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[Hundreds of Turkish women protested. One had a
photo of an unmarried woman said to have been killed
for having a child.]
The New York TimesVan is in a conservative area, but
there was little call for the law. AN, Turkey, Sept.
14- After suffering a wave of criticism from
European Union officials, women's groups, newspaper
columnists and finally from its own members,
Turkey's governing party abandoned a proposal on
Tuesday to criminalize adultery.Even so, the party,
which has sought for two years to reassure Turks and
foreigners that it had no Islamic fundamentalist
agenda, may have lost important political good will
at home and abroad."Especially now, when Turkey is
doing so much for E.U. membership, the fact that
they're trying to bring in this law raises questions
about them," said Gulseren Demir, a caseworker at
the Women's Association in Van, in southeastern
Turkey.
"To tell you the truth," a co-worker, Alev Sahar added, "we never trusted
them." The proposed adultery law had been debated in
the news media during the past month, while
Parliament was in summer recess, and Prime Minister
Recep Tayyip Erdogan had repeatedly said he endorsed
it as a way to preserve the family.His Justice and
Development Party had been expected to introduce it
on Tuesday when the deputies reconvened to vote on a
voluminous new penal code. But by the end of the
day, with protesters in the streets and some
European officials darkly warning that it smacked of
fundamentalism, the proposed law had not made an
appearance.
No one even stepped forward even to claim ownership.Party officials said
the proposal, once fiercely defended by some
deputies, had won few supporters during a closed
party meeting the night before."There is general
agreement that we will not propose that kind of
thing right now," said Reha Denemec, a deputy
chairman of the party. "We've got something like 340
different articles to get passed - we did 60 or so
in four hours - and it's very important to do these
things right now."During its brief and contentious
public life, however, the adultery proposal shone an
unwanted spotlight on the backgrounds of the party
leaders.
Most are veterans of Welfare, a more militantly Islamist party that
briefly ruled in a coalition government in the
mid-1990's. The army removed it from power in
1997.Mr. Erdogan was a senior Welfare member and a
former mayor of Istanbul who spent time in jail in
1999 for reciting a poem in public that talked of
mosque minarets as bayonets.
His action has not been forgotten by the powerful military establishment,
which sees itself as the guardian of Turkey's
secular system. But since sweeping into power nearly
two years ago after his party won nearly two-thirds
of the seats in the Parliament, the prime minister
and his party aides have generally sidestepped
issues that might make the military and the
nationalists bristle. Instead, he has shuttled
continuously between Turkey and European Union
countries, vigorously promoting Turkey's bid to
begin accession talks leading to membership. He has
also presided over wholesale changes in the
Constitution, a rewrite of the administration law,
revisions of the civil code and, now, some hundreds
of proposed amendments to the penal code - all to
bring the country's laws in conformity with European
Union standards.
The European Commission in Brussels is expected to decide whether to
recommend a date for accession talks at its meeting
on Oct. 6. European Union leaders are expected to
vote on the matter at their summit meeting in
mid-December. A number of those leaders have already
expressed doubts about whether Turkey, a majority
Muslim country, belongs in Europe.
In the face of those misgivings, the sudden appearance of the adultery
proposal last month brought a sharp warning from
Günter Verheugen, the European Union's enlargement
commissioner.During a visit to Turkey last week, he
said, he bluntly asked Mr. Erdogan why the adultery
issue was being raised now, and he warned the
Turkish leader that it would undermine its campaign
for acceptance in Europe. Suspicion about the
intentions of the party, which is known by its
Turkish abbreviation, A.K.P., has never really
evaporated, despite its general popularity as a
can-do government and its near-total dominance of
Turkish politics since its success in municipal
elections around the country six months ago.
Even the party's supporters appeared puzzled at the attempt to legislate
morality - adultery is forbidden in Islam, as it is
in most religions - at a time when Turkey has been
trying to prove its European credentials. "It's true
that people's suspicions about the A.K.P. were
awakened," said Selahaddin Direck, a contractor and
businessman in Van who has been an enthusiastic
supporter of the party and Mr. Erdogan. Even though
the region is conservative and might have favored
outlawing adultery, he added, there was no
particular demand. "Maybe another time, or on
another platform or in another presentation, the
issue can be put on the agenda again," Mr. Direck
said.
"But at the moment, E.U. membership is more important than such debates.
So it was very unfortunate. I don't think there
could have been a worse time to introduce such a
debate."Criminalizing adultery could bring more harm
to women in a country where honor killings, the
murder of women who are suspected of dishonoring
their families through their sexual conduct, are
still not uncommon, according to the Women's
Association."There is already lots of violence
against women," Ms. Demir said. "This law would
endow the man with even more authority and power,
and could increase the number of crimes against
women."A previous adultery law in the criminal code
punished a man if it was proved that he had set up
housekeeping with a woman or installed her in a
house. But it punished a woman simply for having
sexual relations with a man other than her husband.
Turkey's highest court ruled that law
unconstitutional eight years ago, saying it
discriminated against women.
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