25
September 2002
2. "EU, Turkey to hold talks in Copenhagen", Turkish Foreign Minister Sukru Sina Gurel will visit Copenhagen on Thursday to meet Danish Minister for Foreign Affairs Per Stig Moeller to discuss EU-Turkish ties.In a press statement issued Tuesday, Moeller said that Gurel's visit will be a good opportunity to discuss relations between Turkey and the EU.
3. "IMF says initial results of turkish economic reforms are "encouraging", initial results of reforms implemented by Turkey to overcome its economic crisis are "encouraging", the International Monetary Fund (IMF) representative in Ankara said Wednesday ahead of further talks between the two parties.
4. "Objection petitions from Bozlak and Birdal", former HADEP Chairman Murat Bzolak and former SDP Chairman Akin Birdal submitted petitions through their lawyers, objecting to YSK disqualification decision.
5. "10% threshold taken to the ECHR by HADEP", the pro-Kurdish People’s Democracy Party (HADEP) has applied to the European Court of Human Rights with the reason that the 10% threshold in votes required in Turkey to enter the parliament is preventing the fair representation of voter’s will.
6. "Ankara Not Warm Towards Coepa's Sending Delegation To Turkey To Monitor Elections", Ankara is not warm towards the decision of the Council of Europe Parliamentary Assembly (COEPA) to send delegation to Turkey to monitor the general elections.
1. - Financial Times - "Turkey warns of action if Kurds form state":
LONDON / 24 September 2002
By David Gardner and Quentin Peel
Turkey will not stand by if a Kurdish state emerges in the north
of Iraq as a result of US or international military action to topple
Saddam Hussein, a senior Turkish official said on Tuesday.
Ankara fears any assault on the Baghdad regime could lead to Iraq
fragmenting, and the conversion of the de facto Kurdish entity just
south of the Turkish border with Iraq into a state that would encourage
Turkey's Kurds to relaunch their campaign for autonomy.
"We will not tolerate in any way the formation of a new state
in northern Iraq," Sukru Sina Gurel, Turkish foreign minister
and deputy prime minister told the FT in an interview in London.
Mr Gurel said he had spelt this out in meetings last week with Colin
Powell, US secretary of state, and vice-president Dick Cheney. "Of
course the Americans understand our position," he said.
Turkey's anxiety about what might happen if the fall of the Baghdad
dictatorship led to Iraqi partition into a Kurdish north, Sunni Muslim
centre and Shi'ite Muslim south has grown along with the likelihood
of a war across its borders.
Last month Sabahattin Cakmakoglu, Turkey's defence minister, threatened
t o put troops into northern Iraq to forestall the Kurds consolidating
power there.
Mr Gurel said on Tuesday he was making "our position as a government
clear" - after what Mr Cakmakoglu said. The foreign minister
would not be drawn on whether Turkey could accept the formalisation
of Kurdish autonomy within Iraq.
2. - IRNA - "EU, Turkey to hold talks in Copenhagen":
BRUSSELS / September 25, 2002
Turkish Foreign Minister Sukru Sina Gurel will visit Copenhagen on
Thursday to meet Danish Minister for Foreign Affairs Per Stig Moeller
to discuss EU-Turkish ties.
In a press statement issued Tuesday, Moeller said that Gurel's visit
will be a good opportunity to discuss relations between Turkey and
the EU.
"I am looking forward to hearing my Turkish colleague's account
of the contents of the recent reforms. We shall furthermore discuss
a number of issues of interest to both Turkey and the EU, such as
the situation in the Middle East, the question of Cyprus and the NATO
cooperation," he said.
The EU is to issue its progress report on Turkey and other candidate
countries in October.
Turkey wants the EU summit in December in Copenhagen to set a date
for talks to begin on Turkey's accession.
However, EU officials in Brussels are ruling out that the EU will
set such a date in December.
Informed sources told IRNA that most of the 15 EU member states oppose
Turkey's membership in the European bloc.
3. - AFP - "IMF says initial results of turkish economic reforms are "encouraging":
ANKARA / September 25, 2002
Initial results of reforms implemented by Turkey to overcome its
economic crisis are "encouraging", the International Monetary
Fund (IMF) representative in Ankara said Wednesday ahead of further
talks between the two parties.
"The authorities' strong policy implementation has enabled the
programme to yield encouraging initial results, despite the political
uncertainty in recent months," Odd Per Brekk said in a statement
here.
"Following a sharp pick-up in activity in the first half, growth
is likely to outperform this year's three percent target and inflation
is fully on course to meet the end-year 35 percent target," Per
Brekk said.
Parliament has voted to bring forward general elections to November
because of Prime Minister Bulent Ecevit's ill health and quarrels
within the ruling government coalition.
Talks surrounding the granting to Turkey of a further 1.5 billion
dollars in aid will take place this week in Washington on the sidelines
of the annual IMF-World Bank meetings. The talks will continue in
Istanbul and Ankara as of October 2.
The IMF has already provided some 12.5 billion dollars to Turkey in
the wake of last year's economic crisis.
The visit here by an IMF delegation will focus on how to further promote
disinflation, reduce overstaffing in state enterprises, reform taxation,
strengthen the banking system and revitalise privatisations, Per Brekk
said.
The representative stressed the need for economic reforms to continue
and welcomed "the evident support of the thrust of the programme
among political parties" ahead of the general elections.
4. - Kurdish Observer - "Objection petitions from Bozlak and Birdal":
Former HADEP Chairman Murat Bzolak and former SDP Chairman Akin Birdal submitted petitions through their lawyers, objecting to YSK disqualification decision.
AYDIN BOLKAN/ANKARA / 25 September 2002
Former HADEP Chairman Murat Bozlak and former SDP Chairman Akin Birdal submitted objection petitions against Supreme Elections Board (YSK) disqualification of them as candidates as well as AKP Chairman Tayyip Erdogan and independent candidate Necmettin Erbakan.
Bozlak's lawyer Mahmut Tanzi, Birdal's lawyer Sedat Aslantas and Erbakan's lawyer Yasar Gurkan asked for YSK to re-consider its decision. Bozlak's petition emphasized that he was sentenced to 1 year in prison on December 17, 1998 but after the amendments to the law no.3713 on 06.02.2002 the act ceased to be a crime. The petition also showed the decision on Hasan Velal Guzel as example. Bozlak pointed out that the crime had been erased from his judicial record but YSK had not taken it into consideration.
Guzel's case was shown as example
And Birdal's lawyer Sedat Aslantas also emphasized that amendments to the law no.312/2 had not been taken into consideration by YSK. Aslantas show Guzel case as example, pointing out that the Law No. 4454 was still valid. The petition drew attention that his civil rights were granted again on September 3, 2002.
Erbakan objected too
Necmettin Erbakan's lawyer Yasar Gurkan submitted a petition consisting of 40 pages to YSK, asking it for re-considering the disqualification rule. The petition argued that the decision was in violation to the Law no. 4454. Erbakan's lawyer reminded that his sentence had been adjourned for one year under the Law no. 4454.
Yurtsever and Uguz carry their case to ECHR
Ali Riza Yurtsever and Filiz Uguz, DEHAP Manisa and Van candidates respectively, submitted objection petitions to YSK but YSK ruled that these decisions could not be objected to. Then Yurtsever stated that he would carry his case to the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR). Yurtsever said that he was disqualified as candidate in 2002 elections although he participated in the elections in 1999 and thus YSK was in contradiction with itself. "It is not possible to disqualify people like that at a time at which Turkey took steps towards the European Union. I cannot accept the rule though I have all my civil rights re-granted. I will carry my case to ECHR."
Uguz, for her part, stressed that in her case all domestic path of
recourse were exhausted and she would carry her case to ECHR.
5. - KurdishMedia - "10% threshold taken to the ECHR by HADEP":
LONDON / 24 September 2002 / by Robin Kurd
The pro-Kurdish People’s Democracy Party (HADEP) has applied
to the European Court of Human Rights with the reason that the 10%
threshold in votes required in Turkey to enter the parliament is preventing
the fair representation of voter’s will. In the 1999 elections
in Turkey HADEP gained 4.8% of the vote but due to the 10% threshold
34 MPs who were elected could not enter the parliament.
If the court accepts the case several parties in Turkey will be able
to take their cases to the ECHR.
The 10% threshold in Turkey is extremely high by democratic standards
and has been put in place to prevent the representation of dissident
views in the parliament.
The threshold has been successful in preventing Kurdish and left-wing
MPs from entering the parliament, as 10% of the votes have not been
gained in elections so far. But this has also meant that quite a substantial
percentage of the population’s views are not represented in the
parliament.
In fact, when the threshold has not worked and dissident parties have
entered the parliament, as in the case of Democracy Party (DEP) and
the Islamist Welfare Party (RP), which won the elections in 1995,
the Constitutional Court has closed the parties that do not “fit”
into the political frame in Turkey. Up to 40 parties have been closed
down and several MPs imprisoned since Turkey adopted the multiparty
system in the 1950s.
Currently there is a debate in Turkey to bring down the threshold
to 5% as not even the “conventional” parties can make it.
6. - Anatolia - "Ankara Not Warm Towards Coepa's Monitoring Turkish Elections":
ANKARA / September 25, 2002
Ankara is not warm towards the decision of the Council of Europe
Parliamentary Assembly (COEPA) to send delegation to Turkey to monitor
the general elections.
High-level diplomatic sources told A.A correspondent on Tuesday that
this was not the first time that a general elections was being held
in Turkey.
The sources stressed that there were no doubts about the results of
elections in Turkey which had been held for half a century.
Besides, the sources said, ''there were not anything that Turkey would
hide.''
The sources noted, ''Istanbul Document was signed at the end of the
Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) Summit
in Istanbul in 1999. With this document, all the participants approved
that OSCE delegations could monitor the elections in their countries
under the title of observer.''
Drawing the attention that Council of Europe (COE) countries were
OSCE members at the same time, the sources said that the demand of
the Council to send an official delegation to Turkey to monitor the
November 3 elections was baseless.
The sources stated, ''if they want, OSCE delegation can come and there
is no need to make the same call twice.''
COEPA President Peter Schieder had said that they did not have any
doubt that a fair elections would be held in Turkey. However, he had
noted, they wanted to send a delegation to Turkey within the framework
of the screening process launched in 1999 related with the developments
marked in Turkey in human rights and democratization.
Turkish delegation chairman Uluc Gurkan had stated that Turkey, a
founder member of COE, was against the decision of COEPA to send a
delegation to Turkey to monitor the elections.