Turkish Army and Islamists Escalate Their Struggle

By James M. Dorsey

The Turkish armed forces have stepped up their efforts to weaken the country’s pro-Islamic forces in a bid that analysts say is unlikely to stymie the Islamists’ hopes of again emerging as Turkey’s largest political force from early elections scheduled for next spring.

The military campaign came as Prime Minister Mesut Yilmaz agreed to step down at the end of this year and to allow a caretaker government to take over from his right-left minority government and lead the country to elections in April. Election polls predict that without electoral and political party reform, the Islamists, united in the Virtue Party, could win the election.

Virtue was formed earlier this year to succeed the Welfare Party headed by former Prime Minister Necmettin Erbakan, which was banned in January by Turkey’s Constitutional Court on charges of seeking to overthrow the country’s secular political system. Mr, Erbakan, 70, was banned from politics for a period of five years.

The election raises questions of what Turkey’s staunchly secular military would do if Virtue were to win and form a new government. A year ago, the armed forces forced Mr. Erbakan to step down as prime minister. After the closure of Welfare, Islamist deputies flocked to join Virtue, making it the largest grouping in the 550-seat parliament with 143 deputies.

Welfare has appealed to the European Court of Justice to declare the Turkish ban null and void. Former Justice Minister Sevket Kazan said the ban of the party constituted an infringement of freedom of speech and assembly as guaranteed by the European Human Rights Convention, to which Turkey is a signatory.

In the latest military-inspired move against the Islamists, Turkey’s state security authorities have charged the country’s largest businessmen’s organization with violating laws on societies and associations in a move that could lead to its banning. The Ankara state security court at the same time charged Erol Yasar, the chairman of the pro-Islamic Association of Independent Industrialists and Businessmen (MUSIAD) with “provoking hatred amongst the people” in a speech he made last year criticizing restrictions on religious education. The charge carries a sentence of up to three years in jail.

The charges follow the arrest last month of 16 pro-Islamist businessmen as part of a sustained, military-inspired campaign to suppress the Islamist movement as well as proposals to restrict activities of Islamic financial institutions. The Turkish military asserts that Islamic businesses and finance houses legally channel $250 million annually to the Islamist movement.

Further EU Troubles?

With branches across Turkey and more than 2,000 members, MUSIAD is the country’s largest businessmen’s organization. It competes with TUSIAD, the Turkish Industrialists and Businessmen’s Association, which has only 387 members but includes the country’s most powerful businesses. The moves against the Islamists are likely to further trouble Turkey’s relations with the European Union, already strained because of the EU’s refusal to acknowledge Turkey as a candidate for EU membership.

Turkey has often come under fire from the West for its poor record on human rights and freedom of speech, factors cited by the European Union late last year for excluding the country from its list of potential EU members. That tarnished record was highlighted in May when Human Rights Association chairman Akin Birdal was shot and seriously wounded by right-wing nationalists who included an army sergeant. An obscure extreme nationalist group, the Turkish Revenge Brigade, claimed responsibility for the shooting. The group has been used in the past to cover up extrajudicial killings.

Eleven Human Rights Association officials have been murdered by unidentified assailants since 1986. Six of them were gunned down and the others were kidnapped and tortured to death. Birdal has won respect in the West for his fight against torture and forced evacuations of Kurdish villages. His activity has brought him repeatedly into conflict with the judiciary; he currently faces an estimated 20 different court cases on charges of links to the rebel Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK). The PKK has been waging a 14-year old war in south-eastern Turkey for self-rule for the country’s 12 million Kurds.

The government in January issued a report suggesting that Turkish officials had ordered police teams to carry out executions, kidnappings or bombings against opponents of its policies and advocates of greater Kurdish rights in particular. The report linked the Turkish state to extreme nationalist terrorists. Legal proceedings against a former interior minister, a member of parliament and several policemen began in April in connection with the allegations.

“This country has failed to bring to light the scandal regarding the death squads which were set up within the state system,’’ said Ilnur Cevik, chief editor of the Turkish Daily News. “Thus, many people are now pointing the finger at these death squads.”

James M. Dorsey is a free-lance journalist based in Istanbul.