Bulletin de liaison etd'information - Institut kurde de Paris

Revue de Presse-Press Review-Berhevoka Çapê-Riv.ista Stampa-Dentro de la Prensa-Basln Özeti
nomic, and legal reforms aimed at paving the way for accession negotiations. Seven months later, the Turkishparliament
passed constitutional c.~a.'1geso££ièially aimed at catching up with. EU democratic standards. Among
-improvements endorsed-by theJegislature were_~endments limiting th~use Q{the death RenaltyJo case~ involving
terrorism and easing the media ban on languages other than Turkish - a move Ankara presented as a green
light to broadcast in the Kurdish language.
Granting greater cultural rights to Turkey's estimated 12 million Kurds - whom Ankara does not recognize as an
official minority - is one of the EU's prerequisites to beginning accession talks.
Rights groups and EU officials initially welcomed the constiq,Itional amendments as a step in the right direction,
but later concluded these changes had in practice made very little impact.
.,
In its 2002 reporlon Turkey, the New York~based Human Rights Watch (HRW) notes authorities are still using
various legal pretexts to prevent broadcasting in Kurdish and other minority languages. In an interview with
RFE/RL, HRW Turkey researcher Jonathan Sugden described last fall's language amendments as merely cosmetic.
"[The Turkish authorities] changed Articles 13 and 14 of the constitution to say and present this as an end to the
problems with freedom of expression. [But] at the moment, Fikret Baskaya, a journalist, is in prison for referring
to the Kurdish minority in something that he wrote. And the proprietor of a newspaper is in prison for saying that
the 1999 earthquake was divine justice. So it really did not impact on fundamental rights in any practical way at
all." .
Adding to Europe's concerns, a bitter row recently emerged between Ecevit's two coalition partners over new draft
legislation tha:t Turkey says is required to reflect the constitutional changes.
The rift arose last month when Deputy Prime Minister and leader of the center-right Motherland Party Mesut
Yilmaz - who oversees government relations with the EU - said the IS-nation bloc had notified him that the drafts
were not satisfactory and should be revised. Speaking to RFE/RL on condition of anonymity, one high-ranking EU
official denied the European body had made any official assessment on the proposed drafts. But he echoed
Yilmaz's concerns, saying the projected changes were "broadening the scope of restrictions imposed on individual
freedoms rather thannarrowing it."
At the core of the dispute are two controversial
the EU would like Ankara to amend.
provisions of the Turkish Penal Code -- articles 312 and 159 -- which
In its current version, Article 312 states that inciting crowds to hostility on religious, racial, social, or cultural
. grounds is punishable by up to three years in prison. The amended draft reportedly extends the criminal offense
to include cases of inciting hostility in individuals.
Article 159 says anyone criticizing certain aspects of the military, the police, or other state institutions may face up
to six years in jail. Journalists, academics, and human rights activists have been imprisoned under this law, which
Turkey's influential military also invoked last year to obtain the closure of a website inviting soldiers to air complaints
about army life. Article 159's revised version reportedly extli!nds the ban o~ criticism to any part of these
institutions. . .
Deputy Prime Minister Devlet Bahceli, the leader of the far-right Nationalist Action Party (MHP), vigorously
defends the proposed amendments, which he says are a safeguard against national disintegration. He also says his
opponents are striving to legalize what he describes as "ethnic and religious separatism."
Addressing the MHP parliamentary group yesterday, Bahceli lambasted Yilmaz, whom he accused of yielding to
European pressure at the cost of Turkey's domestic stability. "This pathetic picture does not correspond to our
understanding of how earnestly the state should be managed." ..
~j
President Ahmed Necdet Sezer has said he does not wish to get involved in the dispute. Last week (i February),
.he nonetheless entered the fray, saying individual freedoms should be expanded. Asked by reporters what the president's
vÏl~ws on the proposed changes were,Sezer's chief spokesman MetinYa1man said: "We cannot possibly
intedere in the debate at the present stage. However, as a former chairman of the Constitutional Court and as president
of the republic, Mr. Sezer believes it is necessary to broaden the scope of individual freedoms. He has open-
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