Military covered up responsibility in deadly blast, probe

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Obama, Medvedev sign disarmament treaty page11
PHOTO
AP, IVAN SEKRETAREV
Mltary
covered up
responsblty
n deadly blast,
probe shows
Land mines that caused deaths of seven
soldiers in Çukurca last year were planted by
the Turkish military, not by the terrorists of the
outlawed Kurdistan Workers' Party, as the
General Staff had announced
were responsible for soldiers' security.
There was also an administrative investigation by the Land Forces Command,
which found that the mines were planted
on the orders of military commanders. The
General Staff, at the time of the explosion,
released a statement saying that the mines
had been planted by PKK terrorists who
crossed into Turkey from northern Iraq.
However, after the telephone conversation between the two commanders
about the mine blast was made public, the
family of Ziya Bener, who was killed in the
explosion, filed a criminal complaint with
the prosecutor's office.
The General Staff's military prosecutor's
office can now open a case against the defendants in accordance with Article 85 of the
Turkish Penal Code (TCK), which says:
“Someone who causes the death of a person
due to negligence shall be punished with three
to six years' imprisonment. If the act causes the
loss of more than one person's life, the punishment can be from three to 15 years.”
On the other hand, human rights activists are doubtful that the military prosecutor's office will continue the investigation and punish the parties responsible.
Abidin Engin, Van branch head of the
Association of Human Rights and
Solidarity for Oppressed Peoples
(MAZLUM-DER), told Today's Zaman
that although the military prosecutor's office should reveal the people responsible
for planting the mines and prosecute them
accordingly, there are no signs that this will
be the case. CONTINUED ON PAGE 17
TOP EU OFFICIAL
FINDS SLEDGEHAMMER
PLANS WORRISOME
Protesters break through a gate of Kyrgyz government headquarters on the central square in Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan, on Thursday.
Kyrgyz opposition
seizes power,
dissolves parliament
07 by 18.1 percent in Feb. 08 in public spending
Continuing its upward trend,
industrial production in Turkey
increased by an impressive 18.1
percent in February over the same
month of the previous year and
was up by 0.5 percent from
January, official figures showed.
NGOs eye transparency
monitoring
economy
Industrial production up
A newly exposed document indicates that Chief of General Staff
Gen. lker Babu was aware that a 2003
military seminar in which participants allegedly drafted a coup plot against the
Justice and Development Party (AK
Party) government violated regulations,
seemingly refuting General Staff arguments that it was a routine meeting.
The document features the signature of
Gen. Babu, who was the Land Forces
commander at the time, according to the
Hürriyet daily. It is currently under examination at the stanbul Public Prosecutor's
Office, which is conducting an investigation
into the suspected plot. In the document,
Gen. Babu expresses reservations and criticism that retired Gen. Çetin Doan, the former head of the 1st Army, went beyond the
“official and legal framework” when presiding over the seminar. CONTINUED ON PAGE 17
THREE RETIRED GENERALS BEHIND BARS
IN SLEDGEHAMMER PROBE PAGE 17
Thirty Turkish civil society
organizations have established
a new body named the Public
Spending Monitoring Platform
in a bid to contribute to a
more transparent public
expenditure mechanism.
Kyrgyzstan's opposition said on Thursday it had taken power and
dissolved parliament in the poor and strategically important Central
Asian state after a bloody uprising forced President Kurmanbek
Bakiyev to flee the capital. Roza Otunbayeva, leader of the interim
government, demanded the resignation of the president, whom she
helped bring to power five years ago. She said Bakiyev was trying to
rally supporters in his power base in southern Kyrgyzstan. CONTINUED ON PAGE 10
04 lower defense spending
diplomacy
The Van Chief Public Prosecutor's
office has revealed that a land
mine explosion which killed seven
soldiers last year was caused by mines
planted by the Turkish military, contrary to
the earlier widely held belief that they had
been planted by outlawed Kurdistan
Workers' Party (PKK) terrorists.
The incident was revealed with the aid
of an ex-officer who claimed the Turkish
Armed Forces (TSK) covered up many incidents caused in part by its weaponry and
put the blame on the PKK.
Following the mine explosion in
Çukurca, Hakkari province, on May 27 of
last year, Van prosecutors launched an investigation which found that the mines belonged to the Turkish military. The prosecutors, who stated that the mines were
planted on the orders of a Turkish commander, demanded that Brig. Gen. Zeki Es,
Maj. Gen. Gürbüz Kaya, whose name is also mentioned in relation to the
Sledgehammer coup plot, and other people
responsible be brought to justice for their
role in the deaths of the seven soldiers.
Because the civilian court lacks jurisdiction over the matter, the file for the case
was sent to the military prosecutor's office.
The Van prosecutor's report included evidence that the mines had been manufactured by the Turkish Mechanical and
Chemical Industry Corporation (MKE) and
had batteries used in the military. The report also mentioned a telephone conversation between Es and Kaya indicating that
the mines were planted by people who
MILITARY CHIEF KNEW
SLEDGEHAMMER MEETING
‘OVERSTEPPED LIMITS,'
DOCUMENT SHOWS
EU Enlargement Commissioner Stefan
Füle said yesterday in Brussels that
plans included in a military action plot with
the code name Sledgehammer, such as shooting down a Turkish fighter jet, are “worrisome.” According to Sledgehammer documents, the Turkish Armed Forces (TSK) had a
systematic plan to create chaos in society by
bombing mosques and attacking popular museums with Molotov cocktails. It also aimed to
provoke clashes between Turkish and Greek
warplanes over the Aegean. If the Greek warplanes had failed to shoot down a Turkish
warplane, other Turkish planes would have
been ordered to do it. The purpose of the attacks was to increase pressure on the government for failing to provide security to its citizens, eventually leading to a military coup.
Füle responded to a written motion
from Georgios Koumoutsakos, a Greek
member of the Group of the European
People's Party (Christian Democrats) regarding allegations that serious incidents including a war would be provoked between
Turkey and Greece. CONTINUED ON PAGE 17
Greece, Turkey eye
FM Davutolu to avoid Tehran
nuke conference amid pressure
While reaffirming their mutual will
for improving bilateral relations
on Thursday, Turkey and Greece
expressed the hope that further
progress in bilateral ties will
eventually lead to a reduction in
defense spending in both countries.
Amid increasing pressure on Turkey to pursue a policy
in line with that of the international community over
the Iranian nuclear issue, Ankara is not expected to be represented at the ministerial level in the “Nuclear Energy For
All, Nuclear Weapons For None” conference, to be held in
Tehran. The meeting is scheduled for April 17-18, just days
after US President Barack Obama hosts a nuclear security
summit in Washington. By AYE KARABAT SEE STORY ON PAGE 04
Ahmet Davutolu
Featuring news and articles from
‘
02 TODAY’S ZAMAN
FOOD FOR THOUGHT
‘
‘
Q U O T E O F T H E D AY
PRESS REVIEW
F R I D AY, A P R I L 9 , 2 0 1 0
colu m ns
WORDS OF WISDOM
He [retired Gen. Çetin Doan] has to answer the
questions of the [Sledgehammer] prosecutors. He
is not the one who should ask questions now.
American politicians are like cowboys.
Whenever they have legal shortcomings,
their hands go to their guns.
Sometimes I give myself
admirable advice, but I am
incapable of taking it.
Army’s prestige can’t
be protected this way
Former Chief of General Staff Gen. Hilmi Özkök
Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad
Lady Mary Wortley Montagu
This is what we understand from the developments
in the probe into the Sledgehammer coup plot: 25
serving generals and admirals were to be detained
but the prosecutors were not allowed to do so. This
is the summary and the essence of the issue, but it
is not that simple. stanbul Chief Public Prosecutor
Aykut Cengiz Engin, who removed two prosecutors
overseeing the probe, is right in saying, “The consequences of such a decision [to detain active duty
military personnel] should be assessed thoroughly.”
It would be wrong for the judiciary to create a mess
while trying to do the correct thing. But doesn’t Engin mean with these remarks that the military ofcers are actually guilty but cannot be treated as guilty
due to their positions. In this case, both the independence of the judiciary and the “immunity” issue become the subject of a debate. On the one hand, the
members of the judiciary are being asked to take the
consequences of their actions into account. One the
other, they are expected to be neutral and independent. It is impossible for the judiciary to do both of
these things. It needs to make a choice.
BRAHM KRAS STAR
CROSS READER
[email protected]
pr ess rou n du p
AA, AHMET ZG
FATMA DL ZIBAK
ENJOY TODAY’S ZAMAN AT THESE TOP HOTELS
Opposition Republican People’s Party (CHP) leader
Deniz Baykal, who earlier voiced strong opposition to the
Justice and Development Party (AK Party) government’s
constitutional reform package, has softened his stance
and said his party would support the package if President
Abdullah Gül removes three articles from it and submits
them to a public referendum. The three articles Baykal
meant are those regarding judicial reform which foresee changes in the structure of the Constitutional Court
and Supreme Board of Judges and Prosecutors (HSYK)
and make party closures more difcult. Baykal said if the
president listens to his suggestion, he will have done a
“historic service” to society. “If the president does so, we,
the CHP, would compromise,” he said, adding that this
would be the way to easing tension. Baykal’s change of
attitude to reach a consensus on the reform package has
been found insincere and unpractical as neither the government nor the president are expected to withdraw their
support for urgent judicial reform in the country.
Yeni afak’s Fehmi Koru, who did not nd Baykal’s
suggestion convincing, wonders why Baykal did not push
for such an amendment package before if the package includes articles that are acceptable to the CHP. Recalling the
CHP’s earlier complaints about the current Constitution,
which is a legacy of the Sept. 12, 1980 coup, Koru says the
articles that Baykal demands be removed from the package are the ones that are the remnants of the coup. “Only
by enacting those particular three amendments can Turkey
get rid of the aftereffects of the 1980 coup. By opposing
the amendment of these articles, Baykal says he does not
have any problems with the legacy of the 1980 coup. Is not
this really odd?” asks Koru. Regarding the argument of the
CHP and some other circles that the AK Party is trying to
take the judiciary under its control through judicial reform,
he says the latest developments in the Sledgehammer coup
probe, direct interventions of some judiciary members in
the ongoing case to protect the suspects, clearly show how
Turkey is in desperate need of a reform in the judiciary.
“CHP leader Baykal is talking sweetly, but his remarks are
far from being credible,” he adds.
According to Vatan’s Ruen Çakr, Baykal is abandoning the strategy he has pursued thus far about the
package and is lending conditional support to the package in a bid to respond to the demand for change in society. He says this new attitude of the CHP has partially
pulled it into the reform process, leaving the Nationalist Movement Party (MHP) on its own on the opposing
side. Nevertheless, Çakr believes that the CHP’s change
in attitude is unlikely to get any results as he does not
expect Gül to accept such bargaining.
Milliyet’s Asl Aydntaba thinks Baykal’s latest maneuver regarding the constitutional reform package is the
kind of one that will place both the president and the government in a difcult position. “We cannot know; perhaps
the CHP leader’s suggestion for a compromise will echo
somewhere, and Turkish politics, which will have failed to
achieve consensus, will decide to give it a try,” she says.
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PHOTO
Baykal’s unwelcome
proposal
Wasn’t everyone
equal before law?
Residents of the village of Güvendik in the Bakale district
of Van transport bottles of water filled at a fountain to
meet their water needs. Faulty installation of pipelines
has left them without running water in their houses.
taraf:
“AK Party: Reform package indivisible,”
the daily said in the headline of its main story yesterday,
reporting the reaction of the Justice and Development
Party (AK Party) to a proposal by the main opposition
Republican People’s Party (CHP). CHP leader Deniz
Baykal on Tuesday said his party would support the reform package if President Abdullah Gül removed three
articles regarding judicial reform from it and submitted
them to a public referendum. AK Party Deputy Chairman Hüseyin Çelik said: “The president will never consent to this bargaining. Why should we divide a package
that is entirely pro-freedom? Baykal, who wants to keep
the status quo, is acting shrewdly.”
yeni afak:
“Biggest obstacle to peace is Israel,”
the daily said in the headline of its lead story yesterday, quoting remarks from Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoan,
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who spoke at a breakfast meeting in Paris on Wednesday. “If
a country uses disproportionate force in Palestine, in Gaza
-- uses phosphorous shells -- we’re not going to say ‘bravo’,” he declared, referring to Israel’s January 2009 offensive
against Gaza. Erdogan said Israel’s justication for the offensive was based on “lies” and cited a report by United Nations investigator Richard Goldstone, a South African judge
who accused both Israelis and Palestinians of war crimes.
star:
“Yerevan move before April 24,” the daily said in
the headline of its top story yesterday, reporting that Prime
Minister Erdoan sent a letter to Armenian President Serzh
Sarkisian via special envoy. In the letter Erdoan asked the Armenian president not to backtrack on the normalization efforts
between the two countries. Both leaders will gather in Washington on April 13. Armenians commemorate April 24 to remember the victims of the so-called Armenian genocide.
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ERHAN BAYURT BUGÜN
stanbul Chief Public Prosecutor Engin, who removed two prosecutors
overseeing a probe into the Sledgehammer plot from the case, spoke
to the Star daily’s amil Tayyar on
Wednesday. Regarding the removed
prosecutors’ decision to detain 25 senior members
of the military, he said, “The consequences of such a
decision should be assessed thoroughly.” What does
this mean? If there is an offense in question and if this
offense is a coup plot against the government and
Parliament, what does the fact that these 25 serving
members of the military have the rank of a general or
admiral matter? Do 25 generals gain immunity if they
are involved in crimes? What is it that renders them
superior to dozens of retired generals, admirals, journalists and academics? With his statements, Engin
clearly reveals that there is no supremacy of the law
or equality before the law in Turkey. Under these circumstances, if the European Union makes an assessment and suspends Turkey’s EU talks on the grounds
that Turkey took a step backward regarding the Copenhagen criteria, nobody should be surprised.
Turkey’s chance
to veto Israel
AKF BEK YEN AFAK
Israel is getting ready to become a member of the
Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), which is a major international
institution. Even under normal circumstances, it
would be difcult for Israel, which has been aspiring to become a member of this club for years, to be
admitted for membership. It needs to fulll certain
criteria to be a member of this organization, most
of whose members are from Western Europe. It is
a matter of curiosity which criteria Israel will need
to fulll to become a member of an organization as
prestigious as the OECD. Turkey, which is member of the OECD, has a historic opportunity in this
respect. In order to admit a new member to the organization, every OECD member needs to approve
it. The rejection of a single member is sufcient to
refuse membership. So, Turkey can use its right to
veto Israel’s membership to the OECD.
O SAN
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NATIONAL
TODAY’S ZAMAN 03
F R I D A Y, A P R I L 9 , 2 0 1 0
STANBUL
ANKARA
ZMR
ANTALYA
ADANA
ERZURUM
EDRNE
TRABZON
KAYSER
15°
13°
20°
23°
21°
7°
18°
11°
12°
KONYA
ÇANAKKALE
DYARBAKIR
SAMSUN
BURSA
GAZANTEP
ESKEHR
MALATYA
KOCAEL
13°
16°
18°
11°
18°
18°
13°
16°
16°
BÜLENT
KENE
[email protected]
The key to
all democratc
ntatves
For the last two years, Turkey has been trying to nd radical
solutions to its acute problems, some of which are almost
100 years old and some of which date back centuries. These
efforts mainly include the Kurdish initiative, the Alevi initiative, the Armenian initiative and nally the Roma initiative.
Unfortunately, these initiatives have not produced tangible
results so far, though they have certainly made considerable
positive contributions to the psychological and sociological
aspects of these problems. It is true that the thick les that
were transferred to the dusty shelves of our tragedy-laden
history have been reopened, but they cannot be concluded
because the decisive and radical steps they entail have not
been taken. Perhaps, just at the beginning, one could have
predicted that the initiatives were doomed to such a course
with our usual tendency to procrastinate.
To better explain my case, I will reiterate one of my
frequent themes in this column: I personally do not believe
that there is really a Kurdish issue or an Alevi issue, or a
minorities issue or an Islam issue or a Roma issue. Rather,
I think that the real problem Turkey has is its lack of a fulledged democracy, the full-blown rule of law and genuine
secularism. So, it is my conviction that when we realize
that all social and political problems which we have been
trying to solve tirelessly for many years, but all in vain, are
nothing but a manifestation of this democracy decit, lack
of rule of law and lack of genuine secularism, we will move
closer to the nal settlement of these problems.
This said, we can safely assert that with the recent package of constitutional amendments that are intended to uproot the militarist mentality as the mother of all these problems, the ruling Justice and Development Party (AK Party)
has nally and for the rst time made the right move toward
the settlement of this country’s deep-rooted problems.
It was really high time that we introduce radical changes
to the militarist-spirited Constitution which serves to extensively undermine democracy and the national will and
perpetuate the suppressive effects of the military coups as
the source of all these fundamental problems we have been
suffering from. In the nal analysis, the existing Constitution, which is the work of the military coup of Sept. 12, 1980,
is essentially a militarist text that presents as binding norms
the diseases of certain groups within the military, such as
social and political engineering. The government’s reform
package is intended to introduce democratic tailoring of
the top judiciary and similar mechanisms designed by the
military -- which has made it a tradition to overthrow the
democratically elected governments and then inltrate up
to the remotest corners of the state apparatus -- in order to
sustain its secret power, and if Parliament passes it, we will
see how many issues which appear to us as extremely large
and complicated are gone without a hitch or any trouble.
When this reform package, whose negotiations at the
parliamentary Constitution Commission began on Thursday, is implemented with or without a referendum, we will
also see that Parliament, whose legislative powers have
been stripped by the Constitutional Court on various occasions, will represent the national will in a more appropriate manner. Moreover, this country will eventually see
the days when civilian power, which derives its democratic
legitimacy from the people and which is responsible or accountable only toward the people, will not have to share its
executive mandate with the militarist mentality of the high
courts and will truly control the fate of the country.
A Turkey that has implemented a reform package, a
rst in terms of exhibiting the courage to touch the militarist
spirit in the Constitution as the source of the mechanisms for
securing the regime of secret powers, will remove all roadblocks to its economic and political progress with full steam.
So, when this day comes, we will witness in amazement that
the Kurdish issue -- which has resulted in Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) terrorism causing the deaths of more than
40,000 people, the wounding of tens of thousands of people,
the displacement of hundreds of thousands of people and
material losses amounting to $300 billion -- can be easily
solved. When it comes, the Alevi issue, the Roma issue, the
Armenian issue and all articial problems devout Muslims
are suffering from will head toward eventual settlement.
The key to the solution of all of Turkey’s acute problems is
nally before us. The constitutional reform package, as a major milestone that will banish the hidden powers and crown
the national will as the sole power over the fate of the country,
deserves the support of all democrats inside or outside.
04 TODAY’S ZAMAN
FRIDAY, APRIL 9, 2 0 1 0
Erdoan sends envoy to Baku after talks in Yerevan
SERVET YANATMA ANKARA
Ambassador Feridun Sinirliolu, the Turkish
Foreign Ministry’s undersecretary, is scheduled
to depart for Baku today where he will convey a message and a letter from Prime Minister Recep Tayyip
Erdoan to Azerbaijani President lham Aliyev, with
whom he will have talks on the Nagorno-Karabakh dispute between Armenia and Azerbaijan.
Sinirliolu traveled to Yerevan on Wednesday
as Erdoan’s special envoy and met with Armenian
President Serzh Sarksyan as a process of rapprochement aimed at restoring relations between the two
estranged neighbors is at a stalemate. Erdoan
sent a letter to Sarksyan as well, which contained
a message that an agreement would better serve
the interests of the two countries, especially when
compared to the cost of a failure to make peace.
Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutolu, speaking at a joint press conference with visiting
Greek Alternate Foreign Minister Dimitris
Droutsas, announced Sinirliolu’s visit to Baku.
Describing Sinirliolu’s meeting in Yerevan as “very positive and
constructive,” Davutolu underlined that the difculties concerning the normalization process
between Armenia and Turkey
should be overcome “all together.”
Recalling that he held a meeting with Sarksyan in Kiev in February when the two attended the inauguration of Ukrainian President
Viktor Yanukovych, Davutolu
said they had agreed on principle with the Armenian president on Sinirliolu’s
visit to Yerevan during the Kiev meeting.
“Within this vision of peace, we believe that
our relations with Armenia will become normalized in compliance with the spirit and wording
of the protocols,” Davutolu added, referring to the two protocols signed in October
between Armenia and Turkey for establishing
diplomatic ties and reopening their border.
Following Sinirliolu’s visit
to Yerevan, a need for paying a
visit to Baku as well has emerged,
diplomatic sources, speaking on
condition of anonymity, told Today’s Zaman. Sinirliolu will
convey his perceptions in the
Armenian capital and the signals
he received from the Armenian
side to Azerbaijani ofcials, the
Feridun same sources said.
Sinirliolu
At the time, diplomatic
sources described the meeting
between Davutolu and Sarksyan that took
place in Kiev as “an open-minded” meeting
during which the Turkish side, for the rst time,
had the chance to explain its concerns on the Nagorno-Karabakh process to the Armenian side. In
earlier meetings, the Armenian side had refused
to talk about the issue with the Turkish side.
On Thursday, diplomatic sources said
Davutolu’s reference to the Kiev meeting during
the press conference with Droutsas should be
interpreted by keeping in mind the Armenian
side’s openness to talk about the NagornoKarabakh dispute with the Turkish side.
On Wednesday, the Foreign Ministry had announced that Erdoan is expected to meet with
Sarksyan on the sidelines of a nuclear summit in
Washington next week. Erdoan will attend the
summit on April 12-13, along with the leaders of
46 other countries. US President Barack Obama,
a staunch supporter of Turkish-Armenian efforts
to normalize their relations, will have bilateral
talks with Sarksyan, but no meeting is currently
scheduled with Erdoan, the White House has
announced. Turkish ofcials said meetings with
Obama or other world leaders could be scheduled in the coming days if necessary.
Recalling that Azerbaijan will not be represented at the White House summit, Turkish diplomatic sources said that through
Sinirliolu’s visit, Turkey also wanted to pacify possible concerns on the Azerbaijani side.
PHOTO
While reafrming their mutual will
for improving bilateral relations on
Thursday, Turkey and Greece, Aegean
neighbors who have had a shaky relationship
for decades, also expressed the hope that further
progress in bilateral ties will eventually lead to a
reduction in defense spending in both countries.
The NATO allies have been at odds for
years over airspace boundaries and ight procedures over the Aegean Sea which divides
them, and mock dogghts between ghter
jets from each side are common.
Speaking at a joint press conference following their meeting in Ankara, Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutolu and Greece’s visiting
Alternate Foreign Minister Dimitris Droutsas
were reminded of remarks by Turkey’s chief
negotiator for European Union talks, Egemen
Ba, who recently criticized Germany and
France for seeking to sell military equipment
to Greece while pressing the government in
Athens to make drastic cuts in public spending as a result of its dire nancial crisis.
In remarks published in The New York
Times late last month, Ba also said that to
help Greece escape its “economic disaster”
and reduce regional tension, Ankara would
reciprocate if Greeks froze or cut defense
procurement. “One of the reasons for the
economic crisis in Greece is because of their
attempt to compete with Turkey in terms of
defense expenditures,” Ba said.
After recalling Ba’s remarks, which
had at the time sparked great interest in
the Greek media, a Greek reporter asked
whether Greek people living on the Aegean
coast would no longer see warships and ghter planes when they look out their windows.
“There is a vision which we have drawn,
and this [vision] is not based on threat perception, but is based on mutual understanding,” Davutolu said, admitting that they had
discussed the issue with Droutsas.
“When we build a common future, there
will not be something called defense spending. Imagine two neighbors who share the
same street; they may have different views,”
Davutolu continued. “We should allocate our
budget to our joint future generations. These are
AA, ECVET ATIK
Greece, Turkey eye stronger tes,
lower defense spendng
While Greek Alternate Foreign Minister Dimitris Droutsas said they want the Aegean to be “a sea of peace,” Turkish Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutolu,
speaking at a joint news conference in Ankara on Thursday, said Ankara aims to achieve a “brand new paradigm” in bilateral relations with Athens.
steps toward throwing owers when we look out
of our windows, and we will make it happen.”
Responding to the same question, Droutsas said Athens has stated that it wants the
Aegean to be “a sea of peace,” adding that
such a situation would help to improve bilateral relations between Ankara and Athens.
“To make this happen, there is the need
for respect for territorial integrity and the international rule of law and [for] discovering a
shared peace, which is the goal of our joint vision. To [discover] the shared peace, there is
the need to transfer from the defense budget
to education and health,” said Droutsas,
whose remarks were translated from Greek
into Turkish through an interpreter.
Greece spends more of its gross domestic
product (GDP) on the defense than any other
European Union country, largely due to the
long-standing tension with its neighbor,
historic rival and NATO ally Turkey.
Turkey, meanwhile, is included among
the top 10 arms buyers in the world despite
the global nancial crisis that recently hit
the world, according to a report released last
month by the Swedish-based Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI).
Ankara aims to achieve a “brand new
paradigm” in bilateral relations with Athens,
Davutolu also said, while announcing that
Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoan will pay a
long-anticipated ofcial visit to Greece in May.
He and Droutsas decided to establish a
high-level strategic cooperation council, similar
to those Turkey has established with Iraq and
Syria, Davutolu announced, noting that the
rst meeting of the council will take place during
Erdoan’s Athens visit with the participation of
10 members of the Cabinet from either side.
In 2002 Greek and Turkish diplomats began exploratory talks on their disputes. Business deals have steadily increased and include a
pipeline link that will be used to carry natural gas
from the Caspian Sea to Western Europe. But
the Aegean has remained a source of tension.
On the occasion of Droutsas’ visit, Greece
and Turkey on Thursday agreed on ve new
condence building measures (CBM) in addition to the 24 CBMs already adopted. The
news measures are all aimed at building mutual understanding and more frequent contact
between the militaries of the two countries.
According to one of those CBMs, “A
Greek division/brigade will be assigned to
NATO Rapid Deployable Corps-Turkey
(NRDC-T) and a Turkish division/brigade
will be assigned to NATO Deployable CorpsGreece (NDC-GR) for training purposes.”
While in Ankara, Droutsas also had
talks with President Abdullah Gül and
Prime Minister Erdoan. On Wednesday
he met with Greek Orthodox Patriarch Bartholomew in stanbul. Ankara Today’s Zaman
Davutolu to avoid nuclear conference in Tehran amid pressure
AYE KARABAT ANKARA
Amid increasing pressure on Turkey to
pursue a policy in line with that of the international community over the Iranian nuclear
issue, Ankara is not expected to be represented
at the ministerial level in the “Nuclear Energy
For All, Nuclear Weapons For None” conference, to be held in Tehran.
The meeting is scheduled for April 17-18,
just days after US President Barack Obama
hosts a nuclear security summit of world leaders
in Washington in which Prime Minister Recep
Tayyip Erdoan is expected to participate.
But, regarding the meeting in Tehran, a
Turkish diplomatic source told Today’s Zaman that it is unlikely Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutolu will participate. “It is probable
that a high-ranking official from the ministry
will be there,” the same source indicated.
Tehran is hoping to get as many supportive
countries as possible to attend its meeting, including China, which has resisted implementing
sanctions on Iran over Tehran’s nuclear ambitions. But a recent shift in the Chinese attitude
on the issue has started to dominate news headlines, a shift which pundits say may increase
even more the pressure Turkey already feels.
Ankara frequently underlines that it is
against any sanctions being placed on its neighbor Iran, the second-largest gas supplier to Turkey and an important trade partner.
Turkey is a nonpermanent member of the
United Nations Security Council and together
with several other temporary members, namely
Brazil and Lebanon, is against any sanctions. In
order for a resolution to be passed, at least nine
members need to support it and no permanent
member of the council -- the US, China, Russia,
Britain and France -- must veto it.
Once the five permanent members and
Germany agree, they will present the proposal to the remaining 10 council members,
but neither China nor Russia are expected to
agree on tough sanctions.
The International Strategic Research Organization’s (USAK) Sedat Laçiner agrees that
a possible shift in Chinese policy towards Iran
makes the situation a little difcult for Turkey.
“It appears that the US administration was able
to convince China on the Iranian issue. It will be
easier and less costly for Washington to convince
Ankara, but instead of doing that, it is simply complaining while demanding that Ankara cooperate,”
Laçiner told Today’s Zaman. He added that Turkey’s reluctance is understandable because its trade
volume with Iran is around $10 billion and that any
sanctions on Tehran will harm Turkey. Laçiner says
those demanding Turkish cooperation should offer
ways to compensate for Turkey’s losses.
Pundits also underline that Turkey’s vote
at the UN Security Council will not change the
result but that a possible vote against sanctions
does have symbolic importance.
Bayram Sinkaya, an expert on Iran at the Ankara-based Center for Middle Eastern Strategic
Studies (ORSAM), recalled that Turkey abstained
during the November 2009 vote of a resolution
passed by the International Atomic Agency (IAEA)
censuring Iran for its uranium enrichment activities
and referring the matter to the UN Security Council. He told Today’s Zaman that it is reasonable to
think that Turkey will also abstain from a possible vote in the UN Security Council on a resolution envisaging sanctions against Iran.
“The scope of the sanctions will be very important. Russia and China will not be in favor of
though sanctions and they will say ‘yes’ only to a
limited degree. If they approve sanctions, it will be
difcult for Turkey to oppose them,” he said.
NATIONAL
Erdoan urges Turks in
France to integrate,
not assimilate
Integrate into a society by learning its language and
becoming involved in its social life but never assimilate, Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoan said while
addressing the Turkish community in Paris.
The prime minister spoke to an audience of 6,000 ethnic
Turks living in France at the Zenith Arena late on Wednesday,
the second day of his visit to France. Met with great applause
when he stepped onto the stage, Erdoan talked about the rise of
Turkey and urged the French Turks to become better represented in the
economic, political and social life of the country they are living in.
Stressing that assimilation is different from integration,
Erdoan said no one can demand that a person assimilate.
“The demand to assimilate is a crime against humanity,” he
said. “No one can ask you to abandon your values, your
culture.” Erdoan said if they want to live in harmony
with the society they are living with, they need to integrate into the society in the best way possible.
Reminding his audience that France allows dual citizenship,
Erdoan criticized those who do not apply for French citizenship.
“Apply, my brothers. Apply! Use the right to vote and to get elected that France has granted you. This is a great asset, make use
of it,” Erdoan stressed. The prime minister said being a French
citizen will not deprive them of their identity. “Why shouldn’t
there be some amongst you running for the European Parliament?” Erdoan asked, urging the Turkish community to be
better represented and integrate into French society.
Speaking about Turkey’s European Union membership bid,
Erdoan said Turkey will only strengthen the EU with its young, dynamic and educated population of 73 million. Saying that there are
nearly 5.5 million ethnic Turks living in Europe, Erdoan asked his
audience not to end the “Turkish Season” both in France and in
other parts of the Europe, after reminding them that they marked
the end of the Season of Turkey in France on Wednesday.
“I ask each of you to make more of an effort as an envoy of your
country to better promote Turkey here,” the prime minister said.
Saying that they have lifted visas requirements with 23 countries
in the past seven-and-a-half years, Erdoan said Turkey’s face is
turned toward the West but it has never turned its back on its eastern
neighbors. “We cannot be indifferent to the people with whom we
have lived for a thousand years,” Erdoan underlined.
No deal with France on EU bid
During talks with Erdoan in Paris earlier in the day, French
President Nicolas Sarkozy reiterated his opposition to Turkey’s
membership in the EU, while Erdoan repeated that Turkey
remains committed to its goal of EU membership and rejected the
French and German proposal for a privileged partnership instead.
“We agree to disagree,” French Minister for European
Affairs Pierre Lellouche told reporters after Erdoan met with
Prime Minister Francois Fillon. “Turkey has its project, that of
integrating with the 27 [EU members]. We respect this project but we have our own project, that of a big Europe, the 27
in a partnership with Russia and Turkey,” Lellouche added.
But the two leaders agreed to work to expand bilateral
ties despite disagreements concerning Ankara’s membership bid. stanbul Today’s Zaman with wires
Somali pirates hijack
Turkish ship with 25 crew
Somali pirates hijacked a Turkish vessel with 25 crew onboard
on Wednesday, the EU Naval Force said. The MV Yasin C was
taken around midday 400 kilometers off the Kenyan coast, said EU
naval spokesman Cmdr. John Harbour, adding that the crew onboard the 36,000-ton bulk carrier are believed to be Turkish.
It is the closest successful hijacking to Kenya’s coast, said
Karen Jacques of Dryad Maritime Intelligence, but two other attacks on March 31 were much closer -- one a mere 135 kilometers from the bustling southern port of Mombasa.
“The attacks were too far apart to be from the same group,”
she said, which she said indicates that at least two pirate groups
are threatening shipping coming to the Kenyan port.
Somali pirate attacks have spiked in recent weeks, and
both pirates and navies are becoming more aggressive.
At least 16 ships and around 24 crew are believed to be currently held by pirates off the lawless coast of Somalia.
Somalia has not had a functioning government since
1991. Multimillion-dollar ransoms have become a way to
make money in the impoverished nation. Nairobi AP
Gönül: No information
on US plans to withdraw
atomic bombs
Defense Minister Vecdi Gönül has said Turkey has no information about reported US plans to withdraw nuclear
weapons deployed in a military base in southern Anatolia.
“No information has been ofcially announced,” Gönül
told reporters on Wednesday when asked about reports that
the US is considering a withdrawal of nuclear weapons from
ve European countries, including Turkey. “The issue that
has been debated is nothing but newspaper reports,” he said
during a visit to the Central Anatolian province of Kayseri.
Last week, The Times reported that the US may withdraw its 200 B61 gravity bombs deployed in Turkey, Belgium, France, the Netherlands and Germany during the
Cold War years. Turkey is believed to be hosting 90 bombs at
ncirlik Air Base in the southern province of Adana.
On Tuesday, US President Barack Obama unveiled his
administration’s new nuclear strategy, which reduces the
role of nuclear arms in US security. Under the new plan, the
US promises not to use nuclear weapons against countries that do not have them. Obama’s plan would lessen
the role nuclear weapons play in US defense planning.
An international nuclear security summit will take place
in Washington on April 12-13. Prime Minister Recep Tayyip
Erdoan is scheduled to attend the summit. stanbul Today’s Zaman
NATIONAL
TODAY’S ZAMAN 05
F R I D AY, A P R I L 9 , 2 0 1 0
CHP pins hopes on SP to challenge ruling AK Party
YUSUF BULUT ANKARA
Since the possibility of early elections has
come to the agenda, the main opposition Republican People’s Party (CHP) has been in discussions with the Felicity Party (SP) to challenge the
Justice and Development Party (AK Party) if the
ruling party’s plans to pass a constitutional reform
package through a public referendum fail.
Late last month, while commenting on the AK
Party’s plans to make changes to the Constitution,
which he strongly opposes, as well as the possibility of a coalition government following next year’s
parliamentary elections, CHP head Deniz Baykal
signaled a rapprochement between the two parties. “It would not be appropriate to comment on a
coalition model at the time being. Our aim is to be a
single-party government. However, I would prefer
to establish a coalition with the SP rather than the
AK Party. The AK Party has experienced a major
spiritual failure. Although they had set sail as if they
were representing Islamic and spiritual values and
the mentality of humbleness, protecting the rights
of orphans [an important value in Islam] and not
having an eye on the state’s properties, is it possible
that those people are still pursuing these values?
The SP’s cadres and administrators don’t seem to
be a part of this corrupt mentality. I don’t see this
when I look at [SP leader] Numan Kurtulmu. He
is an upright man,” Baykal had said.
Seeing that the polls conducted following the
announcement of the AK Party’s plans to amend
the Constitution have shown that the ruling party
is likely to garner a high percentage of votes in the
next elections, the CHP has devised a new strategy. Baykal and his team also think that the Turkey
Change Movement, led by ili Mayor Mustafa
Sargül, which has not yet formally organized as a
political party but which is expected to be a major rival of the CHP, is also secretly supported by
Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoan, who they
think is attempting to divide the CHP’s voter base.
In response to this perceived move, the CHP is
moving closer to the SP. The SP and the AK Party
were both established after the closure of the Virtue Party (FP) in 2001 by the Constitutional Court.
While the SP more strictly follows the line of the
FP, a party which was close to Islam, the AK Party
became more moderate and democratic than both
the FP and its current incarnation, the SP.
Upon the olive branch offered by the CHP
leader to the SP, SP leader Kurtulmu thanked
Baykal but underlined that his party keeps an
equal distance from every party. The CHP is
also currently concerned that the SP is likely
to support the government’s planned constitutional changes if they are taken to a public vote.
Kurtulmu has recently stated that they are supportive of current efforts to amend the Constitution, though they still point to deciencies contained within. Noting that their stance toward
the Constitution is open and clear, he stressed
that they have never said they would not lend
support to it through any specic measure.
The CHP is also reportedly seeking election cooperation with the Democratic Left
People’s Party (DSHP), which was established
by the widow of the late prominent left-wing
politician and former Prime Minister Bülent
Ecevit in November of last year after an intraparty row in the Democratic Left Party (DSP)
following a party congress in May of that year.
TODAY’S ZAMAN, AL ÜNAL
AK Party fine-tunes reform
package to prevent annulment
In a move to prevent the opposition
from taking the government’s constitutional amendment package to the
Constitutional Court for annulment, the ruling
Justice and Development Party (AK Party) has
made some changes to articles that would create
grounds for its abrogation.
After the main opposition Republican People’s Party (CHP) announced that they are determined to take the changes to the Constitutional
Court, AK Party jurists identied the deciencies
in the package that would pave the way for an
annulment. In light of this, the ruling party withdrew the 29-article constitutional amendment
package it submitted to Parliament last week to
prevent recent debates over the list of signatures
attached to the bill from casting a shadow over
the future of the package.
Soon after the government presented the rst
proposal to Parliament, the CHP started a debate
alleging that Parliament Speaker Mehmet Ali
ahin’s signature was among the signatures on
the package sponsored by the AK Party, which
is against parliamentary bylaws since the speaker
should be impartial. Although both ahin and AK
Party ofcials denied the claims, uneasy with the
ongoing debates on the issue, the AK Party withdrew the proposal to present it once again after
changing the signature list. The package with the
new signatures, including that of the prime minister, was submitted to Parliament again on Monday. Parliament’s Constitutional Commission began reviewing the package yesterday.
The AK Party also removed the articles that
are directly related to elections, taking into consideration the fact that according to the Constitution changes made to the Election Law cannot be
implemented for elections to be held within the
next year. The government was planning to introduce the “Turkey deputy” system in response
to criticism of Turkey’s current 10 percent election
threshold. The government suggested that 100
deputies in the 550-seat Turkish Parliament be
elected as “Turkey deputies” to provide fair representation for parties. However, taking into consideration that the inclusion of this system to the
package would be delayed if the CHP initiated a
debate, the AK Party removed it from the package.
PHOTO
ERCAN YAVUZ ANKARA
Commission discussion on reform package begins with quarrel
Parliament’s Constitutional Commission began reviewing the government’s 29-article
constitutional reform package yesterday amid
bickering between deputies.
The Constitutional Commission gathered
at 2 p.m. under the chairmanship of Burhan
Kuzu, the head of the commission. The government was represented by Deputy Prime
CHP playing nal trump card
The AK Party’s moves to foil the CHP’s plans
for an annulment seem to have made it harder
for the CHP to appeal to the Constitutional
Court. Another development that disappointed the main opposition party was the recent
remarks of former President Ahmet Necdet
Sezer, who said the CHP cannot appeal the
package before a referendum is held on it.
“This change cannot be enacted without being accepted in a referendum. For this reason, it
cannot be led at this time,” he said.
The CHP, which currently has 97 deputies
in Parliament, needs 13 more deputies to appeal
Minister Cemil Çiçek while the Justice and Development Party (AK Party) was represented by
the party’s parliamentary group deputy chairman Bekir Bozda. Republican People’s Party
(CHP) and Nationalist Movement Party (MHP)
parliamentary group deputy chairmen were
also present at the meeting. Kuzu delivered an
opening speech at the beginning of the meet-
to the top court. Failing to get the support of 13
deputies, the CHP’s latest move has been to ask
President Abdullah Gül for help.
Speaking at his party’s parliamentary
group meeting on Tuesday, CHP leader Deniz
Baykal called on Gül to remove three articles
included in the package regarding judicial
reform and submit them to a public referendum. Baykal said that if the president listens
to his suggestion, he will have done a “historic
service” to the society. “If the president does
so, we, the CHP, would compromise,” Baykal
said, adding that this would be the way to ease
tension. Baykal then said his party would work
ing in which he underlined the need to amend
the current Constitution. When Kuzu requested members of the press leave the meeting after his speech since dozens of deputies were
also there to observe the meeting, a squabble
erupted over finding a seat for Tunceli independent deputy Kamer Genç. A seat was later
found for Genç. Hamza Erdoan Ankara
in Parliament to approve the other suggestions
in the constitutional amendment package.
The articles Baykal wants removed from the
package are those on the structure of the Constitutional Court and the Supreme Board of Judges
and Prosecutors (HSYK) as well as a change regarding party closures. However, these articles
are the raison d’être of the package.
The AK Party’s jurists are also planning
to lower the 10 percent election threshold
after the enactment of the constitutional
changes, which was a demand of the smaller
parties in Parliament during their meetings
with the AK Party to discuss the package.
DP looking for new leader following merger
SA YAZAR ANKARA
The Democrat Party (DP) recently stepped
up efforts to nd a new leader, a move it embarked upon after merging with the Motherland
Party (ANAVATAN) last year.
Although Hüsamettin Cindoruk, the party’s current chairman, is resisting stepping down, the party
is preparing for a congress on May 27 that will mark
the 50th anniversary of a military coup that took place
in 1960 and resulted in the execution of the then DP
leader and Prime Minister Adnan Menderes.
Senior members of the DP discussed cooperating in the 2011 general elections with Abdullatif
ener, who established the Turkey Party last year
after parting ways with the Justice and Development Party (AK Party), and are trying to have
Turkish Union of Chambers and Commodities
Exchanges (TOBB) President Rfat Hisarcklolu
elected as the new leader. Hisarcklolu, who will
step down as TOBB president in May, will decide
whether he will enter politics in late April.
DP members are also in contact with Democratic Left Party (DSP) Eskiehir Mayor Ylmaz
Büyükeren. Professor Büyükeren attended the
DP-ANAVATAN merger assembly but did not decide on whether to enter the party. DP ofcials are
also working on having CHP stanbul deputy lhan
Kesici, Professor Süheyl Batum and Coca-Cola
CEO Muhtar Kent join the ranks of their party.
Proposal made to Çiller
The DP administration also approached former
Prime Minister Tansu Çiller, a former leader of the
True Path Party (DYP), to ask her to re-enter politics. Senior DP ofcials believe a DP with Çiller and
former ANAVATAN leader Mesut Ylmaz would
comfortably pass the 10 percent threshold in the
next general elections. Nevertheless, Çiller said she
is not considering joining the ranks of the DP un-
der the leadership of Cindoruk.
During the Feb. 28, 1997 postmodern coup,
Cindoruk parted ways with Çiller’s DYP and established the Democratic Turkey Party (DTP).
The DP’s former ANAVATAN members are
reportedly disturbed with the course of developments in the party, in particular by the indifference shown by Cindoruk to problems faced by the
party’s organizational structure.
A ght is taking place between the ANAVATAN and DP members of the party and the structure of the General Executive Board (GK) is leading to debates. GK was formed after the merger of
the parties to serve as the highest decision-making
mechanism. It has 50 members from the DP and
50 members from ANAVATAN. The dominant
DP gures in the GK complain that the board has
an excess of members, preventing it from working
efciently. They suggest that the number of GK
members be lowered to 75 or 50. If such a change
takes place, the number of ANAVATAN members
on the board will be cut. ANAVATAN members
oppose this suggestion because their delegates will
not be able to vote in the general assembly.
The Supreme Court of Appeals’ Chief Prosecutor’s Ofce cancelled the mass registry of ANAVATAN members with the DP after ANAVATAN
was dissolved. This decision invalidated the merger of the parties on the grassroots level, leaving
party organs to only have members from the DP.
The DP and ANAVATAN decided to unite
ahead of the May 2007 presidential election, but
the move turned into a asco. During the presidential election, former DP leader Mehmet Aar dissuaded the Erkan Mumcu-led ANAVATAN from
attending the parliamentary sessions to elect the
president, thereby creating a crisis. The ruling AK
Party decided to hold early elections, giving the two
parties an overwhelming defeat in the parliamentary elections of July 22, 2007.
HÜSEYN
GÜLERCE
[email protected]
Pashas n play,
everythng
comng to a head
Let’s start with the most recent development. According to
reports in the Hürriyet daily yesterday, a most crucial document is in the prosecutor’s ofce heading the Sledgehammer
investigation. The document is signed by Chief of General
Staff Gen. lker Babu. In the document Babu prepared as
the land forces commander in light of the investigation and
information obtained, he makes serious criticisms of Gen.
Çetin Doan overstepping the formal and legal framework
while chairing a special session at an ofcial seminar.
Towards noontime yesterday, the General Staff issued a
statement saying, “This news does not reect the truth.” This
issue is becoming increasingly more complicated. Hürriyet is
a daily the General Staff trusts. Just last month, its executive
editor was hosted at the headquarters. Besides, even if Hürriyet has a bad reputation on other topics it wouldn’t lie about
this kind of issue. Let’s wait and see how Hürriyet’s publication management will back up their news. The Hürriyet daily
has been doing something different for the past two days. Or
has Erturul Özkök really gone? Is Doan media saying, “We
can’t continue like this?” Hürriyet and the Doan group are
trying to dilute, twist and obscure the Ergenekon case process
with its publications and broadcasts.
The Sledgehammer coup plan case is triggering groundshaking developments. Even if the General Staff belies Hürriyet, the debate sparked between the then-1st Army Commander Doan and then-Chief of General Staff Hilmi Özkök
point to the truth.
Three days ago retired Gen. Doan, who quickly admitted himself to the Gülhane Military Academy of Medicine
(GATA) after another arrest warrant was issued for him and
is referred to as the “Sledgehammer Commander” in the
documents, sent a letter to the media. He claimed that Özkök had leaked the documents that were discovered during
the Sledgehammer operation. The other day Hürriyet printed
Özkök’s response to the statement.
In brief Özkök said: “Instead of explaining the truth about
these matters, there is a tendency to leave it to other people
and take the easy way out. It saddens us all to see a general
who has served the army to be in this kind of a situation. It is
unfortunate that he tries to refer the issue to others instead of
answering the questions directed at him. Didn’t Doan Pasha
go on television and in reference to a voice recording say ‘Yes
I said this.’ How can a person who delivered such a speech
not think that the personnel under his command would be
motivated by this speech and that this would result in unwanted negative incidents?”
These are statements that declare the existence of Sledgehammer.
Now the situation has reached a crucial point. Those who
in the Sledgehammer plan advocated “crushing, unleashing
forces, and doing as Israel did” need to go through a fair trial.
But what’s happening instead? stanbul Chief Public Prosecutor Aykut Cengiz Engin is stopping arrests. He’s
changing the duties of prosecutors. And when speaking to
Star’s amil Tayyar he says: “Of the military ofcers that are
wanted for detention, 79 are on active duty. ... Of this 24 are
admirals and generals. ... The consequences of these kinds
of arrests and detentions need to be assessed very carefully.”
In other words the law applies to retired ofcers but not
to active ones. So does that mean blindfolded justice removes
its blindfold once in a while and sees who it is going to try
and treats it accordingly? Well then what happens to the rule
of law? If some people in this country are still unaccountable,
then why are we even talking about law or judicial impartiality? There is something else. When speaking to Milliyet’s Fikret Bila last month, Babu persistently said he was actually
bothered by the current generals on duty.
How will prosecutors and judges be able to fulll their
duties in a trial process when there’s the impression that
prosecutors are being fooled at the request of the chief of
general staff. We are talking about a judiciary that has been
taken over by the forces of tutelage.
The mentality that chooses the tutelage regime and not justice
needs to end. The judiciary, the army and politics are all suffering
from this. Don’t you still get it? Everything is coming to a head.
Ba defines ErdoanSarkozy meeting as
constructive
Turkey’s EU negotiator has called the meeting between
Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoan and
French President Nicolas Sarkozy one of the most fruitful
and constructive meetings ever. Turkish-French relations
and Turkey’s EU membership negotiations as well as important global issues were discussed during the meeting,
noted State Minister and chief negotiator for EU talks Egemen Ba, who spoke to reporters in the Central Anatolian
province of Eskiehir on Thursday. Ba said Erdoan and
Sarkozy assessed the common vision of Turkey and France
as well as what could be done to bring peace to global problems. Erdoan was received by Sarkozy in Paris on Wednesday. During the meeting, Sarkozy accepted an invitation by
Erdoan to visit Turkey and said he would come after November 2010. Erdoan visited France to attend the closing
ceremony of “Season of Turkey in France” activities. Turkish culture was in the spotlight in France with more than
600 activities in 120 cities throughout the nine-month-long
“Season of Turkey in France.” stanbul Today’s Zaman with wires
06 TODAY’S ZAMAN
F R I D AY, A P R I L 9 , 2 0 1 0
Constitutional Court head Klç sues Kanadolu for insult
Constitutional Court President Haim Klç led a
criminal complaint against former Supreme Court
of Appeals Chief Prosecutor Sabih Kanadolu, alleging
that he insulted him during a speech he made in the
eastern province of Van late in last month.
Klç’s lawyer, Ali Özkaya, submitted the case
against Kanadolu, based on Article 125 of the Turkish Penal Code (TCK), to the Van Chief Public Prosecutor’s Ofce soon after Kanadolu called Klç a
“goat” during a speech he made at a conference titled
“Today and Tomorrow of the State of Law in Turkey,” which was organized by the Atatürkist Thought
Association (ADD) in Van on March 29. Article 125
stipulates that those who insult civil servants because
of their duties shall be punished with a prison term of
one to three years or with a judicial ne.
In reference to government-proposed changes
to the Constitution, which include increasing the
number of members of the Constitutional Court
and boosting democratic representation there,
Kanadolu discussed how already problematic
Klç’s presence in the top court was and how the
proposed changes would make things even harder
for them. “There is only one non-jurist member in
the Constitutional Court, and it is its president. If the
proposed changes are enacted, then 13 non-jurists
could become members. We cannot even tackle one
goat. We will face 13 non-jurist members then,” he
said, speaking at the ADD-organized conference.
ADD became the focus of attention when its former chairman, retired Gen. ener Eruygur, former
commander of the gendarmerie forces, was arrested as
part of the Ergenekon investigation, an alleged terrorist organization whose suspected members are accused
of various offenses including plotting to overthrow the
government. Kanadolu, however, has long been a
controversial gure in the eyes of the public since he
has sided with the suspects of the Ergenekon case, expressing support for them numerous times at different
platforms. Kanadolu was also the mastermind behind
the controversial 367-deputy quorum in Parliament, an
effort to prevent the election of former Foreign Minister
Abdullah Gül as the next president.
Turkey was trapped in a political stalemate for four
months, from late April to late August 2007, because of the
Constitutional Court’s quorum decision, which was seen
by many as an unconstitutional and fabricated reason to
prevent Gül’s presidency. stanbul Today’s Zaman with wires
TODAY’S ZAMAN, HAM SÖYLEMEZ
PHOTO
Forget about bratwurst, currywurst
and other kinds of sausages -- döner
kebab, or shawarma, has overtaken
traditional German fast food as the country’s
favorite snack on the go.
First brought to Berlin by Turkish immigrants in the 1970s, the grilled meat snack that
comes wrapped in a pita bread with shredded
lettuce, tomatoes, onions and different dressings, is now being sold everywhere in Germany
from the Baltic Sea to the Bavarian Alps.
Students and late night revelers relish it as much
as construction workers, children and foreign backpackers on a tight budget. “We assume that döner
kebab is the Germans’ favorite fast food by now,”
said Yunus Ulusoy, an expert from the Center for
Turkish Studies in Essen, who has done extensive
research on how the ethnic specialty conquered
Germany’s culinary mainstream.
The secret behind the döner’s success story is
not only its satisfying grilled taste, Ulusoy said, but
also the big portions and its affordability -- a regular
döner in a pita costs only between 2.50 euros and 5
euros ($3.30 to $6.70). The veal and chicken sandwiches are more popular than pizza, hamburgers,
French fries and even classic German sausages, according to a poll by German Men’s Health magazine from 2008. “We can actually no longer speak
of Turkish food, because the Germans like it even
better than the Turks,” said Ulusoy.
Some 15,500 döner places in Germany sell
about 400 tons of döner meat every day, according to
ATDID, the Association of Turkish Döner Producers
AP, GERO BRELOER
Döner kebab becomes
Germany’s favorte fast food
Restaurant owner smet Dönmez (C) and his employees prepare döner kebab in a Turkish restaurant in Berlin.
in Europe. About 60,000 workers produce, cut and
process the hearty delicacy with annual sales of 2.5
billion euros ($3.3 billion).
The word döner comes from the Turkish verb
“dönmek,” or to turn, because it is grilled for hours
on a spit and cut off in razor-thin slices when the
meat is crisp and brown. In Turkey, the dish was
originally made of lamb and sold only on a plate.
According to the legend, it was Mahmut Aygün, a
Turkish guest worker, who invented the rst döner
sandwich in 1971, when he sold the meat in a piece
of pita bread with yoghurt dressing at City-Imbiss
PHOTO
Leyla
Zana
Leyla Zana sentenced
to 3 years in prison
MEHMET GÖKÇE DYARBAKIR
Former Democracy Party (DEP)
deputy Leyla Zana was handed a
three-year prison sentence onThursday for
spreading propaganda for the outlawed
Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) in two
speeches she made in 2008. She was also
banned from politics for those three years.
The Diyarbakr 5th High Criminal
Court ruled yesterday on two speeches
that Zana made in September and November of 2008 at a pro-Kurdish Democratic Society Party (DTP) congress and a
demonstration. Zana and her lawyer did
not appear in court at the session.
The court ruled that Zana had
spread propaganda and convicted her
in accordance with Article 7/2 of the
Prevention of Terrorism Act. The court
also ruled that the defendant intentionally committed the crime and therefore
she should be banned from politics until she completes her sentence.
Zana had read the nal statement
of the DTP congress in Diyarbakr on
Sept. 20-22, 2008, leading to her conviction: “Our congress condemns the
policies of suppression, torture and
isolation of the Kurdish public leader
Abdullah Öcalan and adopts a policy
of continued struggle against it.”
She was referring to the jailed leader of the PKK, Öcalan, who is currently
imprisoned on mral Island.
She made another speech at the
DTP’s Nov. 1-3, 2008, demonstrations
in Diyarbakr where she called on the
Prime Minister Recep Erdoan to go to
mrali and “shake hands with peace.”
Zana gained prominence in 1991
for taking part of her oath of ofce in
Parliament in Kurdish, a language not
recognized as an ofcial language in Turkey. She was convicted in 1994 by the
State Security Court (DGM) of links to
the PKK, which is considered a terrorist
group by Turkey, the US and the EU.
In 2004, she was released after an appeals court overturned her conviction.
stand near West Berlin’s main Zoo train station.
Since then, the snack has been exported around the
globe and even countries as far away as Vietnam
now sell döner pita as “typical German students’
food,” as papers in Germany have repeatedly reported. Germany is home to 2.7 million people of Turkish origin; an estimated 500,000 are German citizens.
While the dish was rst mainly sold in Berlin,
outlets sprang up across the nation in the 1990s,
when the second generation of immigrants came of
age and set up their own family-run döner shops.
Wholesale dealers who are offering meat already on
the spit -- between 22 to 175 pounds (10 to 80 kilograms) -- have also mushroomed. In the last 40 years,
döner vendors have rened the taste and assimilated
it to the gusto of German palates. Razor-thin slices
of crispy chicken or veal are usually accompanied by
chopped lettuce, tomatoes, cucumbers, cabbage and
red onions. Customers can choose between garlic,
yoghurt and spicy dressing. “In Turkey, the dish is
served without dressing, but Germans just can’t eat
any meat without sauce,” said Ulusoy, adding that
the meat itself is also much more seasoned in Germany than in its country of origin.
The recipes for the seasoning vary and are a
well-kept secret. Often the meat is marinated in
yogurt and avored with bell pepper akes, salt and
black pepper, cumin and pimento. Arabic shops who
sell the so-called shawarma variety, sometimes add
cinnamon, coriander seeds and pomegranate juice.
Different from gyros, the Greek pork spit that contains a lot of oregano and is served in bigger chunks,
döner has to be cut very thinly. “You need to have a
real feel for the meat when you slice it,” said smet
Dönmez, who runs Rosenthaler Grill- und Schlemmerbuffet in Berlin. “The art is to cut thinly, but to
avoid pressing the knife against the spit, otherwise
all the fat will run out and the meat becomes dry.”
Dönmez, who emigrated from Turkey 20 years
ago, sells chicken and veal döner 24 hours a day on a
busy square in the city’s Mitte neighborhood.
“I’ve come here every day for lunch since I arrived in Berlin,” said Or Steinberg, an Israeli tourist,
who was visiting the city for a week. “It’s the best I’ve
ever had. It tastes even better than at home.” Berlin AP
NATIONAL
Big Three’s fans
issue joint call for
peace on the pitch
Prominent members of the supporters
groups of Turkey’s “Big Three” soccer teams -- Galatasaray, Fenerbahçe and
Beikta -- have come together demanding
an end to soccer hooliganism.
The calls came during a meeting held in
stanbul’s Maltepe district on Wednesday as part
of the National Reconciliation Olympiads, organized by Cokun Schools with the aim of reducing tension in all aspects of life, from families,
schools and culture to trafc and sports.
Beikta supporters group head Alen
Markaryan and his Fenerbahçe and Galatasaray counterparts, Sefa Kalyan and Sebahattin
irin, were among those in attendance.
The meeting comes at an especially tense
time in Turkish soccer. One month ago, a
Diyarbakr-Bursaspor game was canceled in
the 17th minute when Diyarbakrspor fans
started throwing projectiles onto the eld. In
an earlier Bursaspor-Diyarbakrspor match
held in Bursa in November, things turned ugly
as a result of insulting slogans chanted by Bursaspor fans, causing the Diyarbakrspor club to
consider withdrawing from the Super League.
At all Diyarbakrspor matches, the slogan most
frequently shouted by supporters of the rival
team has been “PKK [Kurdistan Workers’ Party] out,” linking Diyarbakrspor with the terrorist PKK. In response to these recent events,
supporters of the Big Three have appealed to
Turkish soccer fanatics to maintain peace.
Mehmet Kcrolu, the general manager
of Cokun Schools, said their aim is to spread
peace all over Turkey. “We are planning to draft
a roadmap to solve Turkey’s problems. We believe that as soon as all people reconcile with
others, there will be no problems in Turkey,”
noted Kcrolu. stanbul Today’s Zaman
Ten more
detained as part of
match fixing probe
In simultaneous police raids carried out in
various provinces on Thursday, 10 people,
including soccer player Celil Sar, were taken
into custody on match-xing charges.
The investigation, undertaken by the
Saryer Chief Public Prosecutor’s Ofce, has
widened with this second wave of detentions.
The 10 suspects were sent to the stanbul Police
Department nancial crimes unit after initial
processing was completed locally. Sar was
picked up by police in the northern province
of Samsun. The detainees also included former
referee Uur Demirhan, who was also taken
into custody in Samsun, and former owner of
third-division Hatayspor Mehmet amaz.
The police initiated a mass match-xing
raid on March 24 as a result of which 27 suspects including former soccer players and
administrators have been arrested while
around 50 others have been detained. Former international defender Fatih Akyel, part
of the Turkish national team that came third
in the 2002 World Cup, was arrested after
the rst wave of detentions and remanded
in custody on charges of fraud and gang
membership. State Minister for Sports Faruk
Özak said after the initial detentions that the
investigation into the issue of match-xing
had been going on since August.
Sar was transferred to Çaykur Rizespor from
Malatyaspor during this season’s recess. Following his detention, Çaykur Rizespor made a statement saying that he had already been sidelined
because of problems in his personal life and because he had missed training sessions without the
club’s permission. stanbul Today’s Zaman with wires
Group stages
anti-nuke protest at
US Embassy
A group of ve people who called themselves
the “Peace Movement” carried out a demonstration in front of the US Embassy in Ankara yesterday to protest the US policy on nuclear weapons.
The group unfurled banners reading
“No for nuclear, now or never” and held
missile models in their hands, which they
managed to leave in front of the embassy
despite police efforts to prevent them from
depositing anything on the premises.
Kclcm lhan, the spokesperson of the
group, made a statement to the press, saying
if countries with nuclear power do not abide
by the rules of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation
Treaty (NPT), the validity of the treaty is in
danger. He also called on the government to
take action to return US tactical nuclear weapons deployed in Turkey. Turkey is estimated
to be hosting 40 to 90 atomic weapons at its
ncirlik Air Base. Ebubekir Atmaca Ankara
BUSINESS
TODAY’S ZAMAN 07
F R I D AY, A P R I L 9 , 2 0 1 0
highlighted that Turkey would be putting more
responsibility, time and resources into their trade
representation abroad to increase the country’s exports. He added that all the country’s trade representatives will be required to meet for a few days
in Ankara to discuss strategies and methods for
increasing Turkish exports.
Çalayan also set forth goals for 2023, the 100th
anniversary of the founding of the Turkish Republic,
saying that Turkey would be exporting $500 billion
by that time, several times the current exports of
$102.2 billion. He added that global exports are currently $11.6 trillion, and Turkey makes up less than
1 percent of this figure. He noted that they hope to
increase this share to 1.5 percent by 2023. He stated
that achieving this could only be done if Turkish
trade representatives abroad assisted in doing so,
and added that the current 115 trade representatives
would be more than doubled, to 250, by 2023.
Çalayan also noted that Foreign Trade Centers would be built throughout the world to assist
Turkish businessmen in doing business in other
countries. The centers would allow those doing
business in the country to enter and exit freely,
and would have translators on-site. He added
that the taxes that are collected from exporters
would be used to build these centers. He said
that 96 trade representatives currently work with
exporters in various regions but stressed that it
was not enough. “We need to increase this to
1,096 or 2,096, and are making the necessary
adjustments to achieve this. stanbul Today’s Zaman
PHOTO
The private sector is achieving new heights
with its exports and production, setting newer
and higher goals for Turkish exports, Foreign Trade
Minister Zafer Çalayan has said.
The minister, speaking to Turkish trade representatives from the Americas and Africa on Thursday, stated that the recent surprisingly high export
figures were led by the private sector, especially
the automotive, textile, furniture and mining sectors. He added that these figures, along with the
industrial production index figures released yesterday, meant that “more investment and production
along with increased employment” would be seen
in Turkey in the near future.
Çalayan also stated that he sees the Undersecretariat of Foreign Trade as a private firm and
AA, RIZA ÖZEL
Çalayan: Private sector is reaching new heights
Foreign Trade Minister Zafer Çalayan
PHOTO
The government is introducing
a stimulus package to support
craftsmen and artisans in the
face of changing economic conditions,
bringing numerous benefits such as tax
reductions, education programs and
easier access to loans.
Industry and Trade Minister Nihat
Ergün, who was on an official visit to Syria, said yesterday in an interview with the
Anatolia news agency that the package is a
transition and stimulus program to ensure
the “survival of craftsmen and artisans in
the wake of recent global economic developments and to adapt them to the current
system.” The program foresees tax reductions for craftsmen and artisans, for which
work is under way in cooperation with the
Finance Ministry, Ergün stated. Under the
new package access to loans will be made
easier, he said, explaining that both the volume and sources of loans will be expanded.
Craftsmen and artisans will also be provided
with education programs in a bid to pave
the way towards innovation and technological development, the minister stated.
Ergün said small businesses would
have more power if they acted together.
Under the new package they will be working to create awareness among craftsmen
and small and medium-sized establishments (SMEs), and then extending the
necessary support to enable them to establish organized structures through cooperation. “The current organizational structure
lacks order. There are about 3,200 chambers of craftsman, along with 83 unions.
This haphazard structure causes the loss of
TL 400 million to the sector annually,” he
said, stressing the need to change the current system to benefit craftsmen and small
businesses. The package also includes possible amendments to the Craftsmen and
Artisans Law, the minister said.
The program has been prepared as one
of the four “strategic targets” of the Industry and Trade Ministry’s “2004-2010 Strategic Plan,” the details of which are scheduled to be announced to the public on
Saturday by Prime Minister Recep Tayyip
Erdoan and Ergün. stanbul Today’s Zaman
Industry and Trade Minister Nihat Ergün visited the Umayyad Mosque in Damascus during his visit to Syria. He stressed on the need of boosting cooperation between Turkish and Syrian companies, while also encouraging investors of the two countries establishing partnership.
Yldz Holding’s Godiva
halts production in
Belgium due to strike
Turkish conglomerate Yldz Holding’s chocolate
producer Godiva halted production in Belgium
on Wednesday due to protests by workers, a company
statement said on Thursday.
The company statement said the safety of workers could
not be guaranteed and production could not be maintained
due to workers’ violent protests, supported by union representatives. Godiva accused union representatives of violating an
agreement they signed on March 10 to continue production.
Nicolas Bouve, managing director of Godiva Europe, said
they had no other alternative than suspending production in the
Brussels factory due to increasing violent protests of workers.
We will not resume production unless workers assure us
that they will fulfill all their obligations under their contracts,
particularly security rules, Bouve stated. However, representatives of labor unions rejected the company’s accusations,
arguing that Godiva, which had decided to dismiss 90 workers from the Brussels factory last month, failed to establish
any dialogue with workers. The Godiva factory in Brussels
Koekelberg employs 360 people. On March 2, Godiva said its
hand package unit would be closed and that this unit would
be transferred to another company, which would jeopardize
the jobs of 90 workers. Workers protested the decision and
went on a strike on March 16. stanbul Today’s Zaman
Ergün: Syrian, Turkish industrialists should further develop cooperation
Industry and Trade Minister Nihat Ergün
has said that Turkish and Syrian companies should cooperate and establish partnerships both in Turkey and Syria along
with third countries.
Ergün, who was on an official visit to
Syria, toured an organized industrial zone
in the capital of Damascus with Syrian Deputy Prime Minister for Economic Affairs
Abdullah al-Dardari. Speaking during his
visit, Ergün pointed out the importance of
establishing cooperation between Turkish
and Syrian industrialists. “We want Turkish and Syrian companies to make investments in each other’s countries and even
to cooperate in third countries. From now
on, we will carry out activities to strengthen the relevant infrastructures and to
provide partnership between them,” said
the minister, also commenting on the improvement in Turkish industry.
“Turkey used to export agricultural
products in the past, but now 90 percent
of its exports comprise industrial products that are mainly sent to EU countries,” he said, stressing the importance of
establishing cooperation between the industrial sector and universities.
Al-Dardari also stated that scientific
research and dialogue between industrialists were essential elements in Turkey
and Syria’s cooperation in the industrial
sector. stanbul Today’s Zaman
February industrial production signals recovery, growth
Continuing its upward trend, industrial production in Turkey increased by an impressive
18.1 percent in February over the same month of
the previous year and was up by 0.5 percent from
January, official figures released on Friday showed,
indicating a strong recovery from the recession and
raising hopes for a double-digit growth rate for the
first quarter of the year.
According to data released by the Turkish Statistics Institute (TurkStat) yesterday, the industrial
production index, an indicator of manufacturing
performance, rose 18.1 percent in the second month
of the year over February 2009. Though the current
rise is mainly attributable to a base effect, it was
above expectations. Analysts had expected the index
to be up by 17.1-17.5 percent. Turkey’s industrial index increased by a record 25.2 percent in December
last year over the same month of 2008, before rising
by 12.1 percent in January on a year-on-year basis.
The year-on-year increase in the index was 18.2
Volkan imek, the chairman of the Professional
Hotel Managers Association of Turkey (POYD),
said on Thursday in Antalya that the government should
allow hoteliers to start the import of red meat following
a recent “meat crisis” in the market.
A growing shortage of red meat has led to extraordinary
increases in prices in the market. Some parties have suggested that the government lift a ban on red meat imports, while
others say the best solution to address the current shortage
would be an increase in stockbreeding.
imek said most hotels faced difficulty in compensating for the red meat shortage, as red meat is among
the top products consumed at hotels. “A kilo of red meat
is around six or seven euros in the EU but we pay 15 to 20
euros here in Turkey. … This puts an extra burden on our
tourism facilities,” he explained.
Noting that hotels in Turkey consume 60,000 tons of
read meat on average per year, he said the government
should come up with a solution to ease the problem in the
sector. This solution could be permission for red meat imports for example, he continued, adding that further price
hikes could hit the sector even more. Regarding recent reports that said some dealers sold horsemeat and pork to the
market, the POYD head said such claims would do nothing
but harm Turkey’s tourism industry. stanbul Today’s Zaman
CHAN, BOSTAN CEMLOLU
Craftsmen and artsans to be
supported wth new package
Hoteliers demand
red meat imports
at lower prices
percent on a calendar-adjusted base. The index was
up by 1.6 percent from the month before when both
calendar and seasonally adjusted.
Industry and Trade Minister Nihat Ergün,
speaking during a visit to Syria yesterday, expressed
satisfaction with the figures, which are a continuation of an upward trend that started in March of
last year. “When seasonally and calendar adjusted,
the index is seen to still be picking up, indicating a
strong recovery from the recession in the space of a
year. The same trend is seen also in exports and capacity utilization rates. The possibility of achieving a
double-digit growth rate for the first quarter of 2010
is continuously increasing,” Ergün said.
“The Turkish economy has nearly overcome the
global financial crisis and returned to producing, exporting and creating employment,” he highlighted.
Foreign Trade Minister Zafer Çalayan, speaking to Turkish commercial counselors and attachés
based in the Americas and Africa in Ankara on
Thursday, commented on the industrial production
figures released yesterday, repeating that the economic crisis “just touched” Turkey. Çalayan highlighted that with the fourth quarter gross domestic
product (GDP) growth numbers Turkey was one of
the first countries to exit the crisis and the only country in the Organization for Economic Cooperation
and Development (OECD) to not intervene in its
financial sector. Noting that Turkey’s goal for GDP
growth is 3.5 percent for 2010, Çalayan stated that
organizations such as the International Monetary
Fund (IMF) and OECD pointed to higher growth
figures, and that the World Bank’s president expects
6 percent growth for Turkey for 2010, high above
Turkey’s own expectations. The increased industrial
production figures were an expected development,
said Çalayan, pointing to increased export figures
released recently.
Turkish Exporters Assembly (TM) President
Mehmet Büyükeki, in a written statement issued
yesterday, said that “all early indicators are signs
of a double-digit growth rate for the first quarter of
2010.” Turkey should re-adopt an export-oriented
growth strategy, he said.
The subgroup that enjoyed the greatest yearon-year increase was the manufacturing sector at
20.5 percent. The sector saw a 1.7 percent rise in its
industrial production index over the previous month
when the index removed seasonal and calendar effects, such as weather conditions or social, cultural
or religious traditions falling in specific seasons. The
index for the mining sector was up by 12.2 percent in
February over the same month of the previous year,
while the rise was 2.8 percent from January to February when calendar and seasonally adjusted. Among
the main industrial subgroups, the biggest rise was
seen in the manufacture of capital goods, with a
32.9 percent increase on a year-on-year basis. The
production of intermediary goods also rose by 23.2
percent during the same period. Ankara Today’s Zaman
Aydn Doan
takes title of top
taxpayer for 2009
Media tycoon Aydn Doan was the Revenue Administration’s (GB) go-to individual for taxes in 2009, coming
first with the highest amount of taxes paid by an individual with
TL 19.1 million in funds being transferred to the government.
According to figures released by GB yesterday for annual
income tax, paid in March, the top three individual taxpayers
were Aydn Doan with TL 19.1 million, Kurtlu Factoring
Chairman Salvo Taragano with TL 15.6 million and Koç Holding Chairman Rahmi Koç with TL 11.2 million.
In 2008, Rahmi Koç was the record holder, with Aydn
Doan second. Hüsnü Özyein, who was third in 2008,
dropped down to 10th place, paying TL 6.5 million in taxes.
According to the figures, out of the top 100 taxpayers, 86 were
located in stanbul, eight in Ankara, three in zmir and one
each from the provinces of Bursa, Isparta and Kocaeli.
The list also included famous individuals from cinema and television, with Acun Ilcal 45th with TL 2.3
million, Mehmet Ali Erbil 53rd with TL 1.7 million and
comedian Cem Ylmaz in 86th place. According to the
figures, 61 of the top 100 taxpayers had stock holdings
that they paid income tax on. Ankara Today’s Zaman
08 TODAY’S ZAMAN
F R I D AY, A P R I L 9 , 2 0 1 0
BUSINESS
stop a bigger crisis from occurring.
PwC Turkey Banking and Capital Markets
Manager and Partner Zeynep Uras said that with
these results and this overwhelming fear of politics in the banking sector, it appears that the future
of banks lies in exogenous factors that can affect
the sector. She added that although government
funding for banks to pull them out of the depths
of the nancial crisis did temporarily help them,
overly politicizing banks may lead to negative effects on the nancial crisis. stanbul Today’s Zaman
icized” and that this could be a large threat to nancial stability. Bankers and non-bankers had differing
reasons for this opinion, with bankers stating that
politics could negatively affect the way banks give
loans while non-bankers said political and monetary
help to banks could lead to banks acting carelessly.
CSFI Research Editor David Lascelles, discussing the report ndings, said he found it
ironic that banks were citing political intervention as the biggest risk at a time when governments need to support the banking sector to
AP, NG HAN GUAN
Turkcell officials
allegedly involved
in wiretapping
ERGN HAVA STANBUL
PHOTO
Turkey’s largest GSM rm, Turkcell,
could face serious problems -- possibly even cancellation of their operating
license -- following recent allegations
that a group of employees from the company formed a wiretapping gang and
tapped lines for $30,000 apiece for anyone who could pay.
According to various news Web sites,
the stanbul Chief Prosecutor’s Ofce has
been collecting evidence of the alleged
wiretapping for a long time. The reports
claimed that the market leader could face
the cancellation of its license.
Timothy Geithner
Evaluating the allegations in Ankara on
Wednesday, Transportation Minister Binali Yldrm said the government “would
do whatever is necessary should the
GSM rm be found guilty of engaging in
any illegal action.” Emphasizing that the
issue is “a serious one,” the minister said
his ministry would follow the developments closely. “Legal proceedings on the
issue have begun. We have very limited
details on the issue; however, it should be
known that we will pursue the case if the
company has actually been involved in illegal actions,” Yldrm explained.
Speaking to Today’s Zaman in a
phone interview, Tayfun Acarer, chairman of Turkey’s Information Technologies and Communications Authority
(BTK), stated that the allegations are serious, but said he could not make any comment on the issue. “We have not received
any ofcial statement as regards the allegations. … It is hard to say anything as
of yet,” he noted. The BTK head said they
could commence an investigation into
the allegations “once the issue is claried
following the legal proceedings.”
A visitor walks past the art work by American artist Tony Oursler entitled “100 yuan (People’s Republic of China)” US Treasury Secretary Timothy
Geithner is expected to press Beijing over its currency controls in a sign the two sides are stepping up efforts to narrow their differences in the dispute.
Gethner to vst Bejng
amd currency dspute
trade surplus. Some American lawmakers want
punitive tariffs on Chinese imports if Beijing fails
to act. “Every administration has thought it could
get something done by talking to China. But
years of experience have shown that the Chinese
will not be moved by words; they only respond
to tough action,” US Senator Charles Schumer
said in a statement. Schumer is co-author of proposed legislation that seeks to increase pressure
on China to let its currency rise in value against
the dollar, saying Chinese “currency manipulation” is hurting the US economy. While a step
forward, Chinese analysts weren’t expecting
any signicant new agreement to come out of
the visit. “We’d better not be too hopeful for any
breakthroughs,” said Niu Jun, professor at Peking University’s School of International Studies.
“Economic and trade issues are not like political
issues, which can sometimes see sudden progress.” Niu said the currency dispute was a “longterm issue that requires long-term work.”
US Treasury Secretary Timothy
Geithner is expected to press Beijing
over its currency controls when he
meets a Chinese vice premier in a sign the two
sides are stepping up efforts to narrow their
differences in the dispute.
Geithner was due to meet Vice Premier
Wang Qishan on Thursday evening en route
home from a two-day visit to India, the Treasury Department said. The surprise visit was announced just a day in advance.
The decision to hold such a high-level encounter suggested Washington and Beijing are
trying to narrow their differences over currency,
which threaten to overshadow cooperation on
the global economy, Iran’s nuclear program and
other issues. Washington and other Chinese
trading partners are pressing Beijing to ease exchange rate controls that they say keep its yuan
undervalued, giving its exporters an unfair price
advantage and swelling its multibillion-dollar
Turkcell remains silent
A Turkcell ofcial who spoke on condition of anonymity told Today’s Zaman
that Ula Öztürk, a director at Turkcell,
had been taken into custody to testify
to police. The ofcial said the company
would wait until the legal proceedings
were completed and declined to make
any further comments. As part of the investigation, police detained Öztürk along
with Fatih Bilir, an information processing ofcer at Turkcell, both of whom allegedly cooperated with the gang’s alleged leader, Mehmet Yank.
Close
Daily Monthly
Change (%) Change (%)
Yearly
Change (%)
YTD
Change (%)
MCAP
(million TL)
1-Y
Av.Volum
Country
Change
(%)
Level
H.Kong
1,82
21.928,8
Nikkei 225
Japan
0,09
11.292,8
Cac 40
France
-0,77
4.022,9
Germany
-0,59
İMKB-100
58.646
0,4%
3,7%
122,3%
11,0%
333.556
1.925
Hang Seng
İMKB-30
73.760
0,5%
4,0%
119,5%
10,1%
263.825
1.312
İMKB-IND
43.107
0,1%
1,8%
115,2%
13,7%
95.620
752
İMKB-BANK
135.261
0,8%
5,3%
144,8%
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162.928
738
DAX
DJIMT
11,85
0,9%
1,7%
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FTSE 100
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ANCE
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Ticker
Australian former Rio Tinto executive Stern Hu
Lawyer: Rio Tinto exec
not to appeal sentence
A jailed Australian former Rio Tinto executive
has opted not to appeal his 10-year sentence
for bribery and commercial spying, his lawyer said
Thursday, in a case that rattled foreign businesses
and prompted Australia to criticize secrecy surrounding the trial.
In a brief text message, lawyer Jin Chunqing
said Stern Hu told him of his decision in a meeting at the Shanghai detention house. He did not
comment further.
Hu, the manager in charge of Rio Tinto’s China
iron ore business, and three Chinese coworkers
were detained in July during contentious price negotiations with Chinese steel mills. They pleaded
guilty but observers said their sentences were unusually severe, especially for a case involving civilian business dealings. Australian Foreign Minister
Stephen Smith called Hu’s penalty “very harsh.”
The case was closely watched abroad and some
questioned whether it signaled a worsening environment for foreign businesses in China. Shanghai AP
Platform to keep eye
on public spending
‘Gov’t will deal with those
who are responsible’
AT A GL
CALENDAR
pected
No data ex
PHOTO
in 15 years that the CSFI’s results have shown
political intervention as a threat to the sector.
“Heavy regulation” came in third place,
demonstrating that the fear of government is
ever present in the global banking sector -which played a major role in the events that unfolded during the global nancial crisis.
The managers and experts surveyed stated that
the large sums of taxpayer money that propped
banks up and the nationalization of failing banks
meant that banks were becoming increasingly “polit-
According to the “Banking Banana Skins
2010” report released by PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC) and the Center for the
Study of Financial Innovation (CSFI), the threat
bankers are most worried about is political intervention into the sector.
The report, which included results from
a survey of 443 “bankers, banking regulators
and close observers of the banking scene” in
49 countries, outlined 30 risks, with political intervention topping the list. This is the rst time
REUTERS
Banks fear political intervention most, survey shows
58,525
1,5005
66.29
53.72
57.7
46.28
5.763,5
-0,59
10.904,9
NASDAQ
USA
0,01
1.982,1
USA
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70.877,2
33.71
29,3
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Foreign
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US$/JP¥
93,61
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93,1
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124,92
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48,3
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1,3349
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4,34
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33,7
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ÝMKB 100
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6,15
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RETAILER
BIMAS
CARFA
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--
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9.209,5
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209
KIPA
990
P/E 2006/12
P/E 2007/06t
17,7x
16,8x
15,0x
335,3x
90,7x
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33,1x
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P/E 2007/09t
12,7x
12,0x
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415,3x
80,9x
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EV/EBITDA 2006/12*
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12,1x
7,4x
11,7x
5,8x
11,3x
9,5x
453,5x
40,4x
72,1x
60,7x
-238,2x
18,4x
10,9x
9,9x
-11,9x
53,0x
EV/EBITDA 2007/06t*
8,2x
6,5x
9,4x
42,4x
56,5x
22,1x
9,1x
95,3x
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6,3x
-0,8x
38,8x
53,5x
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Light C. Oil
Gold
Copper
Turkey, Iran to jointly
establish zone
Technical delegations from Ankara and Tehran are expected to commence studies for the
establishment of a free industrial zone between
Turkey and Iran in the eastern province of Idr,
the city governor announced on Thursday.
Idr Governor Saffet Karahisarl, officials
from the Ministry of Industry and Trade along
with experts from Iran met on Thursday in Idr to
discuss the establishment of a free industrial zone.
Speaking to reporters, Karahisarl said technical delegations from Turkey and Iran would shortly come together to discuss the necessary preparations for the zone, which will be situated along the
border connecting Turkey, Iran and Nakhchivan.
Following talks in Idr, the technical delegations
will proceed to the Turkish provinces of Ar, Van
and Hakkari, the governor said.
An eastern Anatolia province, Idr borders
Armenia, Nakhchivan and Iran. stanbul Today’s Zaman
10.0
8,6
3,36%
Price (TL) Daily Change (%)
YKSGR
Mcap TL
-0,29
USA
BOVESPA
China is very close to announcing a shift in its
currency policy, the New York Times reported on
Thursday. The change would involve a “small but
immediate” revaluation of the yuan and would
permit the yuan to uctuate more widely, the paper said. The Hong Kong dispatch quoted people
with knowledge of the policy consensus emerging
in Beijing. It said the model for the upcoming shift
was China’s 2.1 percent revaluation of the yuan,
also known as the renminbi, against the dollar
in July 2005. After that, the yuan was allowed to
trade in a wider daily range, but with a trend toward further strengthening. “For the upcoming
announcement, however, China is likely to emphasize that the value of the renminbi can fall as
well as rise on any given day, so as to discourage a
ood of speculative investment into China betting
on rapid further appreciation, they said,” according to the New York Times. Beijing Reuters
6.215,2
UK
Dow
S&P
0,04%
-0,99%
‘China close to currency shift’
Thirty Turkish civil society organizations have
established a new body named the Public
Spending Monitoring Platform in a bid to contribute
to a more transparent public expenditure mechanism.
The platform will follow expenditure closely
and periodically share the gures with both Parliament and the public. Speaking to the Anatolia news
agency on Thursday in stanbul, platform spokesman
Nurhan Yentürk said there are currently separate
bodies which monitor public spending, but the data
provided by these groups can be incoherent and lack
such important details as the amounts allocated to
each public institution.
Yentürk said their studies could help open up
the state’s expenditures to public debate and that
it is critical that such monetary transfers are monitored by an impartial body. “We want to see exactly
how much of our money is spent where. It is also
the people’s right to see how effective this expenditure proves to be in any eld,” she explained.
They expected to meet with deputies from Parliament’s Planning and Budget Commission, but did not
expect their reports to provoke immediate action from
the government; however, this was still an important
step for the sake of transparency, Yentürk said. “We do
not expect that the government will cut military expenditure or allocate more money to any other eld right after
we release our reports, but this is a beginning, and we
should know how much money we have in the budget,”
she asserted. stanbul Today’s Zaman
85,68
1133,25
360,70
Way
Change (%)
-0,6%
0,8%
-0,3%
High
86,38
1133,25
363,50
Low
85,31
1133,25
359,50
P/E: Share price divided by earnings per share is a measure of the price paid for a share relative to the
income or profit earned by the firm per share.
EV/EBITDA: Enterprise value divided by earnings before interest, tax and amortization; “t” stands for
trailer and means the data over the last four quarters.
(*) Yesterday's closing(**) Updated at 6 p.m. by GMT+2
Disclaimer: The information in this report has been prepared by BMD, Bizim Securities from sources believed
to be reliable. All the information, interpretations and recommendations covered herein relating to
investment actions are not within the scope of investment consultancy. Therefore investment decisions
based only on the information covered herein may not bring expected results.
Russia: Austria joins
South Stream in April
Russia’s energy minister says Austria will join
the Russian-backed South Stream pipeline
project in April.Russian news agencies are quoting Sergei Shmatko as saying Thursday that this
would be the final deal before construction begins
later this year. South Stream is a joint venture of
Russia’s Gazprom and Italy’s Eni. The pipeline
will exit Russia under the Black Sea and enter the
European Union via Bulgaria to carry some 63 billion cubic meters of gas a year when it comes online in 2015.Serbia, Hungary, Slovenia, Bulgaria,
Greece, Italy and Croatia are also signed onto the
deal. Austria has backed the rival Nabucco pipeline project, which is supported by the EU and the
United States and would bypass Russia in supplying gas from the Caspian Sea region. Moscow AP
NATIONAL
TODAY’S ZAMAN 09
FRIDAY, APRIL 9, 2010
First hearing on Poyrazköy arsenal begins today
BÜRA ERDAL ÝSTANBUL
The rst hearing of a trial regarding a large
cache of munitions discovered almost a year
ago in stanbul’s Poyrazköy area as part of the Ergenekon investigation begins today.
Arrested defendants retired Maj. Levent
Bekta, Lt. Col. Ercan Kireçtepe, Maj. Emre Onat,
Maj. Eren Günay and Ergin Geldikaya, a retired
ranger from the navy’s Underwater Assault Teams
(SAT), were summoned to the stanbul 12th High
Criminal Court, where they are scheduled to testify about their suspected links to the unearthed
cache of 21 light anti-tank weapons (LAW), 14
grenades, 24 explosive fuses and 450 grams of C3
explosives. Tight security is expected to be in place
around the courthouse. Police discovered the arsenal in Poyrazköy on April 21, 2009.
The 297-page indictment against the 17 defendants in the case alleges that they formed a
gang and were planning to take action to create
chaos in the country and to wipe out the government and Parliament.
Five of the defendants, including Bekta,
Kireçtepe, Onat and Günay, are charged with
“attempting to destroy the government and Parliament using coercion and violence” and “being
members of the Ergenekon armed terrorist orga-
nization.” Prosecutors demand two life sentences
for each defendant for the rst charge and a prison
term from seven-and-a-half years to 15 years for
each of them for the second charge.
Other defendants, Geldikaya, Ali Türken,
Halil Cura, Ferudun Arslan, Sadettin Doan,
Levent Görgeç, brahim Koray Özyurt, Muharrem Nuri Alacal, afak Yürekli, Dora Sungunay,
Tayfun Duman and Mert Yank, are charged with
“being a member of the Ergenekon armed terrorist organization.” Rear Adm. Görgeç is the one
that attracts the most attention since he will be
the rst active duty general to be tried on charges
of membership in a terrorist organization.
A CD that was in Bekta’s possession which
is also in the indictment contains a detailed plan
codenamed “Cage” and mentions assassinating
leaders of non-Muslim communities in Turkey.
The Cage plan was allegedly prepared to undermine the Justice and Development Party (AK
Party) by assassinating prominent non-Muslim
gures in the country and putting the blame
for the killings on the party. The plot aimed to
intimidate the country’s non-Muslim groups,
which would hopefully increase internal and external pressure on the ruling party, diminishing
public support for the party that would eventually
lead to a military takeover, according to the plan.
Cemil Çiçek
Deputy PM Çiçek
vents frustration
with EU, Cyprus
Turkey's deputy prime minister vented his
frustration with the European Union and
Greek Cypriots before an election on the Turkish
side of Cyprus on April 18 that could impact his
country's bid for EU membership.
In an interview with Reuters on Wednesday,
Cemil Çiçek, a heavyweight in the ruling Justice and Development Party (AK Party), decried
the European Union's attitude to Turkey, saying
other EU candidates received more favorable
treatment. "It's time the Europeans also began
behaving ethically," he said. "When it concerns
others one kilogram equals 1,000 grams, when
it concerns Turkey one kilogram equals 800
grams," said the 64-year-old, who is known for
speaking his mind.
The biggest obstacle Turkey faces to gaining
admission relates to the dispute over Cyprus. Cyprus was divided in 1974 after Turkey sent troops
to the island in reaction to a coup engineered by
a military junta ruling Athens against the Cypriot
government made up of Greeks. Turkey was the
only country to recognize the Turkish Republic of
Northern Cyprus (KKTC) when it was declared a
separate state in 1983 and still has troops there.
Now, Turkey hopes reunication talks between
the Turkish and Greek sides will unblock its negotiations with the EU on several policy fronts.
Çiçek said Turkey is committed to nding
a peaceful resolution for Cyprus, regardless of
who wins the election on April 18 when Turkish Cypriots vote for a president. But ofcials
privately fear incumbent Mehmet Ali Talat, who
has been at the forefront of the reunication
process, could lose because of a lack of progress
so far. If that happens, and progress on reunication stalls, so could Turkey's EU bid.
Turkey has opened 12 out of 35 negotiating
chapters, covering different policy areas since
starting formal EU entry talks in 2005. But 18 are
blocked, most because of Cyprus. Turkey's EU
negotiations could hit a wall by the end of the
year if it completes the remaining chapters and
18 are still frozen. One Turkish ofcial described
it like "seeing a train coming down a tunnel."
Using Cyprus
Turkish membership is a divisive issue in the
EU. Critics say cultural differences with the predominantly Muslim state will hamper integration. This negativity towards Turkey was behind
Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoan's
comment during a visit to Bosnia and Herzegovina earlier this week when he said, "The EU will
only be a Christian club without Turkey." Some
European leaders, notably Germany's Chancellor Angela Merkel and French President Nicolas
Sarkozy, have suggested Turkey opt for a "privileged partnership." But Turkey wants nothing
less than full membership.
Çiçek gave assurances that should the AK
Party win a third term in elections due by mid2011, it would stay true to a goal of meeting
EU norms across political, social and economic
spheres. "Turkey has a vision for 2023, which
is a centennial of the republic. We would like
to see Turkey as a full EU member by that
date," said Çiçek, referring to the founding of
the modern Turkish republic out of the ashes
of the Ottoman Empire. But he said some EU
states were using Turkey's support for the
KKTC to block the EU bid. "We are aware that
there are certain countries which want to obstruct Turkey's EU membership by using this
Cyprus issue," he said. "This attitude of the
EU is primarily unethical and immoral because
EU membership is conditional on Copenhagen political criteria and the implementation
of those criteria," he said, adding that Turkey
had met those requirements.
Çiçek also denounced the EU for isolating
Turkish Cypriots living in the north of the divided island, describing it as being like "an open
prison" and said the Greek Cypriots were spoiling chances of a political solution. Turkey would
honor a pledge to open its ports and airports to
Cypriot trafc, Çiçek said, so long as the EU simultaneously ended its embargo of northern Cyprus. He went on to voice concern that the Greek
Cypriot side could use the outcome of the vote
to further delay a solution. "This situation is not
going to last forever, another ve to 10 years, because we are now fed up with the ploys of the
Greek Cypriots," Çiçek said. Ankara Reuters
10 TODAY’S ZAMAN
*Jamie F. Metzl, who served on US President Bill Clinton’s National Security Council, is executive vice president of the Asia Society. © Project Syndicate, 2010.
REUTERS
Sri Lanka’s
President
Mahinda
Rajapaksa
casts his vote
at a polling
station for the
parliamentary
elections, in
the southern
district of
Hambantota,
south of capital
Colombo.
PHOTO
re is under the ashes? We need to unite the
broken hearts of this country through development,” he told reporters. “That can be done
only through a stronger parliament. We’ve
already shown in this short time what we are
able with economic and other developments.”
The war deeply divided the Tamil minority and the Sinhalese majority from which Rajapaksa hails, like all of the country’s leaders
since independence from Britain in 1948. He
says reconciliation can only come from democracy and development.
Rajapaksa’s alliance has positioned itself as
the shepherd of island-wide development and
an economic revival, propelled by the stock market and sizeable foreign investment in high-yield
government securities. Colombo Reuters
PIROGOV
REUTERS, VLADIMIR
TODAY’S ZAMAN
NEW YORK -- China’s willingness to join negotiations
on potential sanctions against Iran and to send President
Hu Jintao to a nuclear security summit in Washington
this month are important preliminary steps towards taking more responsibility in managing international affairs. But merely joining conversations or showing up for
meetings is not enough. Given its growing prole, China
must do far more to demonstrate its bona des as a responsible global leader or risk undermining the system
that has enabled its own miraculous rise.
China has emerged as a world power far more quickly
than most observers -- and China’s own leaders -- might
have predicted as little as a decade ago. China’s rapid economic growth, juxtaposed against America’s problems
in Iraq and Afghanistan, monumental debt, and role in
sparking the global nancial crisis, have changed global
power realities -- and global perceptions of those realities
even more. China’s current international inuence likely
outstrips its desire or capacity.
This puts China in a difcult position in relation to the
so-called international system -- the structures and rules
created by the United States and others after the Second
World War to check national sovereignty through a system
of overlapping jurisdictions, transnational obligations, and
fundamental rights. China has been an enormous beneciary of this system, and its rise would have been unthinkable without the US-led free-trade system and globalization
process, access to US markets, and global shipping lanes
secured by the US Navy. But China’s history of humiliation
at the hands of European colonial powers has made its leaders ardent supporters of inviolable national rights and suspicious of any sacrice of sovereignty.
Because China’s leaders are not popularly elected,
their legitimacy stems largely from two sources -- their
connection to the Chinese revolution and their ability to
deliver national security and economic growth. Although
Mao Zedong is widely implicated in the unnecessary
death of millions and is ofcially designated by the current
regime as having been 30 percent wrong, his photograph
still adorns Tiananmen Square, because the regime’s legitimacy depends in part on its connection to the restoration of national sovereignty that Mao represents.
The economic foundation of the Chinese government’s legitimacy also places an enormous burden on
China’s leaders to make decisions that foster domestic
economic growth at the expense of virtually everything
else -- including, some say, the viability of the international currency regime, nuclear non-proliferation, and basic rights in resource-rich countries.
This dichotomy creates a difcult situation as China
emerges as the world’s second largest economy. If China, in the name of national sovereignty, does not buy
into the international system, it becomes hard to argue
that this system exists.
China’s unwillingness, for example, to join other members of the international community in pressuring Iran and
North Korea to abandon nuclear weapons programs foreshadows the potential collapse of the nuclear non-proliferation regime. China’s active courtship of countries that violate
human rights on a massive scale, such as Sudan, North Korea, and Burma, similarly represents a preliminary decapitation of the international human rights regime.
Given its size and importance, and regardless of its intentions, China will, perhaps inadvertently, destroy the international system if it does not either actively endorse and
work to maintain it, or reframe it for the greater common
good. If it does neither, the world is in trouble.
If China sees itself as the heir and beneciary of the USled post-war international system, it must do much more to
prevent and roll back nuclear proliferation in Iran and North
Korea, pay a much greater percentage of costs for the United
Nations, and curtail its mercantilist policies. It must also end
its alleged corrupt practices in resource-rich parts of the developing world, align its currency policy with global norms,
lead efforts to curb greenhouse-gas emissions, and, more
generally, take into more account the fate of people outside
of China in its decision-making.
If, on the other hand, as is its right, Chinese leaders have
an alternative vision of what an improved international system might look like, the onus is on them to articulate that
vision and outline what they are willing to do to realize it.
There may be a better international model than the current one, but it will not emerge by default. As US Presidents
Franklin Roosevelt and Harry Truman demonstrated in the
1940s, such a system must be articulated and then forged
through decisive action and global leadership.
If China sees inviolable state sovereignty as the foundation of 21st century international affairs, as now appears
to be the case, then it must explain why this principle will
not lead to the same disastrous consequences as it did in the
19th and early 20th centuries.
The US and the international community must acknowledge that today’s fast-rising China has earned the
right to play an important role in shaping how the 21st century unfolds. But if China’s leaders will neither do more to
support the current international system, nor articulate an
alternative, and instead continue to hark back to 19th century models of inviolable sovereignty, they will destroy a global
order that, warts and all, has served the world exceedingly
well. Those countries that value the current system will increasingly feel the urge to close ranks to defend it.
The end of the electoral uncertainty is expected to bring some stability to Sri Lanka’s postwar landscape, and give way to a clearer picture
of what Rajapaksa plans to do with a $42 billion
economy billed as an upcoming frontier market.
The Colombo Stock Exchange on Thursday kept climbing higher into record territory. It has gained 165 percent since 2009,
spurred by the end of the war and lately has
risen on hopes of political stability and macroeconomic reform after the polls.
Rajapaksa cast his ballot early at a school
named after his politician father in Medamulana, in the southern Hambantota district where
his eldest son, brother and niece were all contesting seats as part of a growing Rajapaksa
dynasty. “We’ve ended terrorism now. What
PHOTO
Jamie F. Metzl
Sri Lankans voted on Thursday in an
election likely to further entrench President Mahinda Rajapaksa’s political dominance, the rst parliamentary poll since last
year’s end of a quarter-century of war.
Nearly 80,000 police and soldiers guarded
polling stations across the Indian Ocean island,
where voters were deciding among 7,620 candidates for the 225-member parliament. Election
monitors reported turnout of about 30 percent,
and a handful of minor incidents of violence.
Rajapaksa has already parlayed last May’s
victory over the Tamil Tiger separatists into a
new six-year term. Now he is banking on a
resurgent economy and political momentum
to give his United Peoples Freedom Alliance
(UPFA) a legislative majority.
ntial administration
vernment protesters near the preside
clashes between riot police and anti-go
Kyrgyzstan this week.
A demonstrator sets fire to a car during
injured in clashes in the capital of
1,000
over
and
killed
been
have
75 people
in Bishkek on Wednesday. At least
KYRGYZ OPPOSITION
SEIZES POWER, DISSOLVES
NATIONAL PARLIAMENT
contýnued from page 1
“People in Kyrgyzstan want to build
democracy. What we did yesterday
was our answer to the repression and tyranny against the people by the Bakiyev regime,” Otunbayeva, who once served as foreign minister under Bakiyev, told reporters.
“You can call this revolution. You can
call this a people’s revolt. Either way, it is our
way of saying that we want justice and democracy.” Bishkek awoke to blazing cars and
burned-out shops on Thursday after a day in
which at least 75 people were killed in clashes
between protesters and security forces.
Plumes of smoke billowed from the
White House, or the main seat of government, as crowds rampaged through the
seven-story building setting several rooms
on re. Looting was widespread. The uprising, which began on Tuesday in a provincial
town, was sparked by discontent over corruption, nepotism and rising utility prices
in a nation where a third of the 5.3 million
population live below the poverty line.
The United States has a military air
base supporting troops in Afghanistan in
the Kyrgyz city of Manas and is a major
donor to Kyrgyzstan, along with China
and Russia, which also has a military base
in the former Soviet state. Russian Prime
Minister Vladimir Putin’s spokesman
said Otunbayeva had told him by telephone she was in full control of the
country and he saw her as “the new
head of government.”
Putin earlier denied Moscow had
played a hand in the clashes and Otunbayeva said the new government would
preserve an agreement allowing the US
AP, IVAN SEKRETAREV
OPINION
WORLD
Sri Lanka holds first post-war parliamentary poll
PHOTO
Wll
Chna lead?
F R I D A Y, APRIL 9, 2010
Kyrgyz protesters carry a wounded colleague during clashes with riot police in Bishkek. Police
in Kyrgyzstan opened fire on thousands of angry protesters who tried to seize the main government building amid rioting in the capital as protests spread across the Central Asian nation.
base to operate. “Its status quo will remain
in place. We still have some questions on
it. Give us time and we will listen to all the
sides and solve everything,” she said.
Bakiyev announced the base would
close during a visit to Moscow last year
at which he also secured $2 billion in
crisis aid, only to agree later to keep
the base open at a higher rent. NATO
said on Thursday that ights from the
US base in support of NATO military
operations in Afghanistan remained
suspended following the unrest. The
US embassy in Bishkek had earlier said
the base was operating normally. UN
Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon called
for calm and said a special UN envoy
would arrive in Kyrgyzstan on Friday.
The White House said US President Barack
Obama and Russian President Dimitry
Medvedev were likely to discuss Kyrgyzstan when they sign an arms control treaty
in Prague on Thursday.
Bakiyev ed Bishkek to southern
Kyrgyzstan, his traditional power base
in a nation split by clan rivalries. A witness said he arrived late on Wednesday
at the airport in Osh, and Otunbayeva
said later he was in his home region of
Jalalabad. Bishkek Reuters
Turkey pledges to
support stability
in Kyrgyzstan
The Turkish Foreign Ministry has released a statement in light of the unrest
in Kyrgyzstan, noting that no Turkish citizens
have been killed in the incidents which have so
far led to 75 deaths and hundreds of injuries.
Turkish Ambassador to Bishkek Nejat Akçal
also released a statement yesterday regarding ongoing events in Kyrgyzstan, emphasizing that the
embassy had sprung into action and was monitoring developments as they occurred. The Foreign
Ministry called the incidents “a cause of great
concern for Turkey” and said: “We regret to have
received news of the loss of lives during these incidents. Emergency desks have already been activated at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Ankara as
well as at the Turkish Embassy in Bishkek. Hereafter, further incidents and any ensuing developments will be monitored at the highest level.”
“Turkey attaches the utmost importance to the
stability, peace and welfare of brotherly Kyrgyzstan. We are ready to take every possible step for
sustaining the stability and security of Kyrgyzstan;
Kyrgyzstan’s stability bears importance for the
whole region. We expect Kyrgyzstan to overcome
the current tense situation through dialogue and
peaceful means and internal stability of the country
soon be maintained,” the statement read.
Akçal noted in his remarks that there had
been no reported injuries or threats to Turkish
nationals, but added that Turks should nonetheless exercise caution. He remarked that
some workplaces owned by Turks had sustained damage during the rioting.
The crisis centers established at the Turkish
Foreign Ministry can be reached at +90-312292-2579, +90-530-515-6491 (including SMS),
or [email protected]; the Turkish Embassy in
Bishkek can be reached at +996-312-62-2354 or
+996-312-62-0378. stanbul Today’s Zaman
Sudanese man
sues after release
from Guantanamo
A Sudanese aid worker freed from Guantanamo Bay in 2007 sued US government ofcials Wednesday over what he called his forced
disappearance and torture. Lawyers for Adel Hassan Hamad, 52, led the lawsuit in US District
Court in Seattle seeking damages for ongoing
physical and emotional problems and compensation for lost wages and loss of reputation.
It names as defendants nearly two dozen current and former US ofcials, including Defense
Secretary Robert Gates, former Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld and former Navy Secretary
Gordon England. Similar cases have been led -and dismissed -- in federal court in Washington,
D.C., where judges have ruled that such claims are
barred by the Military Commissions Act.
Lawyers for Hamad said his case was the rst
brought outside of Washington, D.C. Gwynne
Skinner, a member of Hamad’s legal team and
a professor in the International Human Rights
Clinic at Willamette University College of Law in
Oregon, said the case was led in Seattle because
Gates owns property in Washington state.
She also hopes the more liberal-leaning
judges in the 9th US Circuit will rule such
lawsuits can proceed. Hamad alleges he was a
humanitarian worker based in Pakistan in 2002
when he was seized from his apartment, tortured
and eventually shipped to Guantanamo. He was
detained for more than ve years. Before he was
returned to his native Sudan in 2007, his lawyers
learned he had actually been cleared to return
home two years earlier, the lawsuit said.
The Defense Department did not immediately
return a call seeking comment on behalf of Gates.
Hamad’s case drew a well-organized campaign for his release -- including a YouTube
video featuring Martin Sheen. “He’s struggling,”
Skinner said of Hamad. “He’s struggling to nd
work and support his family.” Seattle AP
TODAY’S ZAMAN 11
F R I D A Y, A P R I L 9 , 2 0 1 0
SENTENCING
Chinese man gets death
for slaying 8 children
A court in southeastern China sentenced a former doctor to death on Thursday for murdering eight children
who were on their way to school, state news agency
Xinhua reported. Zheng Minsheng, 41, attacked the
children last month just before school began in Nanping in Fujian province. He admitted to “intentionally killing” the children, at a trial which lasted for four
hours, Xinhua said. “I’m willing to shoulder responsibility for what I’ve done,” the report quoted him as saying. Prosecutors played 15 video clips of Zheng stabbing children with a knife, it added. “Zheng, appearing
agitated, repeatedly told the court he had been turned
down by a girl and suffered unfair treatment from the
girl’s wealthy family, which prompted him to carry out
the attack,” Xinhua said. “Prosecutors said Zheng, who
is not married, had been unsuccessful in relations with
women, his family and in his career, so he felt life was
meaningless,” it added. “Zheng had no history of mental illness, according to police.” Five children survived
the attack, one of whom is still in intensive care, Xinhua
said. There have been a series of stabbings at Chinese
schools and universities in recent years. In 2008, a student stabbed to death a law professor in class at an elite
Beijing law school after he suspected the professor of
having an affair with his girlfriend. Beijing Reuters
ALARM
Jet restroom smoker
causes bomb scare
A Mideast diplomat who grabbed a surreptitious
smoke in a jetliner’s bathroom sparked a bomb scare
and widespread alert that sent jet ghters scrambling
to intercept the Denver-bound ight, ofcials said.
But no explosives were found and authorities speaking on condition of anonymity said they don’t think
he was trying to hurt anyone and he will not be criminally charged. Qatar’s US ambassador, Ali Bin Fahad
Al-Hajri, defended the envoy in a statement on his
Washington embassy’s Web site. “This diplomat was
traveling to Denver on ofcial embassy business on
my instructions, and he was certainly not engaged in
any threatening activity. The facts will reveal that this
was a mistake,” the ambassador said, without identifying the envoy by name. An Arab envoy briefed on
the matter identied the diplomat as Mohammed AlMadadi of Qatar, an oil-rich Middle East nation and
close US ally. Wednesday’s scare came three months
after the attempted terror attack on Christmas Day
when a Nigerian man tried to blow up a Detroitbound airliner. Since then, law enforcement, ight
crews and passengers have been on high alert for suspicious activity on airplanes. Denver AP
GATHERING
ASEAN summit
convenes amidst unrest
Southeast Asian leaders began talks yesterday about
building a strong economic and political community at
an annual summit clouded by unrest in Thailand and
Myanmar’s widely derided election plans. Thai Prime
Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva cancelled his trip to Hanoi for
the Association of Southeast Asian Nations’ summit
after declaring a state of emergency on Wednesday to
control a month-long anti-government protest aimed at
forcing an election. “The situation in Bangkok is worrying,” Singapore Foreign Minister George Yeo said. “It is
a somber backdrop to our discussions. It was the second
straight year anti-government protests have disrupted
an ASEAN summit. Last year ASEAN leaders meeting
in a Thai Beach resort had to be evacuated by helicopters
when protesters stormed into the venue. The 10-member ASEAN has been largely focused on economic and
diplomatic issues since it was founded in 1967 at the
height of the Vietnam War. But in 2008, it adopted a
charter that turned the region of 580 million people with
a combined GDP of $2.7 trillion into a rules-based bloc
that aims to become a political, economic and security
community over the next ve years. Hanoi Reuters
After months of diplomatic dancing, China
has agreed to sit down with ve major powers
Thursday to discuss possible new sanctions against
Iran for refusing to suspend uranium enrichment and
start talks on its suspect nuclear program.
French Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner
told a French parliamentary hearing on Wednesday that China would join the United States, Britain, Russia, France -- all veto-wielding members of
the UN Security Council -- and Germany for talks
on a fourth UN sanctions resolution.
China agreed to discuss possible new sanctions
during a phone conversation in late March with senior diplomats from the ve other countries but no
date had been set for the start of the discussions.
Kouchner said the Chinese participation on
Thursday is a “positive factor,” according to the
ministry. He did not give any details and China’s
Foreign Ministry had no immediate comment.
In Washington, US State Department spokesman
P.J. Crowley would not conrm Thursday’s meeting,
saying there will be discussions in coming days in several locations and “I’m not going to sit here and advertise every single meeting that takes place.”
US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said in
January that the Obama administration has concluded that the best way to pressure Iran to come
clean on its nuclear ambitions is to impose new
sanctions aimed at the country’s ruling elite.
Ambassadors from the six countries will be
discussing elements for a possible UN resolution
circulated by the United States which well-informed diplomats said will target Iran’s powerful
Revolutionary Guard, which has major interests
in nuclear proliferation activities.
The proposed new sanctions would also
toughen existing measures against Iran’s shipping,
banking and insurance sectors and target additional companies and individuals connected to its
nuclear program, the diplomats said, speaking on
condition of anonymity because the US proposal
has not been released publicly. United Nations AP
AP, VIRGINIA MAYO
A key opposition party in northern Sudan is
boycotting this week’s local and parliamentary
elections, a senior party ofcial said Thursday,
in another blow to the country’s rst multiparty
balloting in more than two decades. Separately,
election observers from the European Union
said Thursday their monitors would not observe
the vote in volatile Darfur, apparently because of
the situation in the troubled western region. The
pullout by the Umma Party comes just days after
the main southern party, the Sudanese People’s
Liberation Movement, announced it would boycott the poll in the northern states. Senior Umma
party ofcial Mariam Sadiq told reporters her
party’s move comes after the government and the
national election commission failed to respond to
key reform conditions. Sudanese opposition parties accuse the ruling National Congress Party of
using state resources, limiting their access to the
media and controlling the election commission.
The elections start April 13, and will include local
as well as parliamentary and presidential polls in a
three-day balloting. Khartoum AP
First talks on new, fourth Iran sanctions resolution
PHOTO
Key opposition party
boycotts Sudan vote
French Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner announced that China
would join in on talks over a fourth UN sanctions resolution.
OBAMA AND MEDVEDEV
SIGN LANDMARK DISARMAMENT TREATY
The United States and Russia signed a landmark disarmament treaty on Thursday they
hope will herald better bilateral ties and raise
pressure on countries seeking nuclear weapons to renounce such ambitions. Presidents Barack Obama and
Dmitry Medvedev signed the pact at a ceremony in the
medieval Prague Castle after talks that covered nuclear
security, Iran’s atomic program and an uprising in the
strategic Central Asian state of Kyrgyzstan.
The agreement will cut strategic nuclear arsenals deployed
by the former Cold War foes by 30 percent within seven years
but leave each with enough to destroy the other.
White House spokesman Robert Gibbs said Obama hoped
and expected the US Senate would ratify the treaty this year,
before mid-term elections may change the composition of the
upper house of Congress, controlled by the Democrats.
Both major nuclear powers needed to show they were serious about reducing their vast stockpiles to lend weight to efforts
to curb the atomic ambitions of countries such as Iran and
North Korea, and avoid accusations of hypocrisy.
White House ofcials told reporters on Obama’s
ight to Prague that tougher UN sanctions against
Iran’s disputed nuclear program would be prominent in his talks with Medvedev, although no
specic announcements were expected.
“The Russians are already committed to
holding Iran accountable through the multilateral sanctions regime,” deputy National
Security Adviser Ben Rhodes said.
The situation in Kyrgyzstan, where
opposition protesters forced out
President Kurmanbek Bakiyev on
Wednesday, thrust its way on to the
agenda as both Washington and
Moscow have military bases in the
poor Central Asian state. The US
base at Manas is vital for supplying
NATO forces in Afghanistan.
Russian Prime Minister Vladimir
Putin effectively recognized the interim Kyrgyz government formed by
opposition leader Roza Otunbayeva
on Thursday, speaking to her by telephone, his spokesman said. There was
no immediate word on whether Washington would follow suit.
Obama this week announced a shift
in US nuclear doctrine, pledging never to use
atomic weapons against non-nuclear states, as
he sought to build momentum for an April 12-13
nuclear security summit in Washington.
The US president set out his long-term goal to
work towards a world without nuclear weapons in a
speech at the same Prague Castle a year ago.
Medvedev said on arrival on Wednesday that the
treaty could play a considerable role in shaping disarmament in the future.
Analysts expected Obama to use the signing to build pressure on Tehran, along with the nuclear summit in Washington
and a meeting with Chinese President Hu Jintao next week.
Steven Pifer, an arms control expert at the Brookings Institution, said the pact with Russia would give the US delegation
more credibility at the non-proliferation conference.
“If the United States and Russia were to show up with no
agreement and between the two of them controlling 95 percent
of the weapons, it’s pretty easy for the non-nuclear states to say,
‘well you’re not doing your part, why should we?’,” Pifer said.
Obama’s new nuclear strategy document broke with former President George W. Bush’s threat of nuclear retaliation
in the event of a biological or chemical attack.
The assurance applies only to countries in compliance
with the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, so Iran and North
Korea would not receive that commitment.
Washington and Moscow have plenty of differences on
issues ranging from Iran to missile defense.
On Tuesday, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov repeated Moscow’s threat to withdraw from the START II treaty if
U.S. plans for missile defense threatened Russia. Prague Reuters
The presidents of the United States and
Russia signed a landmark disarmament
treaty yesterday that they hope will raise
pressure on countries seeking nuclear
weapons to renounce such ambitions.
AP, PETR DAVID JOSEK
BOYCOTT
PHOTO
WORLD
Thai protesters scuffle with riot police outside broadcaster
Thai protesters scufed with riot police outside a satellite broadcaster on Thursday after the government blocked opposition websites
and TV channels on the second day of a state of
emergency to quell mass protests.
Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva called off a oneday trip to Vietnam for a Southeast Asian leaders
summit as tension remained high, with tens of thousands of protesters defying orders to end a six-day
siege of Bangkok’s main shopping district.
Despite the decree, the red-shirted supporters of ousted former Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra promised their biggest rally yet on Friday
after briey storming parliament this week.
Nearly 1,000 protesters tried to push through antiriot forces guarding Thaicom Pcl’s satellite earth station
in northern Pathum Thani Province. The company,
formerly owned by Thaksin, was used by the red shirts
to broadcast programmes before it was taken off air on
Thursday. The red shirts were demanding that it be back
in operation by the end of the day. The risk of a confrontation subdued Thailand’s recently hot stock market,
which fell more than three percent in its biggest fall in
more than two months, and brought a warning from the
central bank over possible fallout on the economy.
“We have to admit that the political factor has
affected consumers and business,” Bank of Thailand
Chief Economist Suchart Sakkankosone told reporters, adding unrest could inuence the timing of an
interest-rate rise most economists expect in June.
Abhisit faces a difcult choice: compromise and call
an election he could easily lose, or launch a crackdown
on tens of thousands of protesters that could stir up even
more trouble. Most analysts doubt the authorities will
use force to remove the mostly rural and working class
protesters who have been camped in Bangkok’s upmarket shopping district since Saturday -- a politically
risky decision for Abhisit as his 16-month-old coalition
government struggles to build support outside Bangkok.
But there were scattered reports of violence. Overnight, two men on a motorbike red into ofces of the
nationalist monarchist “yellow shirts,” arch rivals of
Thaksin and his allies, wounding two security guards. A
grenade lobbed at a yellow shirt radio station failed to
explode. The number of protesters in the district of malls
and luxury hotels was growing steadily. Numbers typically swell into the tens of thousands in the cooler evenings in a carnival-like atmosphere. Pressure is growing
on Abhisit from residents in Bangkok, a stronghold of
his Democrat Party, to take decisive action to end the
rolling protests, which began on March 14 when up to
150,000 massed in the city’s old quarter. Bangkok Reuters
12 TODAY’S ZAMAN
F R I D AY, A P R I L 9 , 2 0 1 0
EXPAT ZONE
Any brght deas?
Only more recently -- and particularly in private primary schools
and kindergartens in urban areas around Turkey -- will you witness children being encouraged to stand out and express themselves. The educational system is gradually changing.
While auditing graduate-level work at a Turkish university in
the department of history in the 1980s and later teaching anthropology and other subjects at a Turkish university, I observed that
the Turkish school system did not encourage creative thinking.
Just under half a century ago, I attended a public elementary
school in the United States where it was common for your teacher
to encourage you to be yourself and think for yourself. The teacher
created an atmosphere of free thinking. You’d be given something to make you smile and want to think -- even at an early age.
Maybe it was just a gold star sticker then, but later in life, rewards
would be greater. Every American child who grew up with Dr. Seuss books is familiar with this one:
It’s amazing what you can do with just a sticker or two
A sticker can make smiles grow quicker for me and you
There’s a sticker for a job well done,
And even a sticker for a job just begun,
A sticker for my very own book,
Or a sticker my just my very own book nook,
CULTURAL CORNER
CHARLOTTE
McPHERSON
There’s a sticker for this,
And a sticker for that,
And a very special sticker
For that cat in the hat!
As Western-style management in non-Western nations increases through globalization, a number of adults who were solely taught by the rote system are learning to feel free to express
their own opinions. Don’t misunderstand me! For older adults,
even in the West, one of the lasting memories from elementary
school is of our teacher using ash cards to teach us some important facts. Whether we were learning to read or remember
our basic math facts, ash cards were often the tool to help us
remember the information our teacher deemed important and,
later, to test our recall of those facts.
With the fast development of technology and the Internet,
young Turkish students have easy access to Google, Wikipedia
and online libraries and do not need to memorize every fact and
gure. Teaching children to think creatively so they can learn
to interpret and apply the knowledge available online is essential. Certainly in major urban areas in Turkey, educationalist are
moving in this direction. The only hindrance may be the lack of
computers in schools.
One major UK-based insurance company, Commercial Union,
which has grown rapidly in Turkey in the past decade, has been
contributing to its creative and energetic team. The company has
strongly encouraged all their Turkish staff to think outside the box.
I was told that the company created an atmosphere for bright ideas
to be shared, calling it “Cin Fikirler.”
Such an approach goes against the old popular notion
where it was believed that teachers (or managers) were the
fountain of knowledge.
Don Tapscott, author of “Wikinomics: How Mass Collaboration Changes Everything,” is convinced that the ability to learn
new things is more important than ever as it is crucial for everyone
to process new information at lightning speed.
Anyone who has the chance to express himself freely enjoys
the opportunity. Others who have not had the opportunity will
continue to say what they think you -- the boss or teacher -- wants
to hear. It dates back to trying to guess what the teacher wanted
them to say, not saying what they actually thought.
You will nd that your Turkish staff will begin to think for
themselves with a manager who encourages open and frank communication. This enables you to tackle issues well before they become problems and also take advantage of the creative ideas of
your employees. After all, don’t we all like to believe that others
are interested in what we have to say?
The attempts that companies such as Commercial Union and
others have made to provide the opportunity to communicate directly with the top managers enhances the sense of self-esteem of
workers and helps create in them a sense of belonging, a feeling
that what they think and feel is important to their organization.
“I think it’s the biggest change in a century in the ways that companies
build relationships and interact with other entities, institutions in the
economy and in society and arguably, the nature of the corporation itself.” -- Don Tapscott
Note: Charlotte McPherson is the author of “Culture Smart: Turkey, 2005.” Please keep
your questions and observations coming: I want to ensure this column is a help to you,
Today’s Zaman’s readers. Email: [email protected]
Protecting the culture
Gaziantep Mayor Asm Güzelbey, who sponsored the establishment of numerous museums
in the city, says their management approach
pays special attention to culture. “As is known,
Gaziantep is a major industrial city. The city’s
investors have taken advantage of investment
PHOTOS
Once a city famous for its baklava and pistachios, Gaziantep, or Antep in popular
parlance, has now become a popular destination for tourists because of its museums. There is
a host of museums with a variety of themes, so the
people visiting this city should allocate ample time
to explore these museums.
In the past, the baths in Gaziantep were the
subject of a number of folksongs, but today, the city
has become a popular spot because of its museums.
A multitude of museums with different content and
concepts are scattered around the city: the Panorama Museum, the War Museum, the City Museum,
etc. Regardless of why you come to the city, your
road ends at a museum. There are so many of them
that you have to set aside one full day if you want to
see them all. The artifacts removed from the excavation of the ancient city of Zeugma, the weapons
used in the defense of the city, ethnographic objects
and kitchen utensils are on display at these museums. Each day, the city discovers one of its hidden
treasures. This is also what city ofcials say.
Famous for its industrial facilities and cuisine,
Gaziantep now seeks to host visitors who want
to view its museums as well. Before you enter the
Panorama Museum located within the Gaziantep Castle, you encounter the statues of three local
heroes Karaylan, ehitkamil and ahinbey at the
entrance. As you enter the museum, you hear the
echoes: “I am from Antep. I am a hawk (ahin). I
don’t carry any gun as I will ght with my sts.” In
an atmosphere that is cool in summer and warm in
winter, you experience the unforgettable days of the
defense of Gaziantep. As you leave, you commemorate all the heroic souls who protected this city and
step into another museum.
There are two museums in the vicinity of the
castle: the Glassware Museum and the Emine
Göü Cuisine Museum. In the Glassware Museum, beautiful objects are on display. The Emine
Göü Cuisine Museum showcases Gaziantep’s
cuisine. As you tour around this museum, you can
get the recipes of dishes you like.
You drop by the Gaziantep Mosaic Museum before you visit the Bayazhan City Museum. The museum that has the artifacts from the Zeugma excavation site has been visited by many statesmen. Prime
Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoan, President Abdullah
Gül and former International Monetary Fund (IMF)
Mission Chief for Turkey Lorenzo Giorgianni are
among the recent visitors to the museum. After learning about the Zeugma mosaics, visitors tend to go to
the Bayazhan City Museum. Here, the traditions,
customs and handicrafts of the city are depicted.
Then, you can visit the Hasan Süzer Ethnography Museum. The Gaziantep War Museum,
opened two years ago after a 45-year wait, is about
life in the city during the occupation. Every visitor is
shown “taktaks,” which defeated the French army.
This tool is a product of the city’s intelligence. The
inhabitants of Antep could not nd weapons to
use against the strong French army, which occupied the city, so they developed a wooden tool that
produces a sound similar to a machine gun and
called it “taktak.” The enemy soldiers were perplexed when they heard the machine gun sounds
produced by these wooden tools. In addition to the
museums in the city center, there are also the Yesemek Open-Air Museum and the Zeugma excavation site, which are popular destinations.
TODAY’S ZAMAN
ADEM YILMAZ GAZANTEP
Gaziantep’s Panorama Museum,
War Museum and the City Museum
feature artifacts removed from the
excavation of the ancient city of
Zeugma, the weapons used in the
defense of the city, ethnographic
objects and kitchen utensils.
Antep’s museums
emerge to replace
its baths as popular
destinations
A multitude of museums
with different content and
concepts are scattered around
Gaziantep: the Panorama
Museum, the War Museum,
the City Museum, etc.
Regardless of why you come to
the city, famous for its baklava
and pistachios, your road ends
at a museum. There are so
many of them that you have to
set aside one full day if you
want to see them all
opportunities and built four organized industrial zones without government support. The
city earns $3 billion from exports and employs
65,000 people,” he says. Güzelbey also underlines that Gaziantep had seen a number of civilizations in the past. “After it was conquered by
Caliph Umar, Gaziantep became the cradle of
Turkish-Islamic civilizations. It has always been
a city of industry, commerce, peace, culture and
tourism. Industry has gained an upper hand
with the introduction of industrial culture. Until recently, no one has concentrated on the cultural values of the city. Now, it is an important
city of culture and arts,” he says.
Mayor Güzelbey stresses that they protect the cultural heritage of the city and at the
same time have the mission of looking forward. “Recently, ve big museums have been
established in the city. The Gaziantep Castle
has been made a center, and the historic relics
near the castle have been renovated. Currently, there are not many foreign tourists visiting
the city. But, for the last two years, the city has
had many domestic tourists. Museums, the
castle, historic relics and the city’s cuisine attract people to this city,” he explains.
Noting that they expect a second mosaic
museum to be completed soon, Güzelbey said:
“With this museum, we expect an increase
in the number of foreign visitors. In the past,
many foreign tourists visited Gaziantep. It was
a major destination for foreign tourists. They
would rst visit this city and then cities nearby.
However, the problems the country has suffered and terror have prevented them from
visiting the region. Our plan is to ensure that
Gaziantep is known for its museums.”
NOTE: Today’s Zaman intends to provide a lively forum for expatriates living in Turkey. We encourage you to contact us at [email protected] and share your experiences, questions and problems in all walks of life for publication in Today’s Zaman.
TODAY’S ZAMAN 13
FRIDAY, APRIL 9, 2010
TWO RIVAL PERFORMANCES OF
RACH 3: AND THE WINNER IS...
MEHMET YAMAN
CULTURE&ARTS
Since the stanbul State Symphony
Orchestra (DSO) was playing
Rachmaninoff’s Piano Concerto No.
3 with two different pianists, Leonel Morales
and David Helfgott, within ve days of each
other, I decided I would attend both concerts, compare them and select which pianist
I liked better. I have to admit I already had in
mind a slight favoritism toward one of them,
but I strove to be as open-minded as possible. With a concerto of that magnitude (one of
the most challenging in the repertoire) and
renown, it could turn into an amusing little
competition. One of these two pianists would just have to drop a few notes or worse:
bore me, and I’d have an instant winner -the other one. Well, the results surprised me.
Australian pianist
David Helfgott
PHOTO
ALEXANDRA IVANOFF STANBUL
TODAY’S ZAMAN
First contender: Leonel Morales
On April 2, Leonel Morales made his second
appearance in stanbul; this time, playing this
work with DSO at the Caddebostan Cultural
Center (CKM). Morales is a Cuban-born pianist who now lives in Spain, where he is the
founder and artistic director of several piano
festivals and competitions. He has recorded,
in addition to some of the standard piano repertoire, several albums of Spanish composers’ works. His tall and handsome appearance and his dignied manner took me back
to another era: a suave, old-fashioned formality reminiscent of lms of the 1940s. As his
large hands did a lmic sweep over the keyboard, his cool demeanor never broke a sweat, remaining always elegant.
The “Rach 3,” as it is known, is a more diffuse work than Concerto No. 2, which is chock
full of romantic and memorable melodies. No.
3 begins with a quiet three-note theme that
gets developed over and over, with many permutations. Morales began it imperceptibly, almost out of nowhere, then leaned into the musical line with grace, letting the sonorities bloom in their own time, never pushing them into
each other. Conductor Emin Güven Yalçam’s
swift and accurate cueing of the orchestra and
Morales’ precision and power built an enormously exciting climax in the middle of the
rst movement. The second movement’s
breathtakingly beautiful muted violins’ purring of the trademark Rachmaninoff melodic
and rhythmic styling was just like a lm score;
Yalçam couldn’t quite get the horns to deliver the passion, but the strings got the message. The third movement brings a chilling
march-like theme, followed by a second theme that gives the pianist a knuckle-busting
marathon with a multitude of cascading gures. The nale is one of music’s all-time thrills.
Morales delivered every note on time, with a
bit less bravura than most but with ample fortitude. A clean, somewhat objective performance -- beautiful, but not extraordinary.
Second contender: David Helfgott
On April 6 at the Hagia Eirene Museum,
again with DSO, Australian pianist David
Helfgott performed the concerto that was in
the movie that made him famous. Helfgott
is the subject of the 1996 Oscar-winning
lm, “Shine,” about a mentally troubled pianist who manages to overcome his illness
enough to triumph in concert with “Rach 3.”
Because of the celebrity status the lm gives
him, his concert tours around the world are
sold out and the media eats him up. Audiences respond to him via his story and the
result is a night of adulation and support
for his struggle and for his musicianship -which is considerable, despite a few bizarrities I’m still scratching my head about. There are plenty of lesser-known genius-level
pianists who would love to have a crack at
this concerto on a world tour and have the
media shower them with the kind of attention Helfgott gets. And how does Helfgott
get attention? He’s got an act on the stage that rivals Harpo Marx’s shenanigans.
He’s a hyperactive child who is in constant
motion, he uses a thumbs-up hand motion at every opportunity (even in the middle of a piece), and audibly talks, growls and
sings his way through the concerto. If he’s
not playing for a minute or two (even though the orchestra is), he turns to the audience and gives them the thumbs-up routine as if to say “Isn’t this great?”
His playing at times reminded me of
an over-eager freshman conservatory student who typically takes everything at breakneck speed because he hasn’t learned
about subtlety and nesse yet. While Helfgott is a master at speed (in fact, that’s re-
Cuban pianist
Leonel Morales
The stanbul State
Symphony Orchestra
hosted two pianists of
worldwide fame, Leonel
Morales and David Helfgott,
within ve days of each
other in early April, both
presenting Rachmaninoff’s
‘Piano Concerto No. 3’
ally where he excels -- his extraordinarily
nimble ngers toss off the famous “Flight
of the Bumblebee” like it’s a simple warmup exercise), the other elements in the performance are suspect in two ways, in my
opinion. Firstly, he uses the damper pedal
so much that it makes the music bleed all
over itself; secondly, he doesn’t know how
to build a climax. Everything in Helfgott’s
book is a climax. After a while, it starts to
sound like so much hammering; if everything is loud, where can you go from there?
Were there some good things? Denitely. Helfgott’s ability to punch out the structural points in this concerto, which often
tends to ramble and wander, worked beautifully in the swimmy acoustics of Hagia Eirene. He does render a remarkably vivid performance, even if troublingly self-indulgent
at times. Helfgott has enough substantial
musical chops and even more oddball charisma to bring new people into the concert hall.
In the rst half of the concert he played three
solos including Franz Liszt’s dark and demonic “Dante” Sonata -- not exactly easy listening -- and there wasn’t a peep in the house
as everyone gave him full attention. The team
of student ushers who crammed themselves
onto the balcony staircase turned off their cell
phones, stopped talking and listened to Liszt
and Rachmaninoff; that’s got to be better
brain food than the latest hip-hop DJ’s hits.
And the winner? Rachmaninoff. His
glorious music reached new ears this week,
and that’s the most important thing of all.
CONFERENCE
CONCERT
Shahira Fahmy to speak at
25th ARKIMEET conference
Ian Hobson to pay homage to
Chopin with MKM program
International award-winning young Egyptian architect Shahira Fahmy will be in stanbul next week,
speaking at the 25th edition of the ARKIMEET conference series, which has been running since 2003.
Fahmy, who also teaches at Cairo University, will
speak about her designs and her outlook on architecture during the conference, organized by the Arkitera Architecture Center and scheduled for April
13 at Bahçeehir University’s Beikta campus.
US-based English pianist, conductor and teacher
Ian Hobson will be this month’s guest at the stanbul Recitals concert series, performing next week
at the Mustafa Kemal Center (MKM). Hobson will
present a program titled “Pure Chopin,” made in its
entirety of pieces by Frédéric Chopin, marking the
200th anniversary of the Polish composer’s birth, in
what will be his rst-ever appearance in stanbul.
Hobson’s concert is scheduled for April 14 at 8 p.m.
FILM SCREENING
Turkish climbers’ Everest
expedition on big screen
“Hazr msn Everest?” (Everest, Are You Ready?),
a 2008 documentary that chronicles the 2006 scaling of Mount Everest by a team of Turkish climbers,
will be screened on Saturday at the Association of
Documentary Filmmakers in Turkey’s (BSB) weekly
program at the BSB center in stanbul’s Beyolu. The
65-minute lm, directed by Mustafa Temizta, will
be shown at 2 p.m., followed by a panel discussion
with the director. For reservations: (212) 245 9096
PHOTO
Two rival performances of Rachmaninoff’s
Balama player Cem Yldz
‘Folk 2.0’ from singerbalama player Cem
Yldz and friends
RUMEYSA KIGER STANBUL
Turkish balama player and vocalist Cem Yldz, who is known for his many collaborations with Turkish artists such as Zülfü Livaneli, ükriye Tutkun and Yldz Tilbe, will be giving a concert
tonight at stanbul’s French Cultural Center in Taksim together with French oud player Jean-Pierre
Smadj and Uzbek musician Rustem Mahmoudov
in support of their newly released album, “Hü.”
“‘Hü’ is a kind of greeting in the Alevi and Mevlevi traditions, and some of the songs on the album
include it in the lyrics,” Yldz explains in an interview with Today’s Zaman. “The album consists
of Alevi folk songs and sayings. I rearranged these songs from Anatolia with my own interpretations. Unlike the widespread interpretations featuring
a single balama and vocals, this album features an
electronic sound that doesn’t damage the authentic structure of the original songs. We think everyone will like it,” he says, adding that they will perform
on stage with the same team and instruments that
they had in the studio in order to make sure the audience gets to hear the same sound as on the album.
Featuring many well-known Turkish folk songs
from Anatolia, the album consists of 12 songs, all
of which are performed with the balama and a
sprinkling of electronic music. “I picked the songs
on the album, and following a year-long process we
released the album. I aimed to create a unity among
the songs and since I have been familiar with them
for such a long time, I tried to nd compatible ones
in terms of rhythm and melody,” he notes.
Yldz, a graduate of the Turkish State Music Conservatory at stanbul Technical University (TÜ), also
says that this was a project he wanted to do for a long
time, since his university years. “While I was making
the soundtrack to the Turkish movie ‘Baka Semtin
Çocuklar’ [Children of the Other Side], I sang ‘Ötme
Bülbül’ [Don’t Sing], and through this song this album
concept was shaped. We did the soundtrack of the movie ‘Muro’ together with Smadj. We were very good
friends and musically compatible. He was a musician
whose music I already appreciated. I also performed in
his projects before. I asked if he would like to join me in
such a project, and he accepted,” he explained.
Later on, Uzbek musician Mahmoudov, who has
released seven albums in his home country, was also
included in the project. “We were performing in various musical collaborations with Rustem for almost
one-and-a-half years. He is very much familiar with
the music of this region,” Yldz noted, adding that
this collaboration is an outcome of friendship. “If we
weren’t friends, we may not have been able to create
this synergy even if we are all talented musicians. We
have a lot of fun together while playing, recording at
the studio and performing on the stage,” he added.
Like Yldz’s band Orient Expressions, which
brings together musicians from a wide range of musical genres, this project also gathers musicians with
different artistic backgrounds. Asked whether it is
hard to keep a balanced musical approach between
so many different perspectives, Yldz says that both
in the case of Orient Expressions and for the “Hü” album project, they started with recording and having
fun during the process. “We were not concerned
with founding a band or making an album, but in the
end we achieved very good results. Both in the work
of Orient Expressions and the album ‘Hü,’ all of us
contributed with our voices and various colors. [Our
differences] did not turn into a disadvantage, but an
advantage. We improved a lot together,” he says.
Bezar’s ‘Min Dît’ wins
Grand Prix in Prague
Groove Armada
FESTIVAL
Ting Tings, Groove Armada
headline June’s One Love fest
Indie pop duo The Ting Tings, electronic music duo
Groove Armada and the hip-hop group De La Soul
will headline this summer’s Efes Pilsen One Love
Festival in stanbul, the organizers announced this
week. German indie band The Whitest Boy Alive
and British rockers Wild Beasts are also on the lineup of the festival’s ninth edition, slated for June
19-20 at Santralstanbul. Tickets for the festival
went on sale on Thursday at Biletix sales points.
“Min Dît/Ben Gördüm” (The Children of Diyarbakr), Kurdish-born lmmaker Miraz
Bezar’s debut feature, won the Grand Prix at this
year’s Febiofest International Film Festival Prague.
“The Children of Diyarbakr,” which opened last
week in several Turkish cities in limited release and
which is vying for the Golden Tulip in the 29th stanbul Film Festival’s national competition, won rave reviews from critics and the festival jury in Prague, who
praised the drama for its “strong story, surprising
plot, wonderful cast … deep message,” according to
the festival Web site. The lm beat 12 other European entrants in Febiofest’s New Europe Cinema competition, which also included the UK’s “The Scouting
Book for Boys,” which grabbed second place, and the
Bulgarian lm “Eastern Plays,” which won third place. The 17th Febiofest ran March 25-April 2.
Set in the ’90s, “The Children of Diyarbakr” tells
the story of two Kurdish siblings in Diyarbakr, who,
after witnessing their parents’ murder, are forced to
live on the streets of the city. stanbul Today’s Zaman
14 TODAY’S ZAMAN
Have you seen that photo in which Nazi ofcials appear to
be having a lot of fun? They’re standing on a wooden bridge,
all posed in their own way; one man carries an accordion.
They are so cheerful, you would even want to share their
enjoyment. But it is a photo taken in a Nazi concentration
camp. In that very particular moment, these “cheerful ofcials” may even be smelling the stench of burning human
esh coming from the crematorium right in front of them.
Who are these people? Are they monsters? I think
they were the “normal,” “ordinary” men and women of
their own time. If we could go back in time and interview
each of them, we could get responses such as “We were
following orders. We thought we were serving the best
interests of our country,” and, “On that particular day,
we thought we deserved to have a damned good open
door party, we had so much fun.”
If there was any person in that group who could
not manage to entertain himself or failed to share in
his friends’ “joy,” he would probably be labeled as
“weird,” the “strange guy,” the “neurotic one.”
In times of crisis, our “normal” man just follows
orders without feeling any discomfort, whereas some
men and women, and they always constitute a minority in any given society, disobey the orders and follow what their personal conscience dictates to them.
The majority bend everything -- their religious beliefs,
their ideologies, personal beliefs -- to follow “orders.”
Only a small minority go in a different direction.
Milgram experiment
In 1961, psychologist Stanley Milgram performed an extremely interesting study at Yale University. The purpose of
this test was to measure the willingness of study participants
to obey an authority gure who instructed them to perform
to acts that conicted with their personal conscience.
Milgram invited experimenters from all walks
of life. The real purpose of the experiment was disguised very cleverly. The experimenters were told
that the university was doing a study to examine the
effects of punishment on learning abilities.
There were three people in the test room: Milgram
(the authority gure), the “student” (his assistant) and
a “teacher” (experimenter). The experimenters were told
that they had an equal chance of playing the role of a student or a teacher, but the process was rigged so that all experimenters ended up playing the role of the “teacher.”
PHOTO
COULD YOU BE
A GENOCIDE
PERPETRATOR?
AP
PHOTO
AP, MICHEL SPINGLER
F R I D AY, A P R I L 9 , 2 0 1 0
A study conducted by psychologist Stanley Milgram in 1961 demostrated that the majority
bend everything - -their religious beliefs, ideologies and personal beliefs - - to follow “orders.”
ORHAN KEMAL
CENGZ
[email protected]
In times of crisis, our ‘normal’ man
just follows orders without feeling any discomfort, whereas some
men and women, and they always
constitute a minority in any given
society, disobey orders and follow
what their personal conscience
dictates to them. The majority
bend their religious beliefs and
personal beliefs to follow ‘orders’
“Teachers” were asked to administer increasingly
severe electric shocks to the “learners” when they failed
to answer questions correctly. At the beginning of the
test, the “teachers” were given a low-dosage electric
shock to show them that the shocks they would give
the students were “real.” In fact, the cable attached to
the “student” was not connected to anything.
The “teacher” was not in a position to give any actual
electricity, but the “student” was able to see how much
“voltage” the teacher was giving him on a panel in front
of him. The “student” started to grunt with feigned pain
when he saw the teacher attempt to give him a 74-volt
shock. He yelled, moaned, begged, cried and screamed as
the test continued and the voltage increased.
It is quite an interesting test, but I am not able to go
into all the details of it due to my column’s space limitations. What happened at the end?
Of course the “teachers” hesitated at some points,
but with the approval of the “authority” gure they
gave “deadly” electric volts (450) to the “student,”
who was “begging” them to stop the “experiment.”
During this trial, only a minority of “teachers” questioned the authority, while 65 percent of the “teach-
ers” were willing to progress to the maximum voltage
level. If the electricity they thought they were giving
had been real, they would have killed innocent people.
Obedient or disobedient
Do you think this experiment would produce any
different result in the community that you belong
to? I do not think so. We all like to think of ourselves
as “normal” people, but normal people can do terrible things when circumstances allow. In this Milgram test 65 percent of the experimenters lost their
humanity in a couple of hours. Try to imagine what
they could be capable of doing under “harsh” conditions and as a result of being subjected to long-term
agitation and brainwashing.
All these memories and thoughts came to my mind
when I read Clive Owen’s article in The Times daily
this Wednesday. Owen is an extremely talented movie
star, but with this article of his, titled “In Rwanda, it’s
as if genocide is still going on,” he also proved a gifted
writer. Owen visited Rwanda very recently and in this
article he shared his observations about the situation
in Rwanda. Towards the end of his article he made some
comments I found quite thought provoking. He said:
“The overriding feeling I came away with was not that
there was a group of awful people doing terrible things during that time, it’s that we, as human beings, have the potential to do it. You don’t have to have an evil disposition to get
involved in the horrors of something like this.
“People there were swept up into doing such things
that, years later, they are still asking themselves why. To
try to have a level of understanding of that is hugely important. It’s not about them and us. We have the potential to be those people. It’s a situation that develops that
you have to be incredibly careful about.”
Owen is right. We all should be very careful about
what we are getting ourselves into at all times. But if we
start to question how a human being can do such terrible
things to another human being, we should start from the
very beginning, from our families, from school. And we
should question everything, starting with being a “normal” person. After all this deep questioning and after
transforming our cultural codes accordingly, we may
create a culture in which the majority would refuse to
take part in this cheerful Nazi picnic. We should question the Nazi within. What do you think?
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OPINION
HUGH
POPE
[email protected]
Turkey’s new ambton to
stablze the Mddle East
Turkey’s negotiations to join the European Union may have faltered of late,
but, in a little-noticed turnaround, it is
now using the same ideas that brought
stability to post-World War II Europe in
an effort to calm the bitter divisions of
the Middle East.
Syria, Jordan, Libya and Lebanon
have recently joined Iran and other
regional countries enjoying visa-free
business and tourism with Turkey. Ankara, also doing all it can to champion
the integration of regional infrastructure, has successfully boosted trade
with its neighbors, and is now even
bringing governments together for joint
meetings of senior Cabinet ministers.
This conversion to the basic EU
idea of progress through interdependence is still in its infancy, partly because Middle Eastern regimes can fear
that regional integration is a political
threat. Turkey long shared this tendency too, until the end of the Cold
War allowed its sense of security and
commercial opportunity to rise. The
centre-right Justice and Development
Party (AK Party) government, in power
since 2002, has developed even further
the country’s growing ties with Russia,
Africa and particularly Muslim neighbors in the Middle East.
Early in this period, Turkey’s relationship with the European Union
sped ahead. Despite many obstacles
after 2005 -- including Europe’s Turkey-skeptics, the slow pace of Turkish
domestic reform and the stand-off over
Cyprus -- Turkey remains in a full negotiating process that could still lead to
membership of the club in a decade or
two. Already Europe’s biggest city according to Eurostat, Europeans have
begun to see stanbul as a culturally
European city in recent years due to its
newly sophisticated shopping, nightlife
and festivals.
These apparently contradictory
dynamics have reopened debate on
the question of whether Turkey is
becoming “European,” “Eurasian,”
“neo-Ottoman” or even “Islamic.”
Few take into account the limitations
of Ottoman Empire analogies and the
relatively predictable modern Turkish
context. This debate is also too often a
proxy for domestic political concerns -be it Europeans fearful about jobs, immigration and Islam, Arab commentators seeking sticks with which to beat
their own governments, or pro-Israel
activists seeking to bring US pressure
to bear on Turkey.
In fact, the EU and the West in
general, contrary to what some Europeans think, need Turkey partly for the
stabilizing impact that it wants to have
among its eastern neighbors. Ankara’s
priority is not a reborn caliphate, but
the expansion of an economy that is
already more than half the size of the
whole of the Middle East and North
African region. When Prime Minister
Recep Tayyip Erdoan makes over-enthusiastic statements on visiting Khartoum, Tehran or Damascus, he is partly
thinking of the contracts to be signed
by the hundreds of business supporters
who accompany him. Similarly, when
Erdoan visited the United States last
December, the main public result was a
joint committee to boost trade.
AK Party leaders, even if they have
left behind the Islamism of their youth,
certainly feel a special warmth for fellow Muslim leaders. Some AK Party
ofcials even talk of Erdoan as the
“representative of 1.5 billion Muslims.”
But Turkey as a whole is more interested in Europe and visitors to Turkish
bookshops will search in vain for much
about the Middle East.
Turkey actually sells proportionally less to the Middle East than it did
two decades ago, a gure that represents less than a quarter of its total
exports. The EU has long accounted
for half of Turkish trade and for
nearly 90 percent of foreign investment in 2008. Some 4 million Turks
live in Europe, vastly outnumbering
the couple of hundred thousand in
the Middle East. Turkish airline companies y frequently to a dense web of
European cities, but serve more destinations inside Turkey than in Iran and
Arab states. While two Turkish Airlines
(THY) planes a day connect stanbul
and Damascus, four go to Tel Aviv.
Extraordinary praise in Arab newspapers for Erdoan when he confronts
Israel should also not be mistaken for
Arab endorsement of Turkish regional
hegemony. Arab envoys to Turkey say
they are happy to see a fellow Sunni
Muslim state act as spokesperson for
their concerns and as a counter-balance to the rejectionist deance of Shia
Muslim Iran. But they say their governments can feel uneasy at Erdoan’s
outbursts of anti-Israel populism and
that they would reject any Turkish effort to do more than offer its good ofces in regional disputes.
Turkey’s rising interest in its neighbors persuaded its leading think tank,
the Turkish Economic and Social Studies Foundation (TESEV), to ask 2,000
people in seven Arab countries what
they thought. In November it published results that found that threequarters of respondents were in favor of
a high-prole role for Turkey in IsraeliPalestinian and other Middle Eastern
issues. But 57 percent said they wanted
to see “a Muslim country” in the EU,
and 64 percent believed that Turkey’s
EU negotiation process had a positive
impact on its role in the Arab world -including 62 percent in Saudi Arabia.
Turkey also believes EU ideas can
help heal the divisions of the region.
The recent popularity of Turkish sitcoms and singers in the Arab world is
not just because the two have grown
closer once again. In a Turkey in which
EU-inspired reforms and competition
have helped open up society, the economy and culture, Turkish music and
lms are now simply much better made
-- and win more prizes in Europe too.
*This article is adapted from one rst published in al-Majalla.
Daðýstan Çetinkaya
[email protected]
COLUMNS
TODAY’S ZAMAN 15
FRIDAY, APRIL 9, 2010
Into the storm
Many readers complain that they are now beginning to lose track
of what is happening around the wave of arrests and investigations
in the military and the developing ght within the judiciary about
their proceedings. I do not blame them. At this stage it has become
difcult even for we experienced journalists to keep track of who is
who and what is what. But, paradoxically, the more mesmerizing
and complicated it becomes, the clearer the picture. We are getting
closer, day by day, to the quiet after the storm.
The fate of such times is that it may, for some outsiders and foreigners, hold traps and temptations in falling prey to manipulations. The
blaming of journalists in Turkey for acting as a ock for manipulation
may be justied if one is talking about colleagues who have been conducting their duties with organic or ideological links to the corporatist
state structures, but not for others. Those others have spent their lives
refusing to play such games of “make believe” at the cost of being marginalized or unemployed, or, at worst, in a prison or a graveyard. This
reached its peak in the late ’80s and remained for the entire ’90s.
So, if many of them pay extra attention and are fully engaged in the
burning issues and unfolding stories surrounding the once-monolithic
structures of a sort of loose Soviet-style state, it is simply because their
ETYEN
MAHÇUPYAN
YAVUZ
BAYDAR
[email protected]
memory is very good and their experience of the past is very valuable.
For decades, this type of reporter or editor, who worked in a non-transparent environment, developed greater skills than their colleagues in
Western democracies by meticulously putting bits and pieces together,
in unnamed solidarity with other decent colleagues, to understand and
tell the truth. Once they were called “Marxists,” “traitors” or “separatists,” and are now being accused of being “liberals” or “Islamists” or
what not, but to most of them none of it matters; they know that they
have been acting as journalists in good faith to the profession.
“There is only one motto for us journalists in these times,” I told
a colleague (who despite his sincere search for truth himself has been
labeled as a “staunch secularist”) in a candid discussion recently, “to
proceed with conscience and fairness, but also with cold-blooded ra-
No Comment
tionality.” Winds will blow from every direction and only an honest
effort to complete the picture of this puzzle called Turkey can be the
powerful response to all suspicion, labeling and propaganda.
As the Turkish media is divided between honesty and dishonesty,
what seems to have made our readers and the general audience of Turkey confused in the recent twists and turns about the military and the
judiciary need to be claried. The details are in the reporting of, for example, this paper. The high military command and the high judiciary,
disguised parallel structures of the “state within,” are crumbling, together and internally. These two “inner state” structures, as opposed to
a single party, have brought about the major cracks and rifts.
Two major stories are unfolding. One of them is the row between
a former top commander, Hilmi Özkök, and a former army commander, Çetin Doan, who is suspected of planning to stage a coup
some seven years ago. Özkök, who has known of coup plans and
averted them, knows a lot. Doan, regardless of being involved in
clandestine activity, represents a powerful, continuous clique within
the army, which want to keep it as a dominant player in politics. Putting everything in the context of an “institutional watershed” may be
quite helpful, to avoid being lured into details. Then, one will also be
SEOUL, REUTERS
[email protected]
AL
BULAÇ
[email protected]
The regme’s
character
The republican administration had a unique “character” to begin with.
The rst Chamber of Deputies (Parliament), which reected Turkey’s
pluralistic structure, was dissolved, and Mustafa Kemal Atatürk set up
the Second Chamber of Deputies with men he personally chose. But
that was not enough. He also developed a small parliamentary group
that was loyal to him and authorized them to make the most important decisions. In 1925, in other words less than two years after the
new regime was founded, freedom of speech was severely restricted
by the Takrir-i Sükun (Law on the Reinstatement of Public Order) for
good. The opposition was silenced, and the people were oppressed.
They all stepped aside from politics. The opposition that had been oppressed was not made up of religious people. On the contrary, they
were people who had been raised in a Western culture, had liberal
ideas and defended the existence of legitimate politics. This led to the
emergence of a “republic” that made an authoritarian mentality commonplace, limited the public sphere by way of nationalism and secularism and created a new privileged class around the leader.
After a while, advancing and getting rich through benets became
a normal part of the system. Instead of protesting it, society tried to
get a share of the prots. So “democracy” in Turkey meant sharing
the privileges in the monopolistic structure with the people. People
entered politics for this purpose, and deputies turned into businessmen who were only concerned with the returns on their investments.
On the other hand, the administrative staff around the statist elite
was concerned that the administrative privilege they possessed would
become systematic. With the global conjuncture appropriate, the regime was predicated on the “domestic threat” concept. Using the
threat of communism as a pretext, a left-wing opposition was not allowed to exist. Due to its secular and “pro-change” nature, Kemalism
was presented as the “real” left politics. In this way, all parties except
the Republican People’s Party (CHP) were declared either separatist
and illegitimate or rightist and non-modern. As a result, Kurds and
religious people, in other words, the majority of the people, lost the
opportunity to conduct politics with their own identities. All other parties either became like the CHP over time or they were closed down.
While the political spectrum looked like it represented the nation
because people voted in the elections, it actually was never representative of social demands and choices. Political parties became eager
to defend the limitation of rights and powers and statism in order to
stay alive. To avoid risks, political parties had to stay out of important
national matters and consider them issues that were “above politics.”
In brief, the “character” of the republican regime in Turkey mandated a dual structure. The responsibility of politics, as it was known,
was to improve economic and social conditions. Foreign policy, security, secularism, personal rights and freedoms were issues that were
“above politics” and so had to be entrusted to an authority “above
politics.” But all these issues implied hard-to-change strategies that
made the state’s continuity a fundamental factor. Furthermore, all of
these were areas that required expertise beyond social knowledge and
opinions and had aspects that were state secrets.
During the period of a single-party government, the dual structure did not pose a problem because the “above politics” area was left
to Atatürk. Then there was a transitional period between 1938 and
1946, when the CHP and its new leader, smet nönü, became authorized. But the world was pushing Turkey to adopt a more pluralistic
system, and there was a risk that the CHP would not remain in power.
There was a need to institutionalize the Atatürk-nönü line and make
its above politics status permanent. The army, which was already very
interested in assuming this kind of position, was the only institution
that could manage and carry out this function. In this way, Turkey
switched to a military tutelage regime. The multi-party “democracy”
was just a facade of the regime. The regime was under the military
tutelage’s domination with respect to all important issues.
Therefore, unlike Latin American countries, Turkey hinted at a
politics/military relationship. The army staged a coup not to establish a
new order but to prevent the current order from changing. It is for this
reason that as soon as the situation returned to “normal,” they withdrew from power on their own. That is because the “normal” order
was a tutelage system that rendered them “above politics” and that
put them in charge of the country anyway. The ideal was to have a
civil government that wouldn’t make a coup necessary, but if civilians
overstepped their area of freedom, a coup would be essential.
This structure was maintained until the 1980 coup. The 1982
Constitution was written under the assessment that staging coups
was no longer easy, so the aim was to make military tutelage “legal.” In this way, there would be no need to stage a coup because
the higher judiciary would protect the regime anyway.
Nowadays, that period is coming to an end as well. Turkey
is slowly getting rid of its tutelage system. The “character” of the
republic is changing.
able to understand a high number of judges’ (many more than prosecutors) efforts to shed light on how much of the country’s powerful
institution of the army is (ideologically) corrupt. The recent attempt to
arrest some 25 generals and admirals on active duty raised the concern that the percentage might be higher than suspected.
The second story involves the judiciary. Increasingly divided and
under threat of becoming dysfunctional, part of the judiciary is now
positioning itself against the executive and legislative powers and seeks
to create a new alliance with its traditional co-traveller: the high command. The rift that widened after the emdinli and Erzincan incidents
and grew with the recent obstruction of many high-rank ofcers being arrested and the removal of three “special” prosecutors from the
Sledgehammer case by the stanbul Chief Public Prosecutor tells us
about the state of the rule of law and equality before justice too.
None of this is unusual. The privileged will resist or seek consensus.
Cases such as the resistance in the Deep South of the US in the early
’60s or the changes during the transition from apartheid in South Africa
come to mind as similar situations. But, here the fronts are sharper, the
trenches deeper and the imposed state ideology much stiffer. We will
have to expect more storms and hope that they will clear the air.
Mardin fatwa
Not t to prnt
NICOLE
POPE
[email protected]
A leaked classied US military video, published on the Internet by the whistleblowing organization Wikileaks, is causing a
buzz in cyberspace. It shows a shooting incident that took place
in a suburb of Baghdad in 2007 and involves the crew of a US
Apache helicopter apparently shooting at armed insurgents. In
fact, two Reuters reporters were among the dozen people killed
in the shooting, which also wounded two children.
The excitement of the crew is obvious in the sound recording that
accompanies the images. Unless you have a particularly thick skin,
you will inevitably be affected, and horried, by the soldiers’ apparent
enthusiasm for their job: “Light’em all up,” followed by a congratulatory “Nice!” when the target is hit. “Look at those dead bastards.”
Sadly, these exchanges are not out of the ordinary. Anyone who
has ever been near a conict zone knows that this detached and casual tone in the face of death is fairly characteristic of war speak the world
over. A potent mix of fear and adrenaline causes a high, and military
training ensures a level of dehumanization needed to ensure that soldiers can shoot at fellow human beings without hesitation or delay.
Civilians often get caught up in the crossre, but war also has
a lasting impact on the combatants who have their ngers on the
trigger. Governments are usually quite successful at keeping a tight
lid on the realities of the front, and veterans, scarred by their experiences, are often reluctant to talk about life on the front line.
The 17-minute recording recently released by Wikileaks
gives the general public a glimpse of the reality of war, which differs from the carefully worded rules of engagement published by
military authorities. Nor does it resemble the sterilized accounts
reected in the media, particularly the images shown on television, edited to remove gory aspects that might upset viewers
watching the news during their evening meal. Incidentally, war
correspondents too can become addicted to the buzz of war.
In Turkey, too, over the years, reporting on the conict in the
Southeast was carefully managed. The Turkish media still devote
plenty of air time and column inches to soldiers’ funerals, but I
can remember few in-depth accounts of the long-term physical
and psychological impact of the conict on the soldiers themselves in the media. Nadire Mater’s excellent book “Mehmet’in
Kitab” (Voices from the Front), based on interviews with veterans, revealed some unsavory truths about the ghting but also
about the veterans’ difcult reinsertion in society after they returned. Mater was prosecuted, but eventually acquitted, for lifting
a veil on a reality the authorities didn’t want the public to see.
That this visual evidence of the Iraq incident is, of course, another interesting aspect of this story. When Reuters news agency
tried to obtain footage of the incident that resulted in the death of
two of its employees, the Pentagon refused to comply. But in the
Internet era, preventing leaks has become much harder. The US
National Security Council may have branded Wikileaks a threat
to national security, but the whistleblowers found out about this,
too. If mainstream media outlets have lost some of the muscle
needed to challenge governments and special interests, the Internet is offering new opportunities, although sifting solid information from tainted noise can be a challenge in itself.
In Turkey, it is the Taraf newspaper, rather than the Internet, that
has channeled most of the revelations that have dominated the news
in recent months. Little is known about the award-winning Wikileaks except for the identity of its founder, Julian Assange. Anonymity is
perhaps what makes the organization so inuential, as well as obvious care that its editors take in ensuring the veracity of the news they
release. So far, the organization has been involved in major scoops
ranging from toxic dumps in Africa to e-mail correspondence between climate change scientists and nancial scandals.
But squeezed nancially, Wikileaks temporarily suspended publication late last year, although it is said to have hundreds of thousands
of controversial documents in its possession. The release of the Baghdad air strike video will, hopefully, convince potential funders that the
services it offers are of crucial interest to the public at large.
The England-based Global Center for Renewal and Guidance (GCRG) and Canopus Consulting organized a symposium in Mardin on March 27-28. The topic of the symposium
was the fatwa delivered by Ibn Taymiyya to the Muslims in
Mardin. The fatwa is allegedly used by al-Qaeda to justify
“terrorist activities.”
The fatwa was delivered in 1302 in response to a question
from someone in Mardin, which at the time was under Mongolian invasion. The factor that played the main role in the
fatwa was “military occupation.” The nal declaration of the
symposium stated that the actions of terror groups are not jihad, but arbitrary murder and announced that “Ibn Taymiyya’s
fatwa concerning Mardin can under no circumstances be appropriated and used as evidence for leveling the charge of kufr
[unbelief] against fellow Muslims, waging revolt against rulers,
deeming their lives and property freely accessible to Muslims,
terrorizing those who enjoy safety and security, acting treacherously towards those who live [in harmony] with fellow Muslims
or with whom fellow Muslims live [in harmony] via the bond of
citizenship and peace.”
According to reports in the media, this joint declaration by
the scholars who convened in Mardin abrogates Ibn Taymiyya’s
fatwa. There is nothing in the declaration that suggests this.
What it says is that it is incorrect to use the text of the fatwa to
justify the actions of some groups.
According to other comments in the media, various political groups and organizations engaged in armed revolt against
the administrations of their respective countries due to their
whimsical attitude and actions. This is not mentioned in the
fatwa, either. As for the concepts of Dar al-Islam (house of
Islam) and Dar al-Harb (house of war), they point to completely different historical and social contexts. It is difcult to
create a fatwa on revolting against administrations using Ibn
Taymiyya’s fatwa because he did not accept kufr (unbelief) as
a reason to wage war (see “Bat’nn bn Teymiyye Yanlgs”
[The West’s Misconception of Ibn Taymiyya] by Ahmet Kurucan, Zaman, April 3, 2010.)
The fatwa only concerns the liberation of Muslim territories
under military occupation. The nal declaration undersigned
by those who participated in the symposium does not mention
this issue at all. Yet this was exactly what the people of Mardin
wanted Ibn Taymiyya to give a fatwa on. The question was this:
Should the people of an occupied nation resist or surrender?
Of course, Ibn Taymiyya would and ultimately did say, “Those
who have the strength should show resistance.”
According to Islamic jurisprudence, one fatwa does not
repeal another fatwa. According to prominent Islamic scholar
Hayrettin Karaman, who has expressed his view on the matter,
only ijma (consensus) can make a fatwa or ijtihad invalid: “If an
enemy occupies a Muslim country or part of a Muslim country, attempts to occupy or attacks a Muslim country, there is no
question that all Muslims who can re a gun have an obligation to ght back. Of course, they will need to show resistance
and repel the attack.” (“Fetva Kaldrlamaz” (A fatwa cannot
be abrogated), Yeni afak April 1, 2010). There is no fatwa or
ijma that prohibits resistance against occupation or war against
occupying forces. Ibn Taymiyya insists on showing resistance to
occupation. He also fought against the Mongols like a solider.
Since the war took place during the month of Ramadan, he also
issued a fatwa that people could break their fast due to the war.
So then the question is, are there similarities between the
people of Mardin during that time and Muslims living in Palestine, Iraq and Afghanistan today? If we take “military occupation” as the common ground, then yes there are similarities.
If Ibn Taymiyya was alive today, he would have delivered the
same fatwa to the Palestinians, Iraqis and Afghans on showing
resistance as well.
“Resistance” against occupation is one thing, “terror” is another. Terror is the “killing of innocent civilians.” Whoever kills
a civilian, for whatever reason, has committed a crime of terror.
It doesn’t matter if this crime is committed by individuals, organizations or states, it is still a crime. In this case, if the actions
of some organization against innocent civilians are a “crime of
terror,” then the crime against civilians committed by the Israeli
state in Palestine, American soldiers in Iraq and NATO forces in
Afghanistan is an act of terror. Terror feeds on terror. Terrorists
do not have difculty in nding “legitimacy” for their actions
from one source or another. What we need to do is end all terror
and occupations and establish a more peaceful world.
16 TODAY’S ZAMAN
LEISURE
F RI DAY, APRI L 9 , 2 0 1 0
tv gude
Gregorian Calendar: 09 April 2010 C.E. Hijri Calendar: 24 Rabi al-Thani 1431 A.H. Hebrew Calendar: 25 Nisan 5770
[email protected]
move gude
“Clash of the Titans”
THE IMAGINARIUM
OF DOCTOR PARNASSUS
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Crossword
REUTERS
Movemax
MGM Moves
“Survivor,” a palm-sized 1938 painting by Frida Kahlo. The long-unseen painting of a pre-Hispanic
idol goes on sale in May at Christie’s when it will reappear in public for the first time in 72 years.
Cem Kzltu
Mr. DploMAT!
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Sudoku
TRT Toursm Rado
HARD
EASY
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EASY
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steakhouse
patron
Part of many
hotel names
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follower
Slender
dagger
Skirt’s edge
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in small
swimsuits
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American
fleece source
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illusion
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not roosters
Ledger entry
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attachment
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change
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god of myth
“All ___ Jazz”
“Desperate
Housewives”
network
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HOW TO PLAY? : The objective of the game is to fill all the blank squares in a game with
the correct numbers. There are three very simple constraints to follow. In a 9 by 9 square
Sudoku game:
travelers’
s.o.s
13
instrument
Acknowledge
applause
Haggard
woman
Open, as a
bolted door
Reagan or
Christian
Variety of
whale
Extinct kiwi
relative
They make
things
happen
Like many
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improvement
project, for
short
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product-tester
Emulated
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Priest’s
assistant
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been granted that had allowed her to survive the
volatility of her personal existence,” Grimberg
wrote in an essay in the art auction catalog.
In recent years, Frida Kahlo has grown to be
a prominent woman artist, with retrospectives
at London’s Tate Gallery, Minneapolis’ Walker
Art Center and the San Francisco Museum of
Modern Art. A major Kahlo show opens on
April 30 at Berlin’s Martin-Gropius-Bau museum. Her paintings infrequently come to market since many Kahlo works are in Mexico and
by law, can’t be exported, Garza said. The last
Kahlos sold at auction were two drawings in
2007. He said the highest ever prize paid for
Kahlo was $5.6 million in May 2006.
Christie’s estimates the price for “Survivor” is
between $100,000 and $150,000.
“We are delighted to add to the scholarship of the artist by locating a long lost
work,” said Garza, who said he learned of
it when its owner contacted him to sell it
in January. “Survivor” was acquired in 1938
by Walter Pach, an influential critic famed in
art history as a key organizer of New York’s
1913 Armory Show, considered a watershed
by introducing Americans to the work of
many avant-garde artists. “Pach was a close
friend of the Riveras,” Garza said. “Pach’s
family offered us ‘Survivor’ as well as a
group of Rivera sketches which we’re also
selling at the auction.” New York Reuters
A long-unseen Frida Kahlo painting of
a pre-Hispanic idol goes on sale next
month at Christie’s when it will reappear in public for the first time in 72 years, the
auction house said. “Survivor,” which sold in
1938 at a New York gallery, has since remained
out of sight, its image unpublished, before submission this year for auction at Christie’s Latin
American art sale on May 26.
“Just when you think everything has been
said and done on Kahlo, you come upon this
treasure, which really has never changed hands,
staying with the same family,” said Christie’s
Latin American art chief Virgilio Garza.
“Survivor” is one of the few Kahlo paintings to
focus on a pre-Columbian idol, he said. It shows
a standing warrior figure, mottled brown, with a
white headdress. The idol stands on a field with
an abandoned house on a ridge, set against a sky
churning with blacks, blues, grays and yellows. Art
historian Salomon Grimberg says the warrior symbolizes Kahlo’s resilience for surviving a tumultuous personal life. At the time, Kahlo was separated
from Diego Rivera, another top Mexican painter
and waiting for a divorce, according to Christie’s.
She had discovered his affair with her sister.
A palm-sized painting, “Survivor” is set in
ornate tin frame typical of religious votive paintings in Oaxaca, a southern state which is predominantly Indian. “Survivor is an ex-voto, done
to express her gratitude for the miracle that had
STANBUL: Beyolu AFM Fita 11:30
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12
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Rare Frda Kahlo pantng of
dol to reappear at aucton
CLASH OF THE TITANS
51 Twist into a
knot
55 Thickly
tangled, as
hair
57 Split ___
soup
59 Place to
gambol
60 Crooked
poet’s
conclusion?
64 Biblical
murder victim
65 Fancy bathroom fixture
66 Feeling fit
67 Make a
tunnel
68 Ammonia
compound
69 Skillful
server on the
court
70 Dermatologist’s
diagnosis
71 Top man in
the choir?
72 Sea salts
DOWN
1 Severe sore
throat
2 Gateway
3 Chinese
martial art
4 Yiddish jerk
(Var.)
5 Spat locale
6 It may
involve dolls
and pins
7 Omani, e.g.
8 Land in the
water
9 Demand at a
breakup
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11 Ear
examination
E2
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on May 5, 1945. Contrary to the situation in other countries
under German occupation during the war, most Danish institutions continued to function relatively unaffected until
1943. The Danish government remained in the country in an
uneasy relationship between a democratic and a totalitarian
system until German authorities dissolved the government
following a wave of strikes and sabotage.
Today is a national day in Iraq that commemorates the
fall of Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein from power in 2003.
The Iraqi government and military collapsed within three
weeks of the beginning of the US-led 2003 invasion of
Iraq on March 20. Baghdad fell to US-led forces on April
9, thus sealing the fate of the three-decade-old Saddam
regime. Saddam was tried and found guilty by the Iraqi
Special Tribunal and was hanged on Dec. 30, 2006.
CNBC-E
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10:45 13:30 16:15 19:00 21:45 23:00
ANTALYA: Özdilek Cinetime 11:15 13:45
16:15 18:45 21:15 23:45
ACROSS
1 Places for
rent (Abbr.)
5 Prove useful
10 Kitchen
utensils
14 Master of
the double
take?
15 Like Hagar
16 Sundance
home
17 Like the
Reaper
18 Australian
eucalyptus
eater
19 Puff on a
cigarette
20 Words from
an optimistic
poet?
23 “Um, no
thanks”
24 Friend of
Morpheus
and Trinity
25 Author Jong
and others
27 Out on ___
(in a fix)
29 Eyebrowraising
32 Mud brick
33 No exemplar
of grace
35 Texas strike
37 Hawaiian
food
38 What a poet
gets from a
plane?
43 In need of a
doctor
44 Mo. for fools
45 Group of
scouts
46 Hide, as loot
49 Balaam’s
mount
On this day in 1963, Winston Churchill became the very
first person to become an honorary citizen of the United
States. A ceremony was held in his honor at the White House,
where US President John F. Kennedy proclaimed him an
honorary citizen, but Churchill was unable to attend. To
become an honorary US citizen, one must have done things
of exceptional merit and then a resolution must be drafted
and voted upon by the US Congress.
Today is Martyrs’ Day in Tunisia. This day honors and commemorates those who fought for freedom against French rule,
which resulted in Tunisian independence in 1956.
On this day in 1940, Nazi German troops began their
occupation of Denmark under Operation Weserübung. The
occupation lasted until German forces withdrew at the end
of World War II, following their surrender to Allied Forces
Today Georgia celebrates the anniversary of its declaration
of independence. On this day in 1991, shortly before the
collapse of the USSR, Georgia held a referendum on independence and the Georgian nation decided to become an independent country. Its independence was finalized on Dec. 25, 1991.
Today is Araw ng Kagitingan (Day of Valor), also known as
“Bataan Day,” a national holiday in the Philippines. On April 9,
1942, 12,000 American soldiers surrendered to the Japanese at
the tip of the Bataan Peninsula, which juts into Manila Bay in the
Philippines. For nearly five months, the troops fought ferociously
against overwhelming odds until they ran out of food, medical
supplies and ammunition. As prisoners of war, they and thousands of Filipinos were taken to a camp run by the Japanese army.
This grueling series of marches is now known as the Bataan Death
March. The captured soldiers are honored on this day every year.
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Every row of 9 numbers must include all digits 1 through 9 in any order
Every column of 9 numbers must include all digits 1 through 9 in any order
Every 3 by 3 subsection of the 9 by 9 square must include all digits 1 through 9
Ambulance: 112 Fire: 110 171 Police: 155156 Maritime: 158 Unknown numbers: 118 80 Turkish Airlines: 444 0 849 U.S. Embassy: 0312 455 5555 U.S. Consulate: 0212 2513602-3-4 Russian Embassy: 0312 439 2122 Russian Consulate: 0212 244 1693-2610 British Embassy: 0312 455 3344 British Consulate: 0212
293 7540 German Embassy: 0312 455 5100 German Consulate: 0212 334 61 00 French Embassy: 0312 455 4545 French Consulate: 0212 292 4810-11 Indian
Embassy: 0312 438 2195 Pakistani Embassy: 0312 427 1410 Austrian Embassy: 0312 419 0431-33 Austrian Consulate: 0212 262 9315 Belgian Embassy:
0312 446 8247 Belgian Consulate: 0212 243 3300 Egyptian Embassy: 0312 426 1026 Egyptian Consulate: 0212 263 6038 Israeli Embassy: 0312 446 3605
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CONTINUATION
TODAY’S ZAMAN 17
FRIDAY, APRIL 9, 2010
Babu certified Sledgehammer meeting as ‘non-routine’
tely hospitalized at the Gülhane Military Academy
Hospital (GATA). A panel of judges at the stanbul
12th High Criminal Court has, however, ordered
his rearrest. He remains at the hospital.
The document shows that Gen. Babu was
disturbed by the course of the Selimiye seminar. According to a note the military chief wrote
on the document, Gen. Doan chose to mention the real names of individuals and institutions
during the seminar. However, the seminar was
supposed to be an exercise during which members of the military were to prepare a “scenario” of an external threat against Turkey and the
TSK’s response in the face of such a threat. The
scenario was supposed to involve pretend individuals and institutions rather than real ones.
The Sledgehammer plan was prepared under the Protocol on Cooperation for Security
and Public Order (EMASYA), which allowed
military operations to be carried out for inter-
contnued from page 1
The seminar was held at the General Staff’s
Selimiye barracks in March 2003. The General Staff
denied the existence of the document on Thursday.
The Sledgehammer Security Operation Plan
was drafted shortly after the AK Party came to
power. The mastermind of the plan was apparently retired Gen. Doan. According to the
plan, the military intended to systematically cause chaos in society through violent events that
would lead to a military takeover. Among the
planned incidents were bombings at the Fatih
and Beyazt mosques in stanbul and crashing a
Turkish jet after a dogght with Greek jets.
The discovery of the plot led to the arrests of
dozens of active duty and retired members of the
Turkish Armed Forces (TSK) on charges of attempting to destroy the government. Gen. Doan
was arrested in late February, but was released last
week in a controversial ruling. He was immedia-
the possibility of an external threat.
In late January the General Staff posted a statement on its Web site that said: “The plan seminar
in question was part of the General Staff’s operations program for the years 2003-2006. The aim of
the seminar is to develop operation plans and train
TSK staff against an external threat to Turkey. The
seminar concerned a scenario that addressed a period of increasing tension in the country.”
The statement also accused the media of
polluting information through groundless allegations against the armed forces.
The General Staff, however, failed to explain why the suspected coup plan mentioned
bombings at the Beyazt and Fatih mosques in
stanbul. The statement also failed to explain
why the coup document aimed to create tension between Turkish and Greek military aircraft, culminating in a Turkish jet crashing after
a skirmish with Greek jets. stanbul Today’s Zaman
nal security matters under certain conditions
without authorization from civilian authorities.
The protocol was abolished in February.
In the document, Gen. Babu complains
that Gen. Doan insisted on setting up the Sledgehammer scenario using real names and institutions although it ran contrary to seminar regulations. The military chief also points to potential problems that could arise from such a practice.
The military chief notes that some participants at
the seminar backed Gen. Doan’s decision to use
real names and institutions in the scenario.
“Gen. Doan said he would remove this mayor
and that state ofcer from his position [in the event
of a military takeover]. Such remarks overstepped
his limits,” Gen. Babu says in the document.
The document seems to refute a previous statement by the General Staff, which claimed that the
Sledgehammer plan was part of a series of “imagined” scenarios drafted by the armed forces against
TODAY’S ZAMAN, MEHMET YAMAN
Military covered up responsibility
in deadly blast, probe shows
“We know from too many other
examples, like the Ergenekon investigation and the emdinli case, that the military
prosecutor’s ofce doesn’t do what is necessary. There is no supremacy of the law or of justice,” he said and added that if the military prosecutor acted in line with the requirements of
the rule of law, then the conscience of the public would calm down.
“That’s why the punishment of wrongdoers is important. We should listen to our conscience, if nothing else,” Engin said.
The deaths of the soldiers and the supposition that the PKK might be responsible for planting the mines also have prevented efforts for
Turkey to nd solutions to some of its problems.
Because of the indignation in society over
the deaths of the soldiers, Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoan cancelled an appointment
with the now defunct pro-Kurdish Democratic
Society Party’s (DTP) President Ahmet Türk on
possible solutions to the Kurdish problem on
May 29, two days after the mine blast. The DTP
was believed to have had ties with the PKK.
Also in May of last year, there was an ongoing debate in the country about clearing mines on the Turkey-Syria border. The Hürriyet daily’s May 29 edition had a headline story
about the issue indicating that a bill on clearing
and destroying mines along the border with
Syria had come to Parliament on the night that
“mines were detonated by remote control by
the PKK in Çukurca.”
The debate was marked by disagreements
between the government and the opposition. In addition, the military said it would assume responsibility for de-mining the region
along the Syrian border, but then said it did not
have enough funding, tossing the ball back to
the government, which favors hiring a private
contractor to carry out the task in exchange for
land usage rights. Opposition parties have expressed dissent, asserting that subcontracting
the deal could harm Turkey’s national security,
in the case of foreign companies, especially Israeli rms, being involved in the project. Previously, a mine-clearing tender was canceled by
the Council of State over such objections.
PHOTO
contnued from page 1
A number of politicians and statesmen attended the funeral of Pvt. Deniz Demirci, who was killed in a land mine blast in Çukurca in May 2009.
‘Some military forces do not
desire an end to terrorism’
Meanwhile, a former gendarmerie ofcer
who lives in zmir has repeated his claims that
no blast scene investigation was carried out
after the deaths of the seven soldiers in the
land mine blast. “If we had carried out a blast
scene investigation, it would have been revealed that the land mines were planted by the
TSK; however, we were ordered to attribute
them to the PKK,” stated brahim Klnç, who
was discharged from the military due to alleged anti-secular activities. Klnç said he was
dismissed from the military because his girlfriend wore the Islamic headscarf.
Klnç also claimed that some forces in
the military do not desire an end to terrorism.
The ex-ofcer also accused top army brass of
being unwilling to end terror in Turkey. Giving examples of incidents that he witnessed
in Çukurca, he said gendarmerie intelligence
services sometimes planted mines at specic
locations and then reported the sites as news
to television stations as if they had received
intelligence regarding the locations of mines
planted by the PKK.
Another example Klnç gave is in regards
to a gendarme’s death. Klnç claimed that
Pvt. Lokman Tekin, 21, died when he stepped on a land mine previously planted by the
TSK. “A report was prepared without even
going to the scene of the blast,” he noted. The
blast was also attributed to the terrorist organization. “We should attach more importan-
ce to statements by soldiers who escaped the
armed attack in Tokat’s Readiye district. It is
not the work of a terrorist organization to attack a military vehicle from four directions.
The aim of the attack was to kill all of the soldiers on the vehicle. The fact that not all of the
soldiers were killed may spoil the game. The
soldiers who escaped the attack may be able
to shed light on the mystery. They may have
seen those who attacked them,” he said, referencing an attack in December of last year.
Seven soldiers were killed in Readiye
when unidentied armed assailants attacked
a military vehicle. Three others were wounded in the assault. The attack came shortly
before the Constitutional Court was set to deliberate a closure case against the DTP.
Three retired generals
behind bars in
Sledgehammer probe
Three more retired generals were sent to jail on Wednesday as part of a probe into an alleged military plot to overthrow the government. Retired generals Tuncay Çakan, Behzat
Balta and Halil Kalkanl, all detained on Monday as part of the
investigation into the Sledgehammer (Balyoz) coup plot, which
allegedly sought to undermine the government to prepare the
groundwork for a military takeover, were arrested on charges of
“attempting to overthrow the government of the Turkish Republic using force and violence” by the stanbul 10th Criminal
Court. Retired Col. Erdla Akyazan, who was also referred to court on Wednesday, was released pending trial.
Retired Gen. Çakan, who served at the stanbul Gülhane Military Academy of Medicine (GATA), was detained in stanbul. Çakan was the commander of GATA in
2007 when Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoan’s spouse, Emine Erdoan, was denied entry to a GATA hospital due to her headscarf when visiting an ailing thespian.
The suspects were sent to the Metris Military Prison. Defense lawyers told reporters that they would appeal the ruling.
Retired Gen. ükrü Sark, a former secretary-general
of the National Security Council (MGK), retired Gen. Nuri
Ali Karababa and retired Col. Mümtaz Can, who were also
among those detained on Monday, were arrested on Tuesday as part of the same probe.
Other detainees -- retired generals Mustafa Kemal Tutku,
Oktay Faruk Memiolu and Ünal Akbulut as well as retired Col.
Stk Özbek -- were previously released after their testimony to
prosecutors conducting the probe into the Sledgehammer plot.
According to the Sledgehammer plot, made public by
a newspaper in January, the Turkish Armed Forces (TSK)
had a systematic plan to create chaos in society by bombing mosques and attacking popular museums with Molotov cocktails. The attacks’ desired result was to increase
pressure on the Justice and Development Party (AK Party)
government for failing to provide security to its citizens.
The Sledgehammer plan was included in the third indictment prepared in the investigation into Ergenekon, a clandestine network charged with plotting to overthrow the government. The prosecutors are now questioning the 24 generals who attended the seminar. Dozens of retired and active duty military ofcers have been detained in the probe.
Twenty-two of them were released last week in a controversial ruling, but the release ruling was rescinded on Sunday by
a panel of judges from the stanbul 12th High Criminal Court.
Fifteen of the 21 suspects for whom arrest warrants were
issued by the court have so far been rearrested. The number of those arrested as part of the probe has increased to 27
with the recent arrests. There are still six who have yet to surrender. The number of Sledgehammer arrests will increase to
33 with these arrests. Retired Gen. Çetin Doan, the former
head of the 1st Army, is among a group that is waiting to be
rearrested. He is undergoing treatment at GATA.
In the meantime, stanbul Deputy Chief Public Prosecutor Turan Çolakkad signaled yesterday that they would detain
the 25 generals and admirals who were to be detained during
Monday’s operations if necessary. The suspects were not detained since operations were suspended by stanbul Chief Prosecutor Aykut Cengiz Engin, who reassigned the prosecutors covering the Sledgehammer case. stanbul Today’s Zaman
Top EU official
finds Sledgehammer
plans worrisome
contnued from page 1
Füle said the EU Commission stays informed about allegations that resulted in the arrest of senior military
members in Turkey and nds the allegations “worrisome.”
Twenty-seven active and retired military members have
been arrested in Turkey so far as part of the investigation into
the Sledgehammer plot. Füle also noted that the EU would
continue to closely follow the developments regarding the coup
probe while demanding that the investigation into the probe is
carried out by respecting the rights of the suspects and paying
full respect to compliance with the principles and standards of a
fair trial. The plan was drawn up in 2003 and discussed in a seminar held at the General Staff’s Selimiye barracks in March of
that year. The General Staff has denied that the Sledgehammer plot was the subject of a seminar, saying it had no record
of such an event. It defended itself by claiming that the Sledgehammer plan was merely a war game. stanbul Today’s Zaman
Metin Arslan Ankara / Yonca Poyraz Doan, Melik Duvakl stanbul / Mustafa Yüksel zmir
TODAY’S ZAMAN
GATA doctors uncomfortable with suspicious hospitalizations
PHOTO
EMRE SONCAN ANKARA
Retired Col. Ahmet Alper said doctors working at
GATA are worried that suspects in ongoing coup probes have been hospitalized there to escape justice.
Doctors working at the Gülhane Military Academy Hospital (GATA) are worried that suspects of the ongoing investigations into alleged coup
plots have been hospitalized there to escape justice,
said retired Col. Professor Ahmet Alper, former head
of the hospital’s gastroenterology department.
Speaking to Today’s Zaman, Alper discussed the
issue of controversial hospitalizations at GATA and
how discomforted the doctors working there were as
a result. “GATA has unfortunately become a way out
of being arrested. If there is an Ergenekon organization trying to topple the government and take over the
administration in Turkey as has been alleged, the fact
that they can escape punishment that way will motivate them. They will be more enthusiastic. The suspects
in question should preferably be transferred to a civilian
hospital capable of providing the required medical care.
That would make GATA doctors feel happier because
they are not so at all, at the moment,” he said.
Professor Alper also said, although they dislike
the fact that high-ranking military ofcers, most of
whom are retired, are controversially hospitalized at
GATA, those doctors still see the suspects not as their patients but as their commanders and are left in a
dilemma. “Doctors cannot consider people like [retired generals] Çetin Doan and Engin Alan as their
patients. These men are commanders for them. That
privilege is not welcomed by people. Retired generals
should be treated the same way as other defendants,”
he stated. Doan and Alan were the last two members of the army’s top brass to check in to GATA. Both
of them were arrested by prosecutors in the investi-
gation into the alleged Sledgehammer (Balyoz) coup
plot, containing plans to bomb stanbul’s historic
mosques and to down a Turkish ghter jet to discredit
the government and prepare the ground for a military
takeover to be carried out soon after. “Doctors who
had said to Doan ‘Aye, Commander’ while he was
in ofce in the past will continue to do the same today, too,” added Alper, who served as the head of the
gastroenterology department for seven years.
Retired generals ener Eruygur, Hurit Tolon
and Levent Ersöz, three main suspects of the alleged
coup-making plans, had previously avoided imprisonment through hospitalization at GATA. Ersöz
had even refused to be admitted to a civilian hospital three times before he was taken to GATA. Eruygur and Tolon were later released for health reasons,
and Ersöz is still under care at the military hospital.
Muslims demand
apology over shooting
range mosques
A group of British Muslims demanded an apology from
the Ministry of Defense on Thursday after it said replica
mosques were being used on a military ring range in northern
England. The Bradford Council for Mosques (BCM), an umbrella organization for faith schools and mosques in the area, called for the green-domed structures to be taken down and wanted assurance they would not be used again.
“The structures do symbolize mosques,” BCM spokesman
Ishtiaq Ahmed told Reuters. “Mosques are our places of worship, they are places of peace, and for anyone to suggest that
they are potential zones of danger and should be shot at is really not acceptable.” The one-dimensional hardboard structures in Catterick, North Yorkshire, are not used as direct targets,
but are intended to provide a more “realistic” background for
soldiers training ahead of deployment in Afghanistan, a military source said. Other “generic eastern silhouettes” used include palm trees and irrigation ditches. But the BCM’s Ahmed said the site did not bear any resemblance to what British forces were experiencing in Afghanistan. London Reuters
18 TODAY’S ZAMAN
F R I D A Y, A P R I L 9 , 2 0 1 0
TODAY’S LEARNING
10th & 11th GRADERS
PHOTO
AP, SHIHO FUKADA
BLACK CULTURE
In 1619, 20 Africans landed at Jamestown, Virginia and were sold into slavery. The history of Africans in
America is deeply rooted in African culture whose own
rich heritage ourished under its own kings.
The early European colonies in America looked for a
supply of cheap labor to use on their plantations and found it in West Africa. By the 19th century millions of Africans were involved in the slave trade to work in the elds, plantations and mines of the Americas. They worked
to harvest rice, tobacco and cotton and by the end of the
18th century they could be found throughout Maryland,
Virginia, the Carolinas and Georgia.
Many in America did not feel comfortable about slavery and the idea of man’s natural rights was expressed in
the Declaration of Independence which stated that
“all men are created equal.” The idea of being free
was the ideal behind the American Revolution.
The life of the African slave was not an easy one. He
was forced to work long hours and lived under harsh colonial laws. Some obeyed their masters out of fear, others
who were bolder tried to revolt. But most slaves were not
hard to control and their lives became easier if they remained submissive.
They found comfort in Christianity and from this
evolved their own songs known as Spirituals. There were
some people known as Abolitionists who wanted to do
away with slavery and a growing debate developed between those who favored slavery and those who were opposed. It became a moral issue which almost divided the
country and culminated in the Civil War (1861-1865).
After the war slaves numbering close to 4 million
were freed but their life was not easy. They were not prepared for their new independence. They needed to be assimilated into the culture of white society and this was not
always successful.
The 20th century saw a rise in prejudice against blacks
as they were free in name only and were denied most of
the rights and benets of American life. Many blacks left
the south and moved north which seemed to promise a
better life, but in the north their living conditions grew
worse and opportunities for them diminished. They lived in poor neighborhoods called ghettoes and faced bitter prejudice. It was not until the 1960s that civil rights organizations won important victories for black people and
a charismatic leader, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. became
a symbol of the black people’s quest for equality and true
freedom. His tragic death in 1968 led to the passage of
the Civil Rights Bill which has created many opportunities for black people with the hope of living in a truly integrated society.
PART 5: TEACHING AS A PROFESSION
1. Where were the first 20 Africans sold into slavery
in 1619?
A. In Jamesville, W. Va.
B. In Africa before boarding ship
C. In Jamestown, Va
D. In Jameson, Va
2. What was one of the main reasons for bringing slaves from Africa?
A. They were a source of cheap property
B. They were a source of servants and householders
C. They were a source of cheap labor
D. They were a source of personal income
3. By the 19th century how many African people
were involved in the slave trade?
A. Hundreds
B. Millions
C. Thousands
D. 10,000
4. Where were most of the slaves concentrated in
America in the 18th century?
A. The northeastern coast of America
B. In the north
C. In Maryland, Virginia, Georgia and the Carolinas
D. In New Jersey and New York
5. What was the motivating idea behind the American Revolution?
A. Truth
B. Human dignity
C. Unity
D. Freedom
6. Which religion became a source of comfort for the
slaves?
A. Islam
B. Christianity
C. Judaism
D. Animism
7. What were the songs sung in slavery called?
A. Country and Western
B. Renewal songs
C. Jazz
D. Spirituals
8. What was the group called who wanted to abolish
slavery?
A. Abolitionists
B. Abolishers
C. The Abolising Ones
D. Christian Separatists
9. How many slaves were there in America after the
Civil War?
A. 4 million
B. 2 million
C. 3 million
D. 6 million
10. What event led to the passage of the Civil Rights
Bill in America?
A. The death of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.
B. The death of President John F. Kennedy
C. The people’s quest for happiness
D. Peaceful demonstrations during wars
THIS WEEK’S TOPIC
Do you think that what we wear is a reection of who and what we are?
Give your opinion using examples to support your view.
The profession of teaching is one of
sorry for their mistakes and pleased
the oldest in the world. And it is cer-
with their successes. The main task
tainly one of the noblest. The art of
of the teacher isn’t in imparting
teaching has suffered a revolutio-
knowledge but in stimulating the
nary change. It has become highly
pupils’ minds. The teacher mustn’t
specialized; its mystery is to be mas-
only install his own opinions into
Must be submitted by Friday of each week’s English Corner
tered. It is based not only on scho-
these receptive minds but he must
Must have student’s full name, school and city
larship, but also on the right met-
also teach them to think, to form.
hods of teaching. Every good te-
One of the most important qu-
acher should learn more about his
alities of a good teacher is humor.
subject every year, every week, every
The real purpose of humor in teac-
month if possible. He must avoid
hing is to link the teacher and the
the sort of feeling that there is not-
pupils through enjoyment. A good
hing more for him to learn. There is
teacher is a creator of people. The
always room for self-improvement.
teacher must treat different pupils
A teacher should be kind and
understanding but at the same
Requirements of essays
time he should be rm. Pupils sho-
To do this he must be a good
uld feel that their teacher wants to
psychologist. If he knows his pupils’
help them, wants to improve, is in-
character he will be able to adapt his
terested in their growth, and is
teaching to their differences.
Mark the statements A if it is correct and B if it is incorrect
1. Teaching is not a new profession
2. Teaching has changed
3. Scholarship is enough for teaching
4. A teacher doesn’t need to improve himself
5. Students ought to know that teachers are very happy with their success
6. Stimulating teaching is very important
7. Humorous teachers can easily reach their students
8. The basic aim of humor is to make the students smile
Example 1:
A school administrator should give new students a complete orientation to their school. She
or he should take them on a tour of the school,
showing them the classrooms, gym, computer
lab, music room and cafeteria. She or he should tell them about the history of the school, its
academic achievements and its athletic and debating teams. The administrator can talk to the
students about what’s expected of them in the
classroom and what rules the school has.
Topic
sentence
A school administrator should
give new students a complete
orientation to their school.
Supporting
details
take students on tour of school
talk about history of school
talk to them about
what’s expected
In the above paragraph the topic sentence is about the
school administrator’s job of giving new students an orientation.. The orientation includes a tour of the school, its
history and a discussion of what is expected of students.
Example 2
Everyone, children as well as senior citizens,
can have important relationships with pets.
Children who have dogs have the opportunity
to learn responsibility while caring for them.
The elderly, who often feel lonely as they get
older, are able to feel needed because they are
caring for a dog that needs them.
Topic
sentence
Everyone, children as well as
senior citizens, can have important relationships with pets.
Supporting
details
teaches children responsibility
elderly take care of dogs who,
in turn, need them
Practice
Read the following paragraphs for the topic sentence and
the supporting details for each paragraph.
You may have more or fewer than three supporting details.
1. Paragraph
Playing games also teaches us how to deal with
other people. We learn about teamwork if the
game involves being on a team. We learn how
to divide and assign tasks according to each
person’s skills. We learn how to get people to
do what we want and we learn that sometimes
we have to do what other people want.
Topic sentence
Supporting details
Maximum number of words: 250
Essay format and use of formal written English is necessary
1.4
Do you think that people are capable of
nding happiness or are they always searching for something beyond what they have?
Give examples to show your views on the
topic.
2. Paragraph
Cooking takes a lot of time. While the food
might not actually be on the stove for very long,
you also have to consider the time that is spent
shopping for the food, cleaning and chopping
it, and cleaning up the kitchen after it is cooked.
Topic sentence
Supporting details
The world is a guesthouse to begin with.
As we don’t own it, we don’t have any
right to complain. We will talk about happiness, but which happiness?
This world consists of different kinds of
people and several types of families. All of
them form our society. Inside this society,
there are poor ones and also rich ones. The
rich ones mostly don’t want to share their
money with the poor ones. So, in our world,
the poor ones are always at the bottom and
the rich ones are at the top.
In order to prevent this,
our religion rules that
Muslims give their alms to the poor. If
everybody does their job,
we can stay in line without
getting into trouble about it.
As for stratied societies, I call
them greedy ones. Unless they know
1.2
1.5
THIS WEEK’S SUCCESSFUL ESSAY SUBMISSION
“No one is contented in this world, I believe. There is always something left to desire, and the last thing longed for always seems the most necessary to happiness.”
-Marie Corelli, a Romance of Two Worlds
1.1
1.3
differently. He must have a way
with them.
Dear readers,
This week we will try to help you in essay writing by giving you some practice in preparing
topic sentences and supporting ideas in paragraph writing. Look at the following two examples and then try and complete the exercise.
the value of their wealth, they will lose
everything they have owned in their life
so far. Of course, that would be a total failure. Who wants to lose ever?
I should state that happiness goes up
as long as we share it with those close to
us. I also suppose that if we manage to do
with less, we will become more contented
than ever because, doing with less is a great superiority. Always looking for more stuff
does not lead us to a pleasing result.
Also, I’d love to put into words
that someone may be delighted with having been given a
little candy and someone may
not be with owning a luxurious
car. Everything is all about our
own line of sight towards life.
2.1
2.2
2.3
2.4
3. Paragraph
Watching movies and television can be good for us.
One thing they do is help us understand the world
more. For example, seeing movies can expose us to
people of different races and cultures that we don’t often see. We can then overcome prejudices more easily. Recently there have been more handicapped people in lms, and this also helps to prevent prejudice.
Topic sentence
Supporting details
Ahmet KURNAZ
School: Siirt Anatolian Teacher
Training High School, Siirt
Last week’s answers: Rock music :1- of 2-around 3-as 4-was 5-number 6-that 7-called 8-lead 9- to 10-even / A. 1-B, 2-B, 3-B, 4-A, 5-A B. 1-b, 2-a, 3-d, 4-c
3.1
3.2
3.3
3.4
3.5
SPORTS
Rangers move closer to Scottish title
Rangers beat Aberdeen 3-1 to go 13 points clear of Celtic and move
ccloser to defending its Scottish Premier League title. Kyle Lafferty scored
his third goal of the season between goals from Steven Davis and Kenny
h
Miller. Darren Mackie scored a consolation goal for eighth-place Aberdeen.
Mil
The win means Rangers can potentially win a 53rd league title. Glasgow AP
FRIDAY, APRIL 9, 2010
BASEBALL
Raptors miss Bosh in
loss to Celtics, Hedo
injured in collision
ATHLETICS
‘Allow Semenya to
return immediately’
Caster Semenya, the world 800-meter champion at
the center of a gender verication row, should be
allowed to compete immediately in female events,
her lawyers have said. on Wednesday. South African Semenya has not competed since last August
when she won the world title in Berlin. Athletics
South Africa (ASA) has made clear Semenya is not
banned from competition but said she must wait
for the results of her gender tests from the International Association of Athletics Federations (IAAF)
which are not expected until June. Her lawyers
from Dewey and Leboeuf’s South Africa ofce
told television channel eNews that test results obtained in February showed Semenya can compete
as a woman. “Caster’s medical team have looked
at the results from Berlin and South Africa,” Benedict Phiri said. “And have also conducted their own
tests and there was a point in time, I think midFebruary, where we got the go-ahead to say we’ve
looked at everything now and based on what we’ve
seen, we believe Caster is entitled to participate in
female athletics competitions.” Johannesburg Reuters
Bayern Munich’s players celebrate following their Champions League quarter-final second leg match against Manchester United at Old Trafford on Wednesday.
Bayern trailed 3-0 before losing 3-2 at United to draw 4-4 on aggregate and advance on
away goals, becoming the rst German team to make the nal four since 2002. Lyon also
lost the return leg, going down 1-0 at Bordeaux but heading through 3-2 winners overall
The nal four of the Champions
League won’t feature an English
team for the rst time since 2003
after Bayern Munich ousted Manchester
United on Wednesday, while Lyon reached
its rst seminal by eliminating Bordeaux.
Bayern trailed 3-0 before losing 3-2 at
United to draw 4-4 on aggregate and advance on away goals, becoming the rst
German team to make the nal four since
2002. Lyon also lost the return leg, going
down 1-0 at Bordeaux but heading through
3-2 winners overall.
“It was an incredible comeback from
three goals down,” Bayern coach Louis van
Gaal said. “In the rst 20 minutes, Manchester United played us off the park, then
we got back into the game with a great goal
from Ivica Olic.
“At halftime, I was condent we could
get back into the game and get the result.”
Four-time champion Bayern hosts Lyon
in the rst leg of the seminals on April 21,
with the return six days later in France. The
winner will play either holder Barcelona or
Inter Milan in the May 22 nal at Madrid.
Inter Milan, which is in the seminals
for the rst time in seven years, hosts Barcelona on April 20 and plays in Spain eight
days later.
At Old Trafford, Wayne Rooney made a
TENNIS
Schwank fined
after erratic play
Eduardo Schwank was ned $1,000 for his erratic
and unusual play after losing 6-1, 6-7 (5), 6-1 to
fellow Argentine Juan Ignacio Chela in the second
round of the US Men’s Clay Court Championships.
Schwank, the seventh seed, says a back problem
caused him to use numerous drop shots and lobs in
his Tuesday match. The crowd booed him after he
foot-faulted on match point. Rain forced the postponement of defending champion Lleyton Hewitt’s
match against lucky loser Somdev Devvarman of
India until Thursday. Hewitt has not played since
having hip surgery on Jan. 29. Third-seeded Sam
Querrey of the United States against Blaz Kavcic of
Slovania also was rescheduled for later Thursday.
Nicolas Massu of Chile had to played the longest
match on tour this year (three hours, 25 minutes)
before nally beating qualier Ryan Sweeting of
the United States, 6-7, 7-6, 6-4. Houston AP
AA,KENAN ÇMEN
Much at stake for Manisa as it takes on Gaziantep away
OKAN UDO BASSEY STANBUL
PHOTO
Port of San Diego ofcials want to host a Louis
Vuitton Trophy regatta that could be part of the
buildup to the next America’s Cup. Port commissioners plan to contact the World Sailing Teams
Association and Louis Vuitton about starting negotiations as soon as possible, with the hope of
hosting a regatta next March. If the sides can agree
to terms, a San Diego regatta would follow racing
scheduled for La Maddalena, Italy, in May, Dubai in
November and Hong Kong in January. Two more
regattas could be held in 2011, on the Black Sea in
Russia and in Greece. A Louis Vuitton Trophy regatta was held recently in Auckland, New Zealand,
with former America’s Cup champion Team New
Zealand beating Italy’s Mascalzone, the new Challenger of Record, in the nal. San Diego hosted the
America’s Cup in 1988, 1992 and 1995. San Diego AP
Bordeaux striker Marouane Chamakh scored right on halftime, sliding
home a cross from Benoit Tremoulinas
that was diverted by teammate Jaroslav
Plasil. But despite ending a three-game
losing run in all competitions, Bordeaux
was out of the competition.
“It was a match that was not easy,” Lyon
coach Claude Puel said. “Even though we
told ourselves that we should play as it was
0-0 in the rst leg, we felt a bit of pressure.
We were too much on the back foot in the
rst half. We handled better the second half
because Bordeaux played at a slower tempo.”
There have been three English teams in
the seminals of the competition for the past
three seasons.
Liverpool was the rst team to be eliminated this year, bowing out in the group stage,
while Chelsea was knocked out by Inter Milan
in the round-of-16 and Arsenal was beaten by
Barcelona on Tuesday in the quarternals.
“All the English teams were expected to
get to the seminals as we have been doing
in the last ve years,” United manager Alex
Ferguson said. “But I don’t think it has cast a
shadow over the game -- I still think it’s the
best league in Europe and the most competitive league. You don’t always get what you
want and we’re all suffering.” Manchester AP
Toronto Raptors’ Chris Bosh (4) is tended to
by team doctors after being hit in the face.
SAILING
San Diego seeks
pre-Cup regatta
surprise return for United after injuring his
ankle in last week’s rst leg, and was involved in both goals as the hosts wiped out
Bayern’s 2-1 advantage inside seven minutes
after goals from Darron Gibson and Nani.
Nani gave United -- last season’s beaten
nalists -- a 3-0 lead when he scored in the
41st. But Ivica Olic began Bayern’s comeback
two minutes later when he left Michael Carrick at-footed and slid a low, angled shot
past goalkeeper Edwin van der Sar.
Three-time champion United played with
10 men after Rafael da Silva was sent off in
the 50th for fouling Franck Ribery to receive
a second yellow card. The Brazilian defender
had already been booked for a petulant kick
after being fouled by Mark Van Bommel.
With Rooney replaced after bursting a
blood vessel below his right ankle, Bayern
took control and Arjen Robben scored from
a volley in the 74th to send the German team
through.
Lyon had goalkeeper Hugo Lloris to
thank after he leaped high to palm away a
powerful header from Bordeaux midelder
Geraldo Wendel in the 87th minute that
could have taken the hosts through on away
goals.
When the referee blew for the nal whistle, Lyon’s players jumped on Lloris in jubilation, forming a mass scrum on the eld.
The Toronto Raptors lost 115-104 to the Boston Celtics in their rst game without injured
All-Star Chris Bosh on Wednesday, loosening
their grip on the eighth and nal Eastern Conference playoff spot.
In the absence of big man Bosh, who suffered a face injury against the Cleveland Cavaliers
on Tuesday, the Raptors (38-40) faded late in the
game to see their lead over the Chicago Bulls cut
to half a game with four to play.
“I think this is the moment we need everybody together,” Toronto guard Jose Calderon told
reporters. Rajon Rondo scored 21 and Paul Pierce
added 20 to lead the Celtics (49-29), who moved
into a tie with the Atlanta Hawks for third place
in the East. The game was tied at 76-76 in the
third quarter but Boston ended the period with six
straight points and took that momentum into the
fourth, where they clinched what was just a second win in six contests.
In the nal quarter, the Celtics’ sharpshooters
came up big. Ray Allen tallied 10 of his 18 points
while Michael Finley put up 11 of his 14 off the
bench to seal the win.
“Our shooting won the game for us tonight,”
said Boston coach Doc Rivers.
“When Ray and Michael get it going at the
same time and they’re both on the oor, that
makes us really good because we can still pound
the ball down low and affect the other team’s ability to take the low-post game away.”
Sonny Weems scored a career-high 21 points
for the Raptors to combine with Andrea Bargnani,
Antoine Wright and Jarrett Jack who all nished
with 17. Toronto stayed close for most of the night
but missed Bosh’s presence inside. Bosh leads Toronto with 24 points per game and 10.8 rebounds.
Raptors Turkish forward Hedo Türkolu was
also injured on Wednesday, leaving the game in
the rst quarter after hurting his nose in a collision
with Tony Allen.
Other NBA results: Indiana 113, New York
105; Orlando 121, Washington 94; Detroit 90, Atlanta 88; Miami 99, Philadelphia 95; Houston 113,
Utah 96; Milwaukee 108, New Jersey 89; Golden
State 116, Minnesota 107; Charlotte 104, New Orleans 103; Denver 98, Oklahoma City 94; Dallas
110, Memphis 84; Portland 93, LA Clippers 85;
Phoenix 112, San Antonio 101. Toronto Reuters
REUTERS, AARON JOSEFCZYK
PHOTO
REUTERS, MICHAEL DALDER
New York newcomer Curtis Granderson hit a
game winning home run in the 10th inning to
spoil the debut of pitcher John Lackey and lead
the Yankees to a 3-1 victory over the Boston Red
Sox on Wednesday. Granderson’s blast to right
eld, his second homer of the season, broke a 1-1
tie in the 10th, before Mark Teixeira’s RBI groundout sealed the decider in the Yankees three-game
opening series with arch rivals Boston. “What better way to start off with a new team?” Granderson
told reporters. “Of all the teams, to play Boston
in the rst series and come out with the victory
is great. All I want to do is just be another small
piece of the puzzle.” Other AL results: Tampa Bay
4, Baltimore 3; NY Yankees 3, Boston 1, 10 innings; Toronto 7, Texas 4; Cleveland 5, Chicago
White Sox 3; Kansas City 3, Detroit 2, 11 innings;
Minnesota 4, LA Angels 2; and Oakland 6, Seattle
5. In the National League it was: Milwaukee 5,
Colorado 4; San Francisco 10, Houston 4; Pittsburgh 4, LA Dodgers 3, 10 innings; Philadelphia 8,
Washington 4; Atlanta 3, Chicago Cubs 2; Florida
7, NY Mets 6, 10 innings; St. Louis 6, Cincinnati 3;
Arizona 5, San Diego 3. Boston Reuters
PHOTO
Bayern to face Lyon in
Champions League semis
Granderson’s homer
in 10th sinks Red Sox
Gaziantepspor Guinea defender Oumar Kalabane.
The Gaziantepspor Falcons host the Manisaspor Tarzans at the Antep Kamil Ocak Stadium
in week 29 of the Turkcell Super League with much
at stake for the struggling Tarzans.
Mid-table Gaziantepspor is in safe territory with
37 points from 28 outings. Not so with Manisaspor,
which currently has one foot in the Super League and
the other in the Bank Asya League 1 (division two).
Ankaraspor was relegated to division two
earlier this season by the Turkish Soccer Federation (TFF) over shady deals, and it is almost
a foregone conclusion that the cellar-dwelling
Denizlispor Roosters will join them at the end of
the season in mid-May. Three teams are doomed
to drop, and so the big question now is, “Which
team will complete the relegation list?”
And the three candidates are: Diyarbakirspor
(24 points), Sivasspor (26) and Manisaspor (29). Of
the three, Manisaspor currently has a better chance
of surviving. But the fact of the matter is that the
Tarzans are still in the relegation bracket and anything can still happen with six weeks to go.
Hence desperate Manisaspor will be all
out to win at Antep this evening and move
out of the danger zone, because failure to do
so would mean falling further into the league
abyss if its doomed relegation rivals win their
matches later this weekend.
However Antep’s no-nonsense Portuguese
coach Jose Couceiro is not concerned one bit
about Manisaspor’s demotion worries and has
instructed his boys to go for the kill right after referee Bar imek blows the whistle for kickoff.
“Six weeks to go, and every match is very impor-
tant for us,” he said this week. “The Manisa match is
one of them, and we are treating it with all seriousness,” he further stated.
But the Manisa cause will not be helped by the
absence of Guinea defender Oumar Kalabane, who
had a near-fatal car accident in Buca on Wednesday. Kalabane’s car hit the wall of a gendarmerie
building in zmir’s Konak district, but the Guinean
was lucky to survive with slight head injuries.
Manisaspor club doctor Cengizhan Özgürbüz
said Kalabane received several stitches and therefore “will not be available for the Gaziantep match
[today].” Kickoff is at 8 p.m.
Kalabane’s accident comes on the heels of
Konyaspor player Branimir Poljac’s car accident
on his way back from training on Saturday, which
may have left him paralyzed for life. It appears the
“trafc monster” is now targeting soccer players.
Jim Carrey, Jenny McCarthy reveal split on Twitter
Actors Jim Carrey and Jenny McCarthy ended their five-year relationship by announcing the split on their Twitter pages on Tuesday. The announcement surprised Hollywood insiders as the low-profile couple appeared to have a durable
union, and Carrey passionately advocated a link between vaccines and autism, a
neurological disease suffered by McCarthy’s 7-year-old son. Los Angeles Reuters
WWW.TODAYSZAMAN.COM FRIDAY, APRIL 9, 2010
Rare blue damond auctoned for $6.4 mllon
A rare, awless blue diamond that was once part of
the legendary De Beers Millennium Collection sold
for $6.4 million at auction, exceeding the top price
estimate but falling short of the 2009 record. The 5.16 carat
pear-shaped diamond was the rst gem of its kind to appear
in an auction from the collection that De Beers, the world’s
largest diamond producer, presented in 2000 to celebrate
the millennium. Auctioneers Sotheby’s had priced the diamond at between $4.6 million and $5.8 million and it was
sold in Hong Kong to London-based gem merchant Alisa
Moussaieff who said she was satised with the price. “It’s
an individual thing and people have got to like it and people
have got to see the value in it, but we do see the value and I
hope our clients will see the value as well,” she said. The De
Beers Millennium Collection comprised 12 rare gems and
took decades to assemble. Blue diamonds are among the
rarest of all gems and owe their natural color to the presence
of boron during the stone’s formation. Hong Kong Reuters
Academics aim to
bring vampires back
home - - to Britain
A British university is to hold a conference
on vampires in an effort to counterbalance
the “Americanisation” of the ctional genre. Delegates to the University of Hertfordshire’s “Open
Graves, Open Minds: Vampires and the Undead
in Modern Culture” conference to be held on
April 16-17 will have their food served to them
out of cofns as part of a mission to encourage
students of all ages to study literature. English
lecturer Sam George, who has just launched a
Master of Arts degree in vampire ction at Hertfordshire, said the most famous vampire narrative of all, Dracula, was written by Irishman Bram
Stoker and set in London and Whitby in Yorkshire, but that now with the “Twilight” saga and
“True Blood,” modern vampires have become
Americanized. “It’s amazing how many British
actors have played Dracula on screen,” George
said in a statement on the university’s Web site.
“I aim to put the British vampire back on the
map.” George said she is particularly interested
in the new teen vampire narratives which act as
a useful metaphor for wider teen anxieties about
their bodies and the rst stirrings of desire. “The
new breed of vampires are far from monstrous,
they are glamorous and sexy and have an emotional side,” she said. “Their [teenagers’] attraction to vampire gures provides a safe way for
them to acknowledge these desires.” Conference lectures will be delivered by academics and
author Marcus Sedgwick, who writes young
adult ction with a vampire twist. Panel topics
during the two-day event will include “Dracula
Lives,” “Appetites of the Undead,” “Undead
Victorians,” “Undead Teens,” “Politics of the
Undead,” “Undead Romance,” “The Gay Undead,” “Undead TV,” “Undead in the New Media,” “Identity, Legality and the Undead” and
“Gendering the Undead.” London Reuters
They walk among
us: 1 in 5 believe in
aliens, survey says
Aliens exist and they live in our midst disguised as humans -- at least, that’s what
20 percent of people polled in a global survey believe. The Reuters Ipsos poll of 23,000 adults in
22 countries showed that more than 40 percent
of people from India and China believe that
aliens walk among us disguised as humans,
while those least likely to believe in this are from
Belgium, Sweden and the Netherlands (8 percent each). However, the majority of people
polled, or 80 percent, don’t believe aliens are in
our midst. “It would appear that that there’s a
modest correlation between the most populated
countries and those more likely to indicate there
may be aliens disguised amongst them compared with those countries with the smaller populations,” said John Wright, senior vice president of market research rm Ipsos. “Maybe the
it’s a simple case that in a less populated country
you are more likely to know your next door
neighbor better,” he said. More men than women -- 22 percent versus 17 percent -- believe that
alien beings are on earth. Most of those believers
are under the age of 35, and across all income
classes, the survey showed. Of those who do not
believe, most are women. Singapore Reuters
Women try to
smuggle corpse onto
plane in Britain
Two women were arrested at a British airport
on suspicion of trying to smuggle a dead relative onto a ight bound for Germany, police said
early this week.The 91-year-old deceased man was
pushed in a wheelchair through Liverpool’s John
Lennon airport wearing sunglasses before check-in
staff became suspicious and he was prevented from
boarding the plane. He was believed to have been
driven about 35 miles (60 km) to the airport by taxi
from Oldham, Greater Manchester, police added.
The women were arrested on suspicion of failing to
give notication of a death and were released on
bail. “At 11 a.m. on Saturday 3 April 2010, police at
Liverpool John Lennon airport were alerted to the
death of a 91-year-old man in the terminal building,” police said in a statement. “Two women aged
41 and 66 were arrested on suspicion of failing to
give notication of death.” London Reuters