Turkish Press Council Critical of New Press Law Proposal
The board of the Press Council have criticized the proposed new press law as being anti-democratic, out-dated and a risk to the country’s freedom of communication. They called on the government not to accept the proposal until they have taken into consideration the views of the press. 
They were further critical that although the Justice Minister, prior to drawing up the law proposal, had listened to the views of the press but he had not included these in the proposal. They said that the end product was far from being democratic or up-to-date. In particular, the proposal contradicted the EU‘s required short-term reforms in the national program, as well as this program’s preamble which expresses the aim of establishing a democratic society and a democratic Turkey. 
The Press Council also said that respect for the right to information was a fundamental element within a democratic society. The new constitution also stated that there was to be no news censorship and that it was the press’s task to inform and criticize. However, the law proposal contradicted all such principles. (Source: Turkish Daily News, 04.03.02) 

Proposal Submitted for RTÜK Law Change 
It was suggested at a meeting between the Justice Ministry and the Turkish “Radio and Television Board of Control” (RTÜK), that the way could be made clear for broadcasts in Kurdish by the removal from the radio and TV law, of the regulation concerning permissible broadcasting languages. However, it was pointed out that any change to the law would be dependent on the political will of the coalition. This second compliance package, which covers the EU requirement on permitting native language broadcasts, must be passed by parliament by March 19th to meet the EU deadline. 
The law change proposal drawn up by RTÜK also puts forward further comprehensive legislative amendments. They propose that the current penalty of bans on broadcasting be replaced by a graded system of penalties. In this way radio and TV stations who breach the law would initially only receive a warning. A repeated breach would require a public apology. If this doesn’t happen then the program could be suspended for a maximum of 12 broadcasts. If there is then still a breach of the law then the broadcaster, if they are transmitting nationwide, would be liable to a fine of between 71 and 150 billion Lira. A broadcast ban would be the highest penalty available. (Source: Radikal, 28.02.02)

Quarrel within Turkish Government Concerning the “Remorse Law” 
A quarrel has taken place within the Turkish government concerning the amnesty law for members of the banned Kurdish Workers Party (PKK). Former PKK members are to receive leniency if they provide the security authorities with important information on the PKK. Government and military leadership gave assurances that the “Remorse Law” would be a “blow” to the organization and would “bring an end” to the PKK. The media consider the proposal to be a response to the latest attempt by the PKK to redefine itself as a political organization.
The first “Remorse Law”, which was passed in 1999 following the arrest of the PKK leader Abdullah Öcalan, did not bring about the desired effect. What is different this time is that PKK leaders and members who participated in fighting and who killed people, would also be included under the law. 
Prime Minister Bülent Ecevit expressed doubts about the law. He said that Öcalan and his deputy Semdin Sakik, who has also been sentenced to death, should be prevented from profiting from any leniency. (Sources: dpa, 01.03.03; afp, 04.03.02) 
 

Deputy Prime Minister Yilmaz Talks of "Nightmare Scenario"
Sections of the Turkish Military Now Against Ankara’s EU Policy 
For the first time a high-ranking Turkish officer – the General Secretary of the powerful Turkish National Security Council – has called on the government in Ankara to abandon its plans for EU membership. Until now the Turkish military have always officially supported Ankara’s EU ambitions. The four star general, Tuncer Kilinc, is now calling for a radical change to Turkish foreign policy. He said that the EU would never accept Turkey. Alongside their relations to the USA, Turkey should now therefore look for closer cooperation with Russia and Iran. Kilinc emphasized that he was only speaking for himself. The general does, however, represent a conservative tendency within Turkey which opposes many reform plans from the government’s majority.
Deputy Prime Minister Mesut Yilmaz, responsible for Ankara’s relations to Brussels, described such thinking as a “nightmare scenario”. Other leading politicians also reacted harshly but without directly criticizing Kilinc. 
Head of government Bülent Ecevit said that "historically and culturally" Turkey was a European country. "Some conservatives" could "not accept this". Only the Islamic Saadet Partisi openly agreed with Kilinc. They were jubilant on the “revival” of a possible alliance with Islamic countries that had been demanded by the Islamic leader Necmettin Erbakan. Kilinc had expressed his views at an event in the Turkish War Academy in Istanbul. His appearance there had been broadcast by several TV stations.
In an interview with a military publication, the chief of the general staff and head of the Turkish armed forces, Hüseyin Kivrikoglu, accused European states of continuing to support terrorist organizations which Turkey had in its sights, even following September 11th. Turkey had not received adequate support in its own fight against terrorism. Kivrikoglu criticized the EU’s anti-terror laws for only taking into account terrorist organizations that were a risk to EU states. Brussels do not include the Kurdish PKK on its list of terrorist organizations. (Sources: NTV/MSNBC, 07.03.02; SZ, 09.03.02)

European Parliament Against HADEP Ban 
In a resolution recently passed by the European Parliament on the human rights situation in Turkey, there was a request not to impose a ban on HADEP. The parliament’s decision stated that “HADEP campaigns for the civil rights of the Kurds and they deny any link to the PKK or other terrorist organizations”. The Turkish Constitutional Court has been trying for the past 3 years to ban HADEP on the grounds of links to the PKK. 
The parliament also called on Turkey to end their action against students who are demanding that Kurdish becomes a subject of choice. They pointed out that Turkey still had to comply with requirements from the EU. The parliament expressed its hope that Turkey would in the future acknowledge the legitimate rights of all its minorities. The resolution stated that “Turkey can only attain full membership if they respect the Copenhagen criteria and basic human rights”. (Source: Turkish Daily News, 01.03.02)

Arrest Warrant Lifted Against Turkish Author 
The case against the Kurdish writer, Mehmed Uzun, has been adjourned until April 19th. His lawyer said that the warrant for his arrest had been lifted. Uzun had been accused of inciting separatism. In a speech in the Kurdish city of Diyarbakir two years ago, he criticized the ban on the use of Kurdish in public. Because of this the writer, who has lived in Sweden since 1978, is liable to a prison sentence of up to 8 years. The 47-year-old author had refused to return to Turkey because of the arrest warrant. According to his lawyer he is now willing to make a statement at the trial in Diyarbakir. Uzun has written around a dozen novels in Turkish and Kurdish and is considered to be one of the leading Kurdish writers. (Sources: ap, NZZ, 09.03.02)

Not Guilty Verdict on Journalist Fehmi Koru 
The trial against the journalist Fehmi Koru has ended in a verdict of not guilty before Istanbul’s State Security Court. He had been accused of “inciting hate amongst the population by discrimination on the grounds of race, religion and class” in a TV broadcast following the earthquake in the Marmara region. Koru had been liable to 6 years imprisonment. The not guilty verdict had been made possible by the change to Article 312. (Source: Turkish Daily News, 06.03.02)

State Sponsored and Banned by the State: The Successful Film "Big Man, Little Love "
The Turkish film “Big Man, Little Love” which has already been seen by 100,000 people in Turkish cinemas and which swept the board at the country’s most important film festival, has finally been banned despite it having been sponsored by the Ministry of Culture. The film from Handan Ipekci had even been selected as Turkey’s Oscar candidate.
In "Big Man, Little Love” the young Hejar goes to live with relatives in Istanbul after her parents are killed in fighting between the Turkish army and Kurdish PKK rebels. The relatives are then killed in a police raid in Istanbul. Only Hejar escapes and is taken in by a neighbor, an old judge. He is a typical representative of the state who doesn’t tolerate any language other than Turkish. However, his views do slowly change.
At times even Turkish subtitles appear during dialogues in Kurdish – unheard of in a production sponsored with state funds. The film has now be banned by a censorship committee from the Ministry of Culture following a request from the police. The police complain that the film shows how police storm an apartment and kill all its occupants – as if this has never happened before in Turkey. Furthermore, “Kurdish identity” was a theme within the film.
These complaints were enough for the censorship committee to take the successful and critically acclaimed film out of circulation. Culture Minister Istemihan Talay defended the ban but humbly admitted that he had not seen the film himself. To justify his ministry’s sponsorship the minister accused the film’s director of obtaining the money by devious mean. His ministry had, from the film script, assumed the film had “good and noble aims”. But he claimed the end product had been changed in the pursuit of profit. (Sources: NRZ, 05.03.02; SZ, 08.03.02)

Legal Action Because of Kurdish Names 
In the district of Dicle (Diyarbakir) 7 families from the villages of Meydan, Ugrak, Üzümlü, Bozoba and Cavli have had legal action taken against them because the first names given to a total of 21 children, allegedly contravene § 16 of Law No. 1587 on registration. 
The names involved are: Serhat, Berivan, Zilan, Rojda, Baver, Velat, Kendal, Zinar, Hebun, Baran, Rojhat, Agit, Zelal and Zozan. It is claimed that they do not conform to Turkey’s “national culture, ethics, norms and traditions”. The action follows a directive from Interior Minister Rüstü Kazim Yücelen from December 2001. This referred to earlier directives from 15th October 1986, 7th August 1990 and 30th March 1992. (Source: Radikal, 04.03.02) 

Police Convicted for the Third Time for Death in Police Custody 
On 05.03.2002, Aydin’s Criminal Court convicted, for the third time, 6 police officers to 5.5 years imprisonment for torturing to death Baki Erdogan who was allegedly responsible for the DHKP-C in the Aegean region.
Erdogan was arrested on 11.08.1993 and died on 21.08.1993. The police officers Ibrahim Türedi, Necmettin Aydinkaya, Cavit Sandikçi, Abdurrahman Çetinkaya, Ali Kumal and Ayhan Erdal had been convicted of the crime on 21st April 1998 and 25th June 1999. The Court of Appeal had reversed the original conviction. The State Prosecutor had called for a not guilty verdict but the court upheld its original decision. The case will now again be put before the Court of Appeal. (Source: Hürriyet, 06.03.02) 

Turkey Removes Chastity and Virginity Tests from 
School Disciplinary Regulations 
Turkey has amended the school disciplinary regulations which had permitted virginity tests on female school pupils. Every year there had been several suicides because of compulsory examinations. However, it wasn’t until 1999 that the government issued a directive banning the tests after 5 pupils had committed suicide with rat poison fearing compulsory virginity tests. Such tests had been particularly widespread in state boarding schools and school houses in rural areas. 
However, the requirement for a chastity test still remained within the school disciplinary regulations even after the law change. This made it still possible for virginity tests to be carried out. The “Chastity Rule” enabled the disciplining or expulsion of both male and female school pupils if they contravened the “Chastity Commandment”. 
The amended clause now states that students can be penalized “if their behavior is not compatible with society’s general values and norms and if it disrupts the learning environment”. (Source: reuters, 28.02.02)

Swiss Bank UBS Withdraws from Dam Project 
The Swiss UBS Bank has stated that it is to withdraw from the controversial Turkish dam project in Ilisu. UBS said that they have terminated the 1997 mandate agreement with the supplier consortium for the construction of the hydroelectric power station. As grounds for their decision was the unsatisfactory progress and the lack of measures taken to prevent the social and ecological consequences of the project. Swedish, British and Italian consortium partners had already pull out of the project prior to UBS. (Source: taz, 06.03.02)

German Firm to Modernize Turkish Attack Helicopter 
“Systems and Defense Electronics“, part of EADS (the European Aeronautic Defense and Space Company), are to equip Turkish attack helicopters with a modern missile warning system. "The Germans won the contract”, said a spokesman for the Turkish Ministry of Defense in Ankara. A spokesman for the company in Ulm said that talks were still on going between themselves and the Turkish authorities. No problems are expected concerning export permission from the German government. A company spokesman said “We have an export license”. 
The contract, which according to Turkish press reports is worth around €200 million, concerns the modernization of around 350 attack helicopters. The contract for the German firm concerns the installation of sensors which can warn the crew of enemy missiles. The spokesman in Ulm said that it was “purely a passive form of self-defense”. 
Another firm belonging to EADS, LFK from Unterschleißheim in Bavaria, had already made a tender for the contract in 1998 and had made inquiries to the German government from whom they received a positive response. In the meantime LFK has handed over their business to the firm in Ulm. The LFK-System is based on sensors which can be installed onto the helicopter and which can detect the engine warmth from enemy surface to air missiles. The warning to the helicopter’s crew provides them with 3-5 seconds to evade the missile or to activate other defense systems. 
According to reports in the Turkish media the 350 modernized helicopters would also be used in the Kurdish conflict. The decision to purchase the system followed the shooting down of several helicopters by the PKK in 1997 and 1998. (Source: dpa, 05.03.02)

Iraq’s Kurds Reject The Role of the Northern Alliance 
PUK leader Jalal Talabani made a stop over in Ankara on his way to the USA. A glance at his diary revealed what interests there were in the Turkish capital concerning the visit of the Iraqi Kurdish leader. He was received on behalf of the government by a state secretary from the Foreign Ministry. The General Staff and Intelligence Services also desired talks with him. As long as Washington envisages the fall of Saddam Hussein then Talabani remains a not insignificant pawn of the chessboard of world politics. He and Massoud Barzani from the Democratic Party of Kurdistan, can call up several tens of thousands of fighters in northern Iraq. This is not enough to topple Saddam but it is clearly more than any other Iraqi opposition group can assemble.
But Talabani does not want to be compared to the leadership of the Afghan Northern Alliance. He said that the Kurds did not wish to experience the past once again. An bitter allusion to the past: in 1975 the USA abandoned the Kurds in their war against the Baghdad dictatorship in which they suffered a devastating defeat. Following the 1991 Gulf War George Bush senior called on the Iraqi people to topple the dictator themselves. What he didn’t say was that the Iraqi’s could not count on the USA. Therefore, the uprising of the Kurds led to mass exodus and a humanitarian catastrophe. 
The priority for Jalal Talabani is the democratization of Iraq. He believes that if Saddam was toppled by military means then another dictator would simply replace him. He fears that a new dictator would be selected under the discretion of Iraq’s Arab neighbors. He would again be a Sunnite Arab who would persecute the Kurds in the north and the Shiites in the south. (Source: Basler Zeitung, 07.03.02)

Iraqi Opposition Leader Calls for US Strike Against Iraq
The Iraqi opposition leader Ahmed Chalabi has called on the USA to attack Iraq and to help the Iraqi people topple Saddam Hussein. At a recent conference of the "Aspen Institute" in Berlin, Chalabi welcomed the link US President George Bush made between Iraq and the war against terrorism. The president of the US-backed Iraqi National Congress, the umbrella organization for opposition groups, said that "Saddam is the most dangerous terrorist in the world". He said that Washington had rekindled the people’s hope that Saddam Hussein would be toppled and that a democratic state could be established. Chalabi further said that “It can begin as soon as the USA wants it to”. (Source: afp, 07.03.02)

Travel Ban on Residents from Makhmoor
According to reports in the newspaper Birayati, the Iraqi administration have imposed a ban on the residents of the Kurdish town of Makhmoor from traveling to Arbil without specific permission from the Iraqi intelligence service Mukhabarat. The town of Makhmoor, which is just 20km from the Arbil and since the founding of the Iraqi state in 1925 has belonged to Arbil, has been severely affected by the campaign of “ethnic cleansing” and Arabisation. Arabs from southern Iraq are being resettled here equipped with false birth certificates claiming that they were born in Makhmoor. Resettlement has been encouraged through cost-free housing, land and other financial benefits. 
Last year there was a ban on the use of the Kurdish language in the schools in Makhmoor. Kurdish teachers were compulsory transferred to other districts. In order to drive out the Kurdish inhabitants from Makhmoor, the Iraqi administration have been persecuting them by, for example, imposing travel bans to friends and relatives in Arbil and by switching off their electricity supplies. (Source: Kurdistan Newsline, 27.02.02)

Iraq Intensifies Persecution Against the Families of Dissidents
The Iraqi government have increased the pressure on the families of dissidents living abroad. Members of the families have been told to call their relatives abroad and tell them they should refrain from making any statements which are hostile to the regime. The families are being observed and followed by special security teams under the control of members of the Baath party. 
Last month the Iraqi regime’s satellite TV station broadcast programs in which the families criticized and condemned their relatives abroad. The station serves as a tool of oppression to terrorize opponents to the Saddam regime. Informed sources claim that intelligence services under Saddam’s son Qusai, are now monitoring all incoming and outgoing international calls. (Source: Iraq Press, 04.03.02)

Swedish Group on Cultural Trip to South Kurdistan 
A group from Sweden have visited South Kurdistan as part of an ongoing cultural exchange program. Included in the group were Swedish artistes from the areas of theatre, dance, painting and mosaic. They gave exhibitions and showed their work at workshops in cultural institutions and universities. Two of the artists, Pearl Koren and Dana Rauf, held a seminar in the Art Institute in Suleymania on Swedish theater. The group was received by Prime Minister Dr. Barham Salih. (Source: Kurdistan Newsline, 26.02.02) 

Drama Before Sicily: 50 Missing
A ship with 65 illegal immigrants onboard, mostly of Kurdish origin, capsized before the coast of Sicily. According to Italian media reports, 11 passengers were rescued. Around 50 were still missing. (Source: taz , 09.03.02)
 

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