26 May 2006

1. "EU critical on ports, role of military", the European Union is set to warn candidate Turkey that its accession process could be negatively affected if it does not open its ports and airports this year to vessels and planes from EU member Greek Cyprus under a customs union protocol with the bloc.

2. "Fifth suspect jailed over Turkey court attack", a fifth suspect was jailed in Ankara on Thursday as part of a probe into a deadly armed attack on a top Turkish court by an alleged Islamist gunman, the Anatolia news agency reported.

3. "Honour killing suicide claims", such mysterious "suicides" have always been treated with suspicion in southeast Turkey, but they have increased so dramatically in recent months that the UN has launched an inquiry.

4. "Bursa Bids to Close Down Gay Association", Bursa Governor's Office filed complaint with prosecution to close down month-old "Rainbow Association" on grounds of being "against the law and public moral". Reason cited is same as Ankara's earlier unsuccessful bid to lock down KAOS-GL.

5. "In Qers, protest with Kurdish language to the forbidden on Kurdish language", Democratik Society Party (DTP) will protest the forbidden on Kurdish language, which is being executed in prisons, by talking only in Kurdish for a week.

6. "In Qers, protest with Kurdish language to the forbidden on Kurdish language", Democratik Society Party (DTP) will protest the forbidden on Kurdish language, which is being executed in prisons, by talking only in Kurdish for a week.

1. - Turkish Daily News - "EU critical on ports, role of military":

ANKARA / 26 May 2006

The European Union is set to warn candidate Turkey that its accession process could be negatively affected if it does not open its ports and airports this year to vessels and planes from EU member Greek Cyprus under a customs union protocol with the bloc.

In a document prepared by the EU Commission to outline the 25-nation bloc's position ahead of a Turkey-EU Association Council meeting in Luxembourg in mid-June, Brussels also criticized the role of the military in Turkish politics and said military officials' statements should be confined to military matters and that they should be made with authorization from the government.

The document also reiterates that Turkish national security strategy should be laid down under supervision of the civilian authority and that Parliament should have powers to supervise military expenditures.

Turkey, which opened accession talks with the EU on Oct. 3, refuses to open its ports and airports to traffic from Greek Cyprus, insisting instead that the EU should first take steps to ease the isolation of Turkish Cypriots, as it pledged to do after Turkish Cyprus voted for a U.N. plan in April 2004 to reunite the island.

With both sides sticking to their positions, a crisis in Turkish-EU relations in the autumn, when an EU review of the issue is due, is looming.

The EU position paper says that accession talks on relevant chapters will not be opened and that the accession talks process could be negatively affected if the customs union protocol is not implemented in 2006.

Slowdown in reforms,

Semdinli investigation: The document says there has been a slowdown in Turkey's reform process and reiterates its concerns over freedom of expression, saying Article 301 of the Turkish Penal Code, under which several authors and activists have been charged for expressing views, has been interpreted in a manner restricting free speech.

Touching on a shadowy bombing targeting a bookstore in the southeastern town of Semdinli, in which two non-commissioned officers and a former member of the outlawed Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) were involved, the EU document voices expectation that the ongoing judicial process would continue in line with the principles of the supremacy of law and independence of the judiciary.

The prosecutor of the case has been sacked after he suggested in his indictment that Land Forces Commander Gen. Yasar Büyükanit was involved in an organized effort to derail Turkey's EU process.

2. - Middle East Times - "Fifth suspect jailed over Turkey court attack":

ANKARA / 26 May 2006

A fifth suspect was jailed in Ankara on Thursday as part of a probe into a deadly armed attack on a top Turkish court by an alleged Islamist gunman, the Anatolia news agency reported.

The May 17 shooting left political tensions running high in Ankara with accusations that religion-influenced policies followed by the Islamist-rooted government of Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan had emboldened extremists.

A judge who questioned the suspect, Erhan Timuroglu, decided that he should be imprisoned, pending trial, Anatolia reported.

Timuroglu is believed to be the one of four people who hurled hand grenades at the Istanbul office of the secularist Cumhuriyet newspaper earlier this month, along with the court gunman, 29-year-old lawyer Alparslan Arslan, and two other people, who were jailed at the weekend.

Another suspect, who allegedly accompanied Arslan in Ankara on the day of the court shooting, has also been imprisoned.

Timuroglu was accused of attempting to overthrow the constitutional order, an offense carrying a possible life sentence, as well as of use of explosives and breaches of the law on firearms, Anatolia reported.

The four others face similar charges.

The prosecution will detail the accusations when it draws up its indictment in the coming days.

Arslan shouted "I'm a soldier of Allah" as he burst into Turkey's highest administrative court, the Council of State, killing a senior judge and wounding four others.

He said that he wanted to "punish" the judges for rulings upholding a ban on the Islamic headscarf in public institutions and universities in Muslim-majority but strictly secular Turkey, according to court officials.

The unprecedented attack sparked mass pro-secular protests and triggered accusations against the government that its opposition to the headscarf ban and vocal criticism of court rulings had given encouragement to extremists.

Erdogan retorted that the attack was "a great conspiracy" to discredit his government, which the secularist establishment, including the influential army, suspects of seeking to reinforce the role of Islam in politics and daily life.

Officials have said that the police are investigating whether the attack on the court was masterminded by Arslan or whether it was instigated by others.

3. - The Times - "Honour killing suicide claims":

ISTANBUL / 26 May 2006 / by Suna Erdem

ZULFINAN Baycinar died from a bullet in her back. Her husband's family went into mourning for the 27-year-old's "tragic suicide". She was very happy, they said; they can't imagine what got into her.
But now Baycinar's husband is on trial for murder. Prosecutors say she was killed because she dared to fight against her husband's wish to take a second wife, refusing to bow to tradition.

Such mysterious "suicides" have always been treated with suspicion in southeast Turkey, but they have increased so dramatically in recent months that the UN has launched an inquiry.

Yakin Erturk, UN special rapporteur on violence against women, is visiting the region to investigate Baycinar's case and other allegations that women deemed to have sullied a family's honour are being ordered to kill themselves. The increase in suicides follows a change in Turkish law a year ago to increase to life imprisonment the punishment for family members who carry out so-called honour killings.

This year 36 women are said to have attempted suicide in the region, more than all of last year.

"The general suicide rate in Turkey is actually low compared to the rest of the world, but the nature of these deaths is very different," Ms Erturk said. "Whereas worldwide there are about three to four times as many male suicides as female, in Batman, in Turkey, for instance, it is quite the reverse."

Until the laws changed, men who killed their female kin for reasons of honour or tradition were treated leniently. Often, a young brother, a minor, would own up to the murder and be let off with little more than a slap on the wrist.

Now the stakes are higher, women's groups believe that the errant women are being told: "Here's a gun or here's some poison, go and kill yourself so I don't have to go to prison for it." If they don't comply, they are killed anyway and declared to have committed suicide after a bout of depression.

4. - Bianet - "Bursa Bids to Close Down Gay Association":

Bursa Governor's Office filed complaint with prosecution to close down month-old "Rainbow Association" on grounds of being "against the law and public moral". Reason cited is same as Ankara's earlier unsuccessful bid to lock down KAOS-GL.

BURSA / 24 May 2006

The governor's office of Turkey's western Bursa province has filed a complaint with the Republic Prosecutors Office demanding the closure of the city's month-old Association to Protect Transvestites, Transexuals, Gays and Lesbians and Develop Cultural Activities - The Rainbow Association (Gokkusagi Dernegi).

In its reason for the closure demand, the governor's office argued that the formation violated current association laws that ruled no association could be founded with intentions against the law or public moral. It claimed the Rainbow Association's targets, regulations and activities were a violation of the Constitution and the Civil Code.

Being gay is not immoral

Last year, Deputy Governor Selahattin Ekremoglu of Turkey's capital Ankara had made a similar attempt to close down the Kaos Gay and Lesbian Cultural Research and Solidarity Association (Kaos GL) on grounds that it was against the law and public moral.

The Prosecutor's Office of Ankara had then rejected Ekremoglu's complaint and in its opinion to the decision said "in a period discrimination against sexual orientation is being debated, being gay is not immoral".

The decision concluded that neither in the name of KAOS-GL nor it its 23 point targets were any content that could be regarded as immoral and said that also taking into account international conventions, there was no need to launch a public case to close the association.

According to a report in the Bursa Hakimiyet newspaper, while citing the same reason in its closure demand, the Bursa Governor's Office claimed the regulations of Rainbow Association conflicted with current laws and the Constitution.

5. - DIHA - "In Qers, protest with Kurdish language to the forbidden on Kurdish language":

KARS / 25 May 2006

Democratik Society Party (DTP) will protest the forbidden on Kurdish language, which is being executed in prisons, by talking only in Kurdish for a week.

A response was come from the Provincial Organization of Qers of DTP, to the forbidden on talking in Kurdish in the prisons. Provincial Chairman of DTP from Qers, Mahmut Alinak, said that they decided to talk only in Kurdish for a week, to protest this forbidden, talked like this; "When the governors from Bulgarian Government forbit Turks to speak Turkish language, who were the citizenship of themselves, Turkish state governors made a lot of protest. But they were making these things, which Bulgarians made to Turks, to Kurds".

Alinak, who said that this kind of applications continues, talked like this;

"The government made irrational methods to cancel Kurdish language from the face of the earth. The most simple example was, they forbit and collected our "Newoz" bulletin, that we wanted to spread in Qers, because of "Newroz" word is in Kurdish language, but the bulletin was throughout in Turkish language. A word was begrudged to Kurds. We will protest the forbidden, which is being executed on Kurdish language, by speaking only in Kurdish for a week. The recoming of this forbidden after 18 years, to the prisons again, shows that Turkey, which is preparing itself for the membership of EU (European Union) is in a comic situation in democratization".

6. - PanARMENIAN.Net - "Europeans against Turkey's Accession to EU":

25 May 2006

According to a survey among 97500 Europeans, 52% were against Turkey's accession to the EU. Only 37% of respondents believe that the geopolitical location and market economy of Turkey will promote soonest accession. Most respondents are worried by the fact that the percentage of poor is higher in Turkey than in other European countries, as well as that most population are Muslims. 48% of participants of the survey do not see any need to expand the EU composition and consider accession of new members incorrect. In their opinion, the EU can be enlarged only with the joining of Norway and Switzerland, Day.az reports.