Islamist Election Victory Casts Shadow Over Turkey's Secular Politicians

By James M. Dorsey

Acting Turkish Prime Minister Tansu Ciller is playing Turkey's newest political card for all it is worth.

Within hours of resolving the commandeering by pro-Chechen Turks of a Black Sea ferry with some 250 mostly Russian nationals aboard, Mrs. Ciller was warning that the northern Caucasus could become another Bosnia-Herzegovina if Russia fails to seek a negotiated solution to its ethnic conflicts.

Her statement decrying the "human tragedy" in the northern Caucasus was likely to cast a further shadow over relations with Russia, Turkey's giant neighbor to the north.

Turkey has in the past been careful to balance its empathy with Chechen rebels struggling against Russian hegemony in the northern Caucasus against complex economic relations that involve billions of dollars in construction contracts obtained by Turkish companies as well as efforts to secure a stake in the flow of Central Asian and Caucasian oil to international markets.

Ciller's remarks were as much an expression of concern about regional stability as they were a bid to capitalize on popular support in Turkey for the Chechen rebels. Millions of Turks have ethnic links with the northern Caucasus.

Turkish legal experts said the nine hijackers would probably be tried under Article 384 of the penal code that prescribes up to nine years in jail for armed hijacking. This would sharply contrast with the use of tough anti-terror laws to prosecute people who speak out or write about the 11-year-old Kurdish insurgency in southeastern Turkey.

"There are, of course, certain reductions in the sentences of those who surrender," Istanbul's deputy governor, Ridvan Yenisen, said regarding the pro-Chechen hijackers in a statement likely to provoke irritation in Moscow.

The prime minister's bid to exploit the ferry crisis came as she began efforts to form a new government. Her bid followed the failure of Islamist leader Necmettin Erbakan to form a coalition on the basis of December's inconclusive election result.

Ciller's attempt to ride the wave of pro-Chechen sentiment coincided with her call for the formation of a temporary government with conservative Motherland Party (ANAP) leader Mesut Yilmaz. Such a government, Ciller said, would serve to prepare for a new election that she hopes would produce a more clear-cut popular verdict on who should govern Turkey.

No party won sufficient seats in parliament during the Christmas Eve election to form a government on its own. Erbakan's pro-Islamic Refah (Welfare) Party emerged as the largest, with 21 percent of the vote. Ciller's True Path Party (DYP) and the conservative ANAP each got slightly more than 19 percent.

The Chechen issue seemingly signals powerful new support for the Islamists.

Ciller has ruled out a coalition with Erbakan, while Yilmaz has been careful to keep the door to the Islamists open. Yilmaz is expected in coming weeks to go through the motions of trying to set aside deep-seated differences with Ciller before making a deal with Erbakan. Ciller and Yilmaz have each set conditions for an agreement between themselves that are unacceptable for the other.

In Yilmaz's view, once Ciller fails in her efforts to form a coalition government, the mandate will pass to him. Then he can set the terms for a new government with Erbakan, analysts say.

Meanwhile, the Chechen issue raises serious questions for which Turkish politicians may not have immediate answers. It also seemingly signals powerful new support for the Islamists at a time when their star already is rising.

Angry Turks pouring out of a mosque in Istanbul during the hijacking of the ferry chanted anti-Russian slogans in a manifestation of the emerging alliance between Turkey's observant Muslim community and supporters of the Chechen rebellion.

"Long live our Chechen rebellion!" shouted the marchers, marshalled by religious leaders in traditional skull caps and cloaks.

The embracing of the pro-Chechen hijackers by both officials and the public contrasted starkly with the government's condemnation of intellectuals and politicians who advocate greater rights for the Kurds as "terrorists." Some 18,000 people have died so far in the insurgency waged by the Kurdish Workers Party (PKK) in southeastern Turkey.

Says Hikmet Cetinkaya, editor of the left-wing Cumhurriyet newspaper: "If the PKK is terrorist when it attacks a village, then why are Chechen supporters not terrorists when they hijack a boat in your country?"

A Month of Political Violence

The inability of politicians to find common ground means a political vacuum and protracted negotiations for a new government at a time when Turkey is witnessing its worst political violence in years.

"Turkey is coming apart at the seams," says Soli Ozeh, a prominent political scientist. "The system no longer provides checks and balances for all the different forces in this country. Democratization is the only way out. You can't keep Turkey in a 70-year-old straightjacket."

The current cycle of political violence began in early January when three militant leftists were killed in a clash between prisoners and security forces in an Istanbul jail, sparking five days of nationwide prison unrest.

Days later the body of a left-wing journalist was found after witnesses, including journalists from mainstream newspapers, said he was detained by police while covering the funeral of militants killed in the Istanbul prison riot.

A day later, left-wing guerrillas claimed responsibility for the murder of two Turkish businessmen, including Ozdemir Sabanci, a member of one of the country's most powerful industrial dynasties, and a secretary at their twin-tower office in an exclusive district of Istanbul.

Businessmen blamed the killings on the failure of politicians to fill the political vacuum. Political analysts note that the Sabanci family has been outspoken in its criticism of government policies, including the government's refusal to seek a non-military solution to the 11-year-old Kurdish insurgency.

Finally, a day before the ferry hijacking, 11 villagers were killed in an ambush Turkish officials say was staged by PKK guerrillas who had, until then, abided by a five-week unilateral cease-fire.

A news agency in Germany with close links to the rebels denied, however, that the rebels had violated their own cease-fire and said the state was responsible in a bid to implicate the PKK and punish the villagers for voting for a Kurdish party in last month's election.

"Turkey today, now that personal struggles between leaders have been added to the political picture after the polls, is assuming the appearance of an ungovernable country," the liberal Yeni Yuzyil daily said in an editorial this week.

"As terror shows signs of being on the rise, the resorting by certain state forces to illegal violence...frightens everyone who believes in the law and democracy. And the economy is ringing alarm bells," the paper said.

James M. Dorsey is an American free-lance writer based in Istanbul, Turkey.