility however rests with the Higher Electoral Board, which will announce later this month which candidates are barred from running in the elections. The AK leader served four months in jail in 1998 for sedition, a conviction which also carries a lifelong ban on political activities. But he made a political comeback last year at the helm of AK on the grounds that a 1999 amnesty and other reforms had rendered the ban invalid.

Recent opinion polls have shown that the elections will propel AK, an offshoot of a banned Islamist party, to power and that the current governing parties will lose their seats in parliament. Erdogan has turned his back on his Islamist past and recast himself as a pro-Western conservative, but the makeover is a source of widespread suspicion in the strictly secular Muslim country, where the army-led establishment has tirelessly cracked down on political Islam. The military has carried out three coups since the 1960s and forced the country's first Islamist prime minister Necmettin Erbakan to resign in 1997.

2. - AFP - "Turkish businessmen to lobby European leaders on EU membership":

ANKARA / 14 September 2002

Turkey's most powerful business group will meet European Union leaders over the coming weeks to urge them to start EU membership negotiations with Ankara, the group's vice chairman said on Saturday.

"We will explain to European organisations, politicans and prime ministers that Turkey needs to be rewarded for taking courageous steps towards Europe at a time of crisis," Aldo Kaslowski from the Turkish Association of Businessmen and Industrialists (TUSIAD), told Anatolia news agency. TUSIAD representatives will meet Greek Prime Minister Costas Simitis at the end of September. They will then hold talks with senior politicians in Denmark, the current holder of the rotating EU presidency, Italy, Belgium and France, Kaslowski said.

Turkey has been pushing the 15-nation EU to set a date by the end of the year for the formal start of membership talks. This follows the adoption by the Turkish parliament in August of human rights reforms that Brussels said were a prerequisite for accession talks. The reforms include the abolition of the death penalty and greater cultural rights for the country's Kurdish minority. They were passed by the assembly in the wake of a political crisis which led to a decision to hold an early general election on November 3.

Ankara insists the reform package fulfills the EU's criteria and wants the bloc's leader to set a date for negotiations to start at their summit in Copenhagen in December. The EU is due in Copenhagen to draw up a timetable for taking in a string of new members from central and southern Europe over the coming years. But the EU says Turkey's reforms are not a guarantee of formal accession talks and warns it will closely monitor their implementation.

3. - Turkish Daily News - "Turkey explicitly demands a negotiation date in 2003 from EU":

Diplomatic sources quoted EU officials as saying, 'EU will make a decision that promotes a positive process in Turkey'

ANKARA / 16 September 2002

Turkey explicitly said to European Union officials that Turkey wants a date for membership negotiations in 2003. This message was conveyed to Chris Patten who is responsible for external affairs of EU by Turkish Foreign Minister Sukru Sina Gurel.

Gurel said to Chris Patten, "Turkey's expectation is to set a date for membership negotiations in 2003 and we are expecting similar positive steps from the EU," in New York.

Gurel said to the press after the meeting: "We have conveyed our messages to Mr. Patten. But we are also aware that he cannot give any answer to us in the name of the EU at this time."

Patten said that he had found an occasion to reiterate the statements of Gunter Verheugen regarding Turkey and added, "The reform package enacted in Parliament is very important and this will be part of the progress report issued in October by the EU Commission."

Gurel also conveyed the same message to Finland and Belgium's foreign ministers.

Diplomatic sources quoted EU officials as saying, "The EU will make a decision that promotes a positive process in Turkey."

Gurel also met with UN Secretary General Kofi Annan and said to both Annan and EU officials that Turkey was supporting the negotiation process in Cyprus which started on April 29. Gurel also said EU's stance regarding the issue is not making the negotiations any easier and emphasized that the Belgium-Switzerland model state structure proposed by the Turkish side is an important occasion for peace.

Gurel also talked about the Iraq issue with Kofi Annan. Annan confirmed in the meeting that a new UN Security Council resolution regarding Iraq is on the agenda of the Council.

Gurel also demanded from Belgian Foreign Minister Louis Michel the extradition of Fehriye Erdal who participated in the Sabanci assassination.

Recalling that the death penalty has been abolished in Turkey, Gurel said to Michel that there wasn't any obstruction for the extradition of Fehriye Erdal now.

Responding to this demand Michel said to Gurel that they had problems stemming from interior laws of Belgium and they were trying to overcome these problems.

Gurel also conveyed Turkey's demand for putting KADEK on the EU terrorist organizations list again, to Minister Michel and added Turkey is insisting on this.

Minister Gurel will meet with the U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powel on Monday.

4. - Kurdish Observer - "KADEK: The Leftist Block will succeed":

Osman Ocalan, member of KADEKCouncil of Leaders, stated that the Turkish politics had been experiencing biggest turmoil in its history, pointing out that November 3 elections would be the biggest opportunity for Turkey to change.

MHA /FRANKFURT / 15 September 2002

KADEK Council of Leaders member Osman Ocalan drew attention that any delay in elections might cause dangerous developments.

Participated by telephone in the "Rojev" program in Medya TV the other day, Osman Ocalan made comments on the latest developments. Ocalan had this to say: "A new parliament is necessary and its method is elections. Even delaying it a day is loss. And postponing it will cause even more losses. Today the Turkish politics, both left and right, is in a great disorder, turmoil. And the weakness of left is even more. And it means that the system created by September 12 coup d'etat failed completely."

The Kurdish leader stated that in spite of crisis and turmoil the solution was possible, asking for Kurds and left to take action as soon as possible. Ocalan pointed out that the leftist block was an historical step and it could succeed throughhard work.

"Individual interests have to be put aside"

Ocalan continued to say the following: "What is most important today is for the Kurdish will to be reflected in the parliament. Because history does not present such an opportunity once more. Those who think their individual interests should be taken into consideration. We think that general interests of the Kurdish people and democratic forces should be relied on. The leftist block will succeed. It represents a struggle of 30 years. They can set hundreds of thousands into action. At a time at which system is in a deep crisis, for all problems alt

5. - AFP - "Ecevit reaffirms Turkish election for November 3":

ANKARA / 15 September 2002

Turkish Prime Minister Bulent Ecevit said on Sunday reaffirmed that Turkey's general election will be held on November 3, brushing aside a call by one of his government partners to postpone the poll. In July, parliament brought elections forward from April 2004 to November 3 in a move stiffly opposed by Ecevit but strongly supported by his two coalition partners.

But on Thursday one of his partners, Deputy Prime Minister Mesut Yilmaz, proposed to delay the election until mid-December to give Turkey time to strenghten its bid to join the European Union ahead of the EU's Copenhagen summit on December 12-13. But Ecevit did not appear keen on the idea at a rally on Sunday of his Demoratic Left Party (DSP) in the northern province of Zonguldak on the Black Sea coast.

"Those who wanted to have an early election are now doing everything they can to get rid of it," he said, according to the Anatolia news agency. "They have run out of options. Turkey will hold general elections on November 3," he added. Ecevit believes that postponing the election would lead to economic turmoil at a time when Ankara is making headway with a 16-billion-dollar stand-by deal with the International Monetary Fund to drag the country out of its worst recession since 1945.

Markets in the crisis-hit country look forward to the November polls to produce a strong administration after months of political turmoil triggered by Ecevit's ill-health and a government dispute on EU-required reforms. But Yilmaz argues that putting elections off until December would enable Turkey to complete the necessary work to make good on its target to get a date by the end of the year for staring accession talks with EU. "Turkey would not suffer by holding elections a month later than scheduled, but it would suffer by missing the EU train," said Yilmaz, who heads the centre-right Motherland Party (ANAP).

Yilmaz's proposal came amid reports of growing efforts by disgruntled MPs excluded from candidate lists to recall parliament from its summer recess in a bid to postpone the elections. Such a movement, observers say, could garner support from parties which risk failing to overcome the 10-percent national threshhold to win parliamentary seats. Yilmaz's ANAP is also expected to fare badly in the November polls, which, according to recent opinion polls, could bring to power a rising leader whose Islamist past is viewed by the secular establishement with suspicion.

6. - NTV / MSNBC - "Constitutional Court to hear MHP application case against EU laws":

The Constitutional Court announced that no date had been set to examine the prosecution case demanding the closure of the pro-Kurdish Peoples Democracy Party (HADEP).

13 September 2002

Turkey’s Constitutional Court is to hear an appeal by the far right Nationalist Movement Party (MHP) seeking to rule invalid a series of legislative reforms granting greater rights to ethnic groups and abolishing the death penalty.

The vice chairman of the Constitutional Court Hasim Kiliç announced late on Thursday that the Court had completed its preliminary study over the MHP’s application to overturn some the articles of the reform package, designed to bring Turkish laws into line with those of the European Union. He said that court members had decided the application was worth being examined by the Court case and added that a decision on whether to implement a temporary order halting the laws being put into force would be made after an expert report was prepared.

Kiliç cited problems over the abolition of capital penalty, one of the articles the MHP opposed, saying as there is an amnesty in Turkey the change required a three fifths majority vote in the parliament. However, he said this argument had been rejected since the deadline to object on these grounds had passed by ten days ago.