Yusuf Kanlı

Turkish Cypriot President Mehmet Ali Talat completed two days of visiting contacts in Ankara and returned to the island Friday. The trip of the Turkish Cypriot leader helped clarify some misconceptions regarding the comprehensive settlement talks continuing between the two sides on the eastern Mediterranean island for the past three months. Listening to Talat and exchanging opinions on the telephone with some prominent Turkish Cypriot and Greek Cypriot people with insights to the process back on Cyprus, I concluded that the current situation in Cyprus peacemaking is very much like that glass with some water in it: For some the glass is empty, for some it is full and for us, it just has some water in it.

First of all, the impression that nothing was achieved in the process so far is wrong. Indeed, the two leaders have covered substantial ground on relatively less important subjects - including competencies of the future federal government, the creation of a two-chamber legislature, a crisis resolution concept and such -however, as regards the key question of power sharing and political equality, in the approaches of the two sides there is a sharp divergence which means unless something is done to facilitate a change in mentality and perception on the Greek Cypriot side, the process is doomed to collapse at some point.

Indeed, Talat was clear in stressing Friday that the main stumbling block for progress in the talks was the belief by the Greek Cypriot side that as an internationally recognized state and an European Union member since May 2004, it did not need an immediate solution and has the luxury of playing with time and avoiding a deadline for the solution...

2009 of course is an important date because of the European Union evaluation on Turkey’s compliance with the preconditions the union set in 2006 in opening accession talks with Turkey: Establishing normalcy with all EU members and extending the 1963 customs union deal to cover all new members of the EU, including the Greek Cypriot administration. Fulfilling either condition would mean Turkey abandoning the Turkish Cypriot people and recognizing the Greek Cypriot state as the "legitimate government" of the entire island.

A strong will is absent...
While of course it will be of crucial importance for the functioning of the future federal republic whether or not there will be a Swiss-type system with the presidency rotating between the members of a presidential council - which would as well be the council of ministers according to Turkish Cypriot proposal - or whether there will be a rotation of an elected president and vice presidents and a federal government established on the basis of political equality of the two constituent states, what’s important at this stage is whether or not the two parties on the island who pretend to negotiate establishing a new partnership state could indeed accept each other as equal partners, rather than die-hard adversaries fighting a domination war.

Indeed, there is some water in the "Cyprus negotiations glass." The two leaders have achieved some progress regarding certain details of the future functioning of some federal organs, and have laid down some principles which may help tackling some other thorny issues as well. However, what is lacking is sincerity. What is lacking is political will. What is lacking is a determination to bury past in history and build a new future on the basis of accumulated experience, a strong will and the EU reality.

Can there be a deal if Christofias is making a proposal for the election of the Greek Cypriot president and the Turkish Cypriot vice president on the same ballot through universal suffrage? If Greek Cypriots do not drop their ambition to dominate and manipulate the political preferences of the Turkish Cypriot people - who now because of migration and other factors comprise about 20 percent of the population of the island Ğ can there be a lasting settlement on Cyprus?

So far, it is unfortunate that there is absence of a strong will in southern Cyprus for a compromise settlement on the basis of political equality, bi-zonality and bi-communality.

Moments before the ceremony held for late Gündüz Aktan at Parliament on Thursday, I was talking with a senior economic bureaucrat of the government. "The bosses are trying to make the best out of the situation... They are putting pressure on the government to get a state guarantee for their foreign debts... They think, like the previous Bülent Ecevit government did after the 2001 crisis, they will get direct assistance from the state... They will not be given a kurush!" That is indeed how the government is evaluating the screams of the private sector, there is need to take some urgent measures to minimize the impact of the global financial crisis on Turkish banking and of course the real economy sector.

"They, the businessmen, are insisting on demanding Turkey should make a new standby deal with the International Monetary Fund in the hope that Turkey will again receive billions of dollars in assistance in exchange for signing a new standby dealÉ We will make a deal with the IMF as a precautionary measure."

It is obvious the government is against a fully-fledged new standby deal with the IMF, or engaging in any sort of obligation that would pose a constraint to its election economics, or populist spending spree plans ahead of the March local elections. Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan conceded that the week of technical talks with the IMF in Washington were progressing but, there were still some disagreements over budgetary issues.

Indeed, many economic analysts writing for various newspapers underlined in the past week that unless Turkey restructures the draft fiscal 2009 budget, that Parliament is preparing to debate soon, in a manner to eradicate some major objections voiced by the IMF at the Washington talks it will be very difficult for the Erdoğan government to get much-needed IMF support.

That would mean the introduction of some bitter austerity measures and tighter controls on government spending at a time when there are increasing problems in the real economy sector and local elections approaching, which could pose a serious impediment for the electoral success of the AKP in the March local polls. Indeed, besides Gedikli’s statement, the surprise move of the Turkish Central Bank on Wednesday to cut its benchmark interest rate to 16.25 percent from 16.75 percent, was considered by analysts as an indication that the Bank knew more than the market and is anticipating a strong IMF program to fall into place in the coming weeks.

Main opposition Republican People’s Party, or CHP, leader Deniz Baykal is engaged nowadays in some extraordinary practices. He is enlisting women in black chadors as members of the CHP, personally fixing the pin of the CHP onto their chadors and delivering statements that if delivered by Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, he would lambasted as confessing the secret agenda of the ruling Justice and Development Party, or AKP.

Is this CHP and the CHP which was adamantly against a first lady wearing a Islamist headscarf the same? Is this CHP and the CHP which criticized the government for appointing top bureaucrats with veiled wives the same?

Is this "attitude change" in the CHP some sort of a "deception" aimed at pleasing the tribunal ahead of the approaching March local elections? Or, in the hope of coming to power has Baykal become a fundamentalist?

Does this mean the CHP may take steps tomorrow to lift the turban ban at universities? Does this mean the obsessive secularist understanding of the CHP will be replaced with a less obsessive understanding accepting of the "Muslim reality" of Turkey?

Irrespective of whether the CHP leader’s latest actions are nothing other than a deceptive election investment, it is just great to see the CHP realizing they need to try to win over practicing Muslims. The problem of the practicing Muslims of this country, restrictions on individual exercise of religion, is that some of the obsessive secularist taboos regarding religion can only be removed by a secularist CHP without, or with fewer, tensions in society.

Because of the secularist obsession of Turks who subscribe to the modernity project of the Turkish republic, for a long period religion was left as a tool for political Islam in the country. Various parties of political Islam did not hesitate exploiting religion and religious symbols to achieve political aims. Now the CHP has stepped into that area and is taking some courageous steps.

Latest figures cannot be included in official figures. Due to the vast size of the country, an insufficient number of personnel in the statistical organization, bureaucratic delays and the failure of several governmental agencies to report data, somehow official figures show around a three-month old situation for the field they are related to. That is, the unemployment figures released by the Turkish Statistical Institution, or TÜİK, released this week show the unemployment situation in the country as of the end of August. In other words, the crisis we are sinking into cannot be seen in those figures.

According to TÜİK, the "official" number of unemployed Turks has increased by 207,000 and has reached 2.439 million. Interesting enough, the number of families the Justice and Development Party, or AKP, is distributing free coal, rice, sugar and such assistance to is reported to be slightly over two million. What a social state! Rather than trying to generate employment opportunities, our government is just opting to distribute donations as a remedy to rising poverty… Anyhow, to return to our subject, according to TÜİK, without including the latest sackings because of the crisis - for example some 3,000 dock workers at Tuzla, or some 1,000 personnel by a leading Turkish bank, or thousands of people who have become unemployed as a result of closure because of the crisis of some 500 companies in the last week - the number of "official" unemployed Turks has reached 2.349 million and the unemployment rate has reached 9.8 percent. On the other hand, again according to official figures, some 6.2 percent of the 10.058 million Turks who are not listed in the "active working population" were either sacked from work or their workplaces were closed. If those who have given up hopes of finding an employment opportunity - and therefore who do not apply to the employment office and thus are not included in the unemployment data-as well as those who worked less than 40 hours in total over the past three months and thus considered in the statistics as "incomplete employment" are to be considered in the official statistics as well, than the rate of unemployment in the country becomes 18.6 percent, rather than the 9.8 reported by TÜİK.And, of course, in these statistics, of the overall 70 million Turks, the working population is being considered to be only around 25 million. That is, according to our statistical department and the official records it prepares, only one in three Turks are included in the "active working population." Rural Turkey and the farming population are largely ignored in the statistics, yet according to TÜİK the rate of unemployment after the farming sector was deduced has become 12.7 percent, a 1.1 percent sharp increase compared to the corresponding period in 2007 when the rate was 11.6 percent. Still, as employment statistics in the agriculture sector are so deficient and particularly rural women are so much discriminated against, it is rather difficult to vouch for the accuracy of these figures. Furthermore, according to the statistics, in urban Turkey one in every four of young Turks (23 percent) is unemployed.Current situation far more bitterAs is stressed above, even though they are deficient, all these figures provide a blurred snapshot of Turkey at the end of August. A snapshot taken today would reflect even far bitter realities. Meetings are underway at several big companies nowadays. Top executives are pondering ways of cutting costs and keeping their companies afloat despite the global economic crisis hurricane. Executives are trying to find ways of cutting costs without laying off a high number of their personnel. Still, particularly the middle sized and small enterprises are facing some acute problems and most of them are just trying to brave the worsening conditions hoping that the government will come up with a comprehensive economic measures package to salvage the Turkish economy. Precious months were wasted by the government which until recently was more busy preparing for the upcoming local elections and thus refusing a new standby deal with the International Monetary Fund which would restrict populist applications aimed at buying votes. Better late than never, one would say, seeing the government nowadays trying to finish off talks with IMF on a new agreement. But, the data released by TÜİK underscores how right the leading businessmen were in appealing to the government to take measures against the approaching crisis back in early September...

 

Is there anyone in Turkey who can say with absolute confidence that Hrant Dink, editor of the Armenian-Turkish Agos weekly, was not a victim of premeditated murder, committed despite police and gendarmerie intelligence being tipped off about the preparations for it, as early as a year before the heinous assassination was carried out, allegedly by a young hit man, 17-year-old Ogün Samast?

Or, is there anyone with brains in Turkey who does not believe the Jan. 19, 2007 Dink murder could have been prevented, if police and gendarmerie intelligence worked properly and the Istanbul Governor’s Office provided adequate security to our colleague, rather than summoning him to a meeting with a deputy governor who warned him that he should behave well?

Or, particularly, after all we have heard and read about the Dink trial, revelations of the alleged hit-man, confessions of victims of the intelligence fiasco, the inability to bring charges against police and military officers who apparently, at least, neglected their duty, can we say with confidence there is definitely not "official involvement" in the Dink murder and nothing to make the Turkish state responsible for the tragedy?

Is it not obvious to many of us who have following the Dink murder trial, why the prosecution have failed, so far, to go further than the hit man and bring to justice the culprits within the state who masterminded this heinous crime, is it a demonstration of the fact there is at least one gang within the state that is still untouchable?

An interesting interviewOur journalist colleague Okan Müderrisoğlu reported Monday on an interview with Justice Minister Mehmet Ali Şahin. The minister was quoted as saying, over the last six months prosecutors have filed 381 applications seeking ministerial approval to launch court cases under the contentious Article 301 of the Penal Code, which regulates penalties for insulting the Turkish state and state organs. Out of these 381 applications, the minister said he approved court cases to be opened in "only 47" of them, including that of writer Temel Demirer.

Demirer is now risking up to five years imprisonment on grounds he "insulted and degraded" the Turkish state, when after the 2007 murder of Dink he said, "There is a genocide in our history. Its name is the Armenian genocide. Hrant explained this reality to all of us at the cost of his life and blood. I am now committing a crime and calling everyone to commit a crime. Those who do not commit a crime against this murderer-state are accomplices in the Dink murder. We have to commit this crime so what happened to our Armenian brothers yesterday, should not happen to our Kurdish brothers todayÉ"

United Nations brokered "comprehensive talks" between the Turkish Cypriot leader, Mehmet Ali Talat, and his Greek Cypriot counterpart, Demetris Christofias, do not appear to be heading anywhere good... Both sides are expressing frustration and complain of not seeing political will on the other side for a resolution of the Cyprus problem. Though Talat spent 30 years in opposition calling for a federal resolution and in a way has made settlement the target of his political life while Christofias was elected on a pro-settlement platform. Talat is claiming that though he was elected on a pro-settlement platform, his failure to establish a pro-settlement government and entering into a coalition deal with the DIKO or Demokratic Party, of anti-settlement former President Tassos Papadopoulos and the ÖMovement for Social Democracy, or EDEK Ğ also anti-settlement Ğ has made the new Greek Cypriot leader a hostage of the anti-settlement block. "One cannot be pro-settlement and anti-settlement at the same time. Christofias must make up his mind," he has been stressing.

Christofias, on the other hand, is claiming that Talat is unable to negotiate because he has become a puppet of the government in Ankara, and the strong Turkish military. Thus, two months after the start of the latest round of Cyprus talks the two sides are still discussing inconclusively on one topic: Administration and power sharing. Indeed, if the two leaders manage to come out some sort of a workable agreement on that topic, the only other thorny subject before a comprehensive Cyprus settlement will be the future of the 1960 guarantee agreement which gave Turkey, along with Greece and Britain guarantor rights on the island.

Turkish Cypriot Foreign Minister Turgay Avcı was in Ankara last week to host the 25th anniversary reception of the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus. During the reception and later at his hotel for many hours I found an opportunity to discuss the latest situation at the Cyprus talks process with Avcı. He was very pessimistic; tough he believed the process must be continued. The domestic situation on both sides of the island as well as the international conjecture, he said, require the two leaders to stick to the process. But, was he hopeful that a breakthrough could come one day? He was not.

"I am telling foreign dignitaries that I meet as well. Is there any reason for the internationally recognized, European Union-member government in southern Cyprus compromise from sovereignty, engage in a power sharing deal with Turkish Cypriots and share the state which everyone has been telling them that it is all theirs? They have no motivation for any compromise, put aside the fact that for a comprehensive settlement both sides on the island are required to make some bitter compromisesÉ"

Avcı was right and indeed summarized the crux of the Cyprus problem of our time. Why should Greek Cypriots indeed compromise?

Thus, Greek Cypriots are looking for an alibi to place the responsibility on Talat and relieve themselves from this cumbersome negotiations process. Otherwise, why are Christofias and Talat discussing rotation of the presidency and methodology of electing the president and the vice president for the past two months with no rapprochement between the positions of the two sides on the issue? Strangely enough, while there is no motivation for Greek Cypriots to compromise, with EU’s 2009 evaluation for Turkey approaching and soon a new team will take over administration in the U.S., the Cyprus issue will likely become an even more serious headache for Turkey in the months ahead.

Is Downer plan in the offing?
As patience is running thin on both sides, as well as among those following the talks, strange indications started to emerge. On the one hand Turkish official sources Ğ while they remain totally lull in commenting publicly on the Cyprus talks process Ğ started to hint the probability of Ankara and northern Cyprus accepting UN arbitration, similar to the Annan talks process.

On the other hand, diplomatic sources with insight of the Cyprus "comprehensive" negotiations have started stressing that UN secretary-general’s Cyprus special envoy Australian diplomat Alexander Downer is getting frustrated with the inability of Talat and Christofias to move forward; likely to let them continue the process until after the new U.S. administration takes office and in March may put in front of the leaders a draft comprehensive settlement plan. Downer has reportedly already started putting some ideas together and may start drafting a paper soon.

In some western countries, provided they "report" to the local authorities that they are living and sharing life together, unmarried couples are provided with some of the legal rights - such as those under the heritage regulations - that are normally enjoyed by married couples. But, even under a such a liberal policy, people married to someone else cannot enjoy such rights if they have some sort of a triangular affair, that is living with someone other than their legal wife or husband... A while ago, looking into a case gave a revolutionary decision. The case was about a woman objecting to a lower courts verdict rejecting her heritage rights on grounds that although she lived together with a man like husband and wife, as she and the man did not marry, she was not eligible for heritage rights. The Court of Appeal said as the man was not married to someone else, and since until the man’s death the woman spent many years with him and shared a life, she was eligible for heritage rights like a "legal wife." That decision of the Court of Appeal was, of course, one taken with a humanitarian approach. But, still, the key element of the verdict was that the woman was given heritage rights because the man was not married to someone else and the woman had lived - even though outside the marriage bond - together with the man for many years like a married couple.

Yet another deform
The parliamentary Justice Commission has been debating for many days a new draft which, when enacted, will replace the present law on debts. While the country is discussing some other very important issues, the commission is silently completing its debate on the 649-article comprehensive draft law on debts.

What’s wrong in that? As conditions change and the country transforms itself to European norms and standards, it must be normal to feel the need to make comprehensive amendments in some laws lagging behind in content or mentality, or to replace them with totally new ones.

Civil marriage and gender equality - despite all the complaints we have as regards to the insufficient application of the norm in Turkey - are very important for the protection of womens' rights. Rather than indulging in practices that may provide incentives to polygamy or religious marriages, the state must try to enforce better application of gender equality and enhancing womens' rights, promoting political representation of women and perhaps providing women some sort of a positive discrimination in employment.

Using the Court of Appeal’s earlier verdict recognizing heritage rights of an unmarried woman, and in a manner contradicting the Civil Code encouraging married life and declaring illegal religious marriages or polygamy practices, in article 55 of the draft (changing the previous article 47) that regulates "moral indemnity rights" the reference to "family" in the old law was deleted and instead it was stressed that "close associates" will be eligible to receive compensation.

Of course there is no reference in the draft to "heritage rights" but many legal experts are of the opinion that after this law is enacted not only "members of the family" - that is the wife/husband and children of the family - will have "compensation" rights if a man or woman dies in accident or loses his/her life on duty, but also "close associates" may demand compensation.

Thus, in effect, they say, woman who live with a man with a religious marriage deal which is not recognized and is condemned as illegal by the state may demand compensation under this draft and based on that right, may go to court and demand heritage rights as well. Thus, this is indeed an attempt to bend the Civil Code, go around the civil marriage regulation and legitimize religious marriages and polygamy...

But, on the other hand, young engaged girls in particular, who lose their beloved in the war against terrorism or on duty, may benefit from compensation rights and from this aspect, this arrangement might be rather useful.

Thus, perhaps rather than using a vague "close associates" term in describing people eligible to receive indemnity, the law must be more specific and while healing a social problem doors should not be legally opened to polygamy.

A group of representatives of the nation discussed the budget of Justice Ministry at a parliamentary commission meeting recently. Justice is of course a very important concept. The Justice Ministry getting an appropriate allocation in the new budget was not at all something on which parties should have considerable differences. The discussions at the parliamentary commission, however, were reminiscent of the time when a coiffure-blonde prime minister declared from the parliamentary rostrum, "Those who die for the state and those who kill for the state are equally heroes to us."

One would think after all the trouble this country has gone through, after hearing all those revelations of heinous crimes being committed by some underground figures and government agents, to help the implementation of some policies, and achieve some government targets, such a deplorable mindset should no longer exist in this country; particularly among lawmakers who have learned with bitter experience the importance of the supremacy of law and equality as the forefront of all legal principles.

However, discussions at the parliamentary commission have shown the problem is not yet over. The Democratic Society Party, or DTP, deputies are definitely not the most loved parliamentarians in Turkey currently. The provocative statements they have been making, their refusal to condemn the Kurdistan Workers' Party, or PKK's, terrorism and their unfortunate involvement in the latest spree of violent demonstrations in which children were intentionally placed at the forefront of protests, are just some of the reasons for a growing antipathy toward the DTP.

Yet, as even a broken watch can show the correct time twice a day, DTP’s Hasip Kaplan was perfectly right in complaining during discussions at the parliamentary commission debates, that in a democratic state, police cannot and should not fire on people on the grounds they did not heed a call to stop. Indeed, not only in violent demonstrations in the Southeast, Istanbul and other western cities, but at several other locations throughout the country, people are falling victim to the "stop or get hit" mentality of the police.

The problem is of course, the law on the duties and powers of police. This law is often described by opponents and human rights activities as the "stop or get hit law" as that is what it has become in practice, the power of police to use guns to enforce the law. While even in military circulars, soldiers are told they must first stop and ask suspicious persons who are approaching to stop, then repeat the call, and if the person continues to approach, fire a warning shot in the air. If the person insists on approaching and does not surrender, then they should "fire on legs," that is, fire at non-lethal organs. What Kaplan said, for a change, was not provocative at all. On the contrary, the DTP deputy pointed at a very serious problem in the country for which lawmakers could provide a resolution, make the law more compatible with the notion of democracy.