21 April 2004

1. "Turk Court Convicts Kurd Rights Advocate", a Turkish court convicted Kurdish rights advocate Leyla Zana and three other former Kurdish lawmakers of having links to rebels in their retrial on Wednesday, ordering the four to serve the remainder of their 15 year prison sentences. (...) "Leyla Zana: from teenage mom to international crusader for Turkey's Kurds", former Turkish deputy Leyla Zana, whose 15-year jail sentence was confirmed Wednesday in a controversial retrial, transformed herself from uneducated teenage mother to international crusader for Kurdish rights.

2. "EU blasts verdict for Turkey rights activist", the European Commission condemned Wednesday the conviction of human rights award winner Leyla Zana in a retrial in Turkey, saying it could hurt the country's EU entry bid.

3. "UN to oppose Cyprus security plan", a British proposal for new security arrangements in Cyprus if Greek and Turkish Cypriots vote to reunify the island faced strong opposition at the United Nations Security Council, diplomats said.

4. "Turkey asks for IMF financial support", the Turkish government has issued a Letter of Intent describing the economic policies it intends to implement in the context of its request for financial support form the International Monetary Fund (IMF).

5. "Ankara plans to break defence contract with France", Turkey is planning to call off a multi-million dollar contract with France for the joint production of Eryx anti-tank missiles because their performance has proven unsatisfactory, a Turkish newspaper said Tuesday.

6. "Turkey Can't Decide on Copter Project", despite numerous pledges to the United States, Turkey can't decide on an award for a $2 billion attack helicopter coproduction project.

1. - AP / AFP - "Turk Court Convicts Kurd Rights Advocate":

ANKARA / AP / 21 April 2004 / by Suzan Fraser

A Turkish court convicted Kurdish rights advocate Leyla Zana and three other former Kurdish lawmakers of having links to rebels in their retrial on Wednesday, ordering the four to serve the remainder of their 15 year prison sentences.

The four have already served 10 years of the prison sentence and would be eligible for release in 2005. The ruling - although widely expected - could be a set back for Turkey's hopes to start European Union membership negotiations next year.

Several EU lawmakers who have been observing the yearlong retrial as a test of improvements in Turkish human rights and of the judicial system, have said the court was biased and violated the defendants' rights to a fair trial.

The retrial was held after the European Court of Human Rights ruled in 2001 that Zana, Hatip Dicle, Orhan Dogan and Selim Sadak did not get a fair hearing in their first trial in 1994.

The defendants will appeal the verdict, Dogan's daughter, Aysegul Dogan told The Associated Press. None of the defendants were present at the hearing. The four decided last month to shun the retrial, claiming the court was not allowing them a fair hearing.

Lawyer Yusuf Alatas expressed disappointment with the verdict.

``The court did not surprise us today,'' Alatas said. ``Our clients had already lost faith in the retrial process and refused to show up in the last three hearings.''

Throughout the retrial, the court has repeatedly refused to release the defendants without offering a reason and judges have on occasion referred to the defendants as ``the convicted'' in what international observers have said was a violation of the presumption of innocence. Defense lawyers have also complained of being denied the right to adequately question prosecution witnesses.

The Switzerland-based International Commission of Jurists immediately condemned the decision.

``The fundamental right to a fair trial was not respected,'' it said.

The EU, which will decide by the end of the year whether to start negotiations on Turkish membership, has said Turkey must improve its human rights record before it can join the bloc.

The defendants were found guilty of ties to Kurdish rebels who fought a 15-year war for autonomy in southeast Turkey. The fighting has claimed 37,000 lives.

With time off for good conduct, the four legislators could be eligible for release in 15 months.

The four were arrested in 1994 and stripped of their parliamentary immunity.

Zana, 43, has advocated nonviolent tactics to push for increased rights for Turkey's Kurdish minority.

When taking the oath in parliament in 1991, she wore a hair band in the traditional Kurdish colors of yellow, green and red - used by the Kurdish rebels on their banners - and spoke Kurdish in breach of a ban on speaking the language in official settings. Legislators accused her of collaborating with the rebel Kurdistan Workers Party or PKK.

Zana's pro-Kurdish Democracy Party was later banned by the Turkish courts.

Since Zana's arrest, Turkey has changed laws to allow broadcasts and education in the Kurdish language. But the reforms have yet to be fully implemented and Turkey's powerful military and nationalist politicians fear such improvements could still divide the country along ethnic lines.

"Leyla Zana: from teenage mom to international crusader for Turkey's Kurds":

ANKARA / AFP / 21 April 2004

Former Turkish deputy Leyla Zana, whose 15-year jail sentence was confirmed Wednesday in a controversial retrial, transformed herself from uneducated teenage mother to international crusader for Kurdish rights.

Born in 1961 in a hamlet in Diyarbakir, a mainly Kurdish region in southeastern Turkey, Zana was an unlikely candidate to become a leader of the campaign for greater rights for the country's minority Kurds.

She went to school for only a year and in 1975, at age 14, found herself married off to a relative some 20 years her senior. She had her first child the next year.

It was through her marriage to Mehdi Zana, a Kurdish activist who for three years served as mayor of Diyarbakir, the capital of the province of the same name, and who was jailed after Turkey's 1980 military coup, that she became interested in politics.

The young mother of two soon took to the Kurdish political struggle as she followed her husband from jail to jail, often facing abuse from security forces.

Determined to do what she saw as her duty towards her fellow Kurds, Zana gained a high-school diploma through state-approved home study courses and worked as a journalist for a pro-Kurdish newspaper in the region.

In 1991 -- a time of heavy fighting between the army and the outlawed separatist Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) fighting for Kurdish self-rule in southeastern Turkey -- she was elected to parliament by a centre-left party, the first Kurdish woman to win such a seat. She caused an uproar during the parliamentary swearing-in ceremony.

After taking the oath in Turkish, the official language, as required by law, Zana said in Kurdish: "I have completed this formality under duress. I shall struggle so that the Kurdish and Turkish people may live peacefully together in a democratic framework,"

The move prompted shouts of protests from other MPs. At the ceremony, Zana also wore a headband in yellow, green, and red, the colors of the PKK, whose armed campaign has claimed about 36,500 lives since
1984.

Her defiance earned her the wrath of the state at a time when national feeling was running high and Ankara was intolerant even of those who campaigned peacefully for Kurdish cultural freedoms.

Her parliamentary immunity saved her from arrest for three years, but after she joined the Democratic Party, a pro-Kurdish party which officials quickly banned for having links to the PKK, she lost her seat and was arrested in March 1994.

In December of that year, she and three other former MPs were sentenced to 15 years in jail for being members of the PKK, in a trial denounced by rights activists and Ankara's Western allies as flawed.

Her case was taken up by international human rights organizations, several campaigns were launched in a bid to secure her release, and in 1995 the European parliament awarded her the Sakharov freedom of thought award.

In 2001, the European court of Human Rights ruled that her trial had been unfair because the accused were unable to have key witnesses questioned and were not informed in time of changes to the charges against them.

Zana and her colleagues were in March last year allowed a retrial in line with EU-oriented reforms adopted by the Turkish parliament. But the retrial has been condemned by defence lawyers and observers who saw it as just a copy of the old trial. The court on Wednesday confirmed the original sentence of 15 years in jail.

The verdict is likely to damage Turkey's EU membership aspirations. The bloc saw the retrial as a test of Ankara's resolve to embrace EU democratic norms. Under Turkish law, Zana is due for release in March 2005. Her husband and two children live in Sweden.

2. - AFP - "EU blasts verdict for Turkey rights activist":

BRUSSELS / 21 April 2004

The European Commission condemned Wednesday the conviction of human rights award winner Leyla Zana in a retrial in Turkey, saying it could jeopardise the country's EU entry bid.

"The commission strongly deplores today's verdict," said a spokesman for the EU executive after Zana and three other former Kurdish lawmakers were sentenced to 15 years in jail for membership of an armed rebel group, confirming a 1994 sentence passed on them.

The verdict "gives rise to serious concern in the light of the (EU's) political criteria and casts a negative shadow on the implementation of political reforms in Turkey," he added.

The commission is due to publish a report on Turkey later this year which will serve as the basis for a decision by EU leaders in December on whether to start formal EU entry negotiations with Ankara.

The spokesman for EU enlargement commissioner Guenter Verheugen declined to say how seriously the Zana verdict could affect Brussels' opinion of Turkey.

"I cannot speculate on the final assessment but this is an element that will be taken into account among all the others when we make our assessment in October," said the spokesman, Jean-Christophe Filori.

But asked whether the EU could open accession talks with a country which is holding political prisoners, he said: "The answer is no."

"Mrs. Zana was imprisoned and sentenced for having expressed opinions in a non-violent way. So for us she is a political prisoner," he added, while declining to say whether Turkey can start talks if her conviction is confirmed.

The Ankara state security court confirmed convictions against Zana, winner of the European Parliament's 1995 Sakharov prize, along with co-defendants Hatip Dicle, Orhan Dogan and Selim Sadak.

Their lawyer, Yusuf Alatas, denounced the retrial as unfair, and announced that they would appeal the verdict and go to the European Court of Human Rights if need be.

The Brussels spokesman repeatedly declined to be drawn on the potential full impact of the verdict. But he noted that such state security courts were due to be abolished in Turkey as part of a raft of EU-oriented reforms.

"Of course if these courts are abolished, it would be good step," Filori said. "But I can only say that we have to watch closely what will happen on appeal," he added.

3. - IC Wales - "UN to oppose Cyprus security plan":

21 April 2004

A British proposal for new security arrangements in Cyprus if Greek and Turkish Cypriots vote to reunify the island faced strong opposition at the United Nations Security Council, diplomats said.

Britain introduced the resolution, and the United States signed on as a co-sponsor, but diplomats said Pakistan, Brazil, Chile, France, China, Russia and other council members raised questions about the draft - and about why the resolution was needed before the April 24 referenda on the reunification plan. Each half of Cyprus will hold its own poll.

UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan, a strong supporter of the resolution, went to the closed security council meeting in New York where it was being discussed to push for its adoption.

He told members that there was great anxiety about the implementation of the reunification plan and a council resolution would reassure Cypriots of the UN commitment to ensure it was carried out, according to council diplomats.

Less than four days before the vote, opinion polls indicate that the plan will be rejected by 65% of Greek Cypriots, but approved by more than 60% of Turkish Cypriots.

British diplomats said they would revise the draft and push for a vote today in an effort to publicise the resolution tomorrow when the campaign ended. Friday is a day of reflection, before Saturday's vote.

"We hope to have a vote tomorrow because the purpose of this is to put the council action on record before people go and make their final determinations on how they're going to vote on this important issue," said deputy US ambassador James Cunningham.

Germany's UN Ambassador Gunter Pleuger, the current council president, said members would hold consultations on the revised draft today. He said there were precedents for adopting a resolution that would only take effect with voter approval.

"I think the point is that members are under pressure to decide very quickly now - and not knowing exactly what kind of effect their decision would have," Pleuger said.

The time pressure "makes it somewhat difficult to come to an agreement because we all want, of course, to have a consensus in the council because that would provide the strongest possible political signal to the people in Cyprus."

The resolution would authorise an arms embargo and new security arrangements that would go into effect next week if Greek and Turkish Cypriots vote for reunification. A second resolution, which would be introduced only after a "Yes" vote, would endorse the reunification plan, diplomats said.

"The purpose of this is to eliminate any question about whether the council will follow through in providing the security aspects, the new mandate for the peacekeeping force and the arms embargo," Cunningham said.

The draft resolution would authorise the 1,400-strong UN peacekeeping force that has been patrolling the border between the Greek and Turkish Cypriot sides for 30 years to be replaced by a new UN mission. It would have 2,500 troops, 510 international police officers, and a substantial civilian staff.

Cyprus has been divided since 1974 when Turkey invaded the island in the wake of an abortive coup by supporters of union with Greece.

Cypriots are under pressure from the European Union and the United States to approve the UN plan so a united Cyprus can join the EU on May 1. If either side rejects the plan, EU laws and benefits will apply only to the southern Greek Cypriot part.

4. - Aljazeera - "Turkey asks for IMF financial support":

20 April 2004

The Turkish government has issued a Letter of Intent describing the economic policies it intends to implement in the context of its request for financial support form the International Monetary Fund (IMF).

To build on its achievements of 2003, the Government of Turkey plans to deepen and advance its economic reform agenda in convergence with European Union standards. The reforms are aimed at putting the fiscal accounts on a more sustainable medium-term footing, moving the banking sector further in line with best international practice, and facilitating private sector development and investment, stated the Letter of Intent.

The 6.5 percent of gross national product (GNP) public sector primary surplus target remains a cornerstone of Turkey's program. The authorities plan to implement a package of corrective fiscal measures that are expected to yield 1.7 percent of GNP over the remainder of 2004. Many of these measures are permanent to help secure not only this year's target but also the medium-term fiscal position.

While protecting key social spending programs, the government recently passed legislation cutting discretionary expenditures by 13 percent and reduced investment incentives, saving some one percent of GNP. Petroleum, tobacco, alcohol and gas excises have all been increased to yield 0.5 percent of GNP and state enterprise prices and excises will be adjusted in line with budget assumptions during the year, the government states.

As for monetary policy, the Central Bank of Turkey (CBT) remains focused on achieving this year's 12 percent inflation target. Last year, the bank met all monetary targets and succeeded in reducing inflation to 18.5 percent. In light of increased real currency demand due to the fall in inflation and the increase in banks' required reserves, CBT has proposed raising base money targets for the remainder of the year.

Privatization is accelerating and the government states its determination to build further momentum in this area by establishing a comprehensive privatization strategy for the remainder of the year. Having secured cabinet approval of a privatization plan for Türk Telekom last November, authorities expect to move ahead with the block sale of 51 percent of the shares by end-May 2004.

Following a year of successful macroeconomic management under the IMF -supported program, the Turkish economy is now at its strongest in a generation, said the Letter of Intent. Last year, the economy grew by around six percent in exceeding the five percent growth projection. Financial markets remain positive, with benchmark bond yields halving last year to stand now at close to 20 percent.

5. - AFP - "Ankara plans to break defence contract with France":

ANKARA / 20 April 2004

Turkey is planning to call off a multi-million dollar contract with France for the joint production of Eryx anti-tank missiles because their performance has proven unsatisfactory, a Turkish newspaper said Tuesday.

The 440-million-dollar (370-million euro) project -- signed in 1998 with Aerospatiale of France, which merged into the MBDA arms company in 2002 -- envisaged the joint production in Turkey of 10,000 short-range anti-tank missiles to be used by the infantry.

According to the mass-circulation Milliyet daily, the Turkish army has found serious targetting problems with the missiles, which had only a "maximum hit percentage of 72 percent". Turkish defence insdustry officials refused to comment on the report, but acknowledged that there were "snags" in the project.

Turkey has already paid 310 million dollars for the project, but is still considering going ahead with the cancellation if a final test to be carried out in May also proves unsatisfactory, Milliyet said. Eryx missiles have equipped many armies, including French, Malaysian, Canadian and Norwegian forces, since 1993.

6. - Middle East Newsline - "Turkey Can't Decide on Copter Project":

ANKARA / 20 April 2004

Despite numerous pledges to the United States, Turkey can't decide on an award for a $2 billion attack helicopter coproduction project.

Turkish industry sources said the Defense Ministry has quietly determined that it does not have the funds to launch such a huge project. The sources said the prospect of significant U.S. aid to help finance a contract by an American defense firm appears out of the question.

The competition for the Turkish project has pitted Bell Textron and its AH-1Z King Cobra against an Israeli-Russian consortium, which has offered the Ka-50-2. The sources said both options appear unattractive and could spark either a government crisis or one with Washington.

The sources said the Turkish military has sought to award the contract to Bell Textron. But the General Staff as well as the Defense Ministry have been dismayed by what the sources term the high price tag of the offer -- reported at $2.5 billion -- as well as the Bush administration's refusal to release software technology required to develop the platform's mission computer.