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April 3 (Bloomberg) -- The trial of two Turkish army
officers for allegedly murdering an ethnic Kurd will
test the independence of the judiciary, potentially
undermining the country's bid to join the European
Union.
Opponents of Turkey's EU candidacy are watching the
case for signs that the government is unable to
uphold the rule of law, Joost Lagendijk, a lawmaker
in the European Parliament and a supporter of
Turkey's EU bid, said in a telephone interview from
Strasbourg, France.
Military police officers Ali Kaya and Ozcan Ildeniz
instructed Veysel Ates, a convicted terrorist, to
throw a hand grenade into a bookstore in Semdinli,
southeast Turkey, prosecutor Ferhat Sarikaya said on
March 3. The attack killed Mehmet Korkmaz, an ethnic
Kurd. A crowd then tried to drag the three men out
of a getaway vehicle, smashing its windows, before
police intervened. The three men have pleaded
innocent to the charges of murder.
``The government's failure to act in this case could
be used as an excuse by some in Europe to block
Turkey's path to the EU,'' said Lagendijk, who is
co-chairman of the Turkey-EU joint parliamentary
committee. ``The incident proves that the government
isn't in control of all security matters in
Turkey.''
Turkey's military, which has removed three
governments from power in the past four decades, has
led a two-decade campaign against militants of the
separatist Kurdistan Workers' Party, or PKK, in the
nation's southeast. The country's bid to enter the
EU has focused attention on the conflict, which has
killed 40,000 people, with the European Court ruling
against Turkey 15 times last year for killing
unarmed civilians.
The PKK is demanding more political rights for the
nation's Kurds and has about 7,000 fighters based in
Turkey and northern Iraq, according to estimates by
the Turkish military.
The Allegations
The bookstore is owned by a suspected member of the
PKK, Sarikaya said in the March 3 indictment. The
bombing may be the latest in a series of
``extra-judicial killings'' by the army, Yusuf
Alatas, head of the Ankara-based Human Rights
Association, said in an interview on March 15. The
army has denied such accusations.
No date for the trial has been set, yet it is
already raising tensions between the military and
the government, which has pledged to bolster the
independence of the judiciary in return for
membership of the EU.
The incident has already led to the removal of head
of police intelligence Sabri Uzun after he told
parliament that lack of discipline among army units
probably led to the bombing. Military chiefs
requested that Uzun be sacked, the Milliyet daily
reported on March 23.
Military Demands
The military is demanding disciplinary proceedings
against Sarikaya, who accused Deputy Chief of Staff
Yasar Buyukanit of interfering in the case after he
defended the character of suspect Kaya. The
allegations were ``politically motivated'' and
sought to ``weaken the Turkish armed forces and its
desire and determination to fight terrorism,'' the
army said last month.
Contacted by telephone on March 24, the military's
press office in the capital Ankara declined
immediate comment on the case or to respond to
questions about its alleged involvement in extra-
judicial killings.
The EU has vowed to halt membership talks with
Turkey if it strays from the bloc's democratic
standards. The Turkish parliament last month sent a
team of lawmakers to Semdinli to investigate the
incident.
Turkey started the EU talks on Oct. 3 after it
reduced the use of torture and widened cultural
rights for its Kurdish minority. It faces opposition
to its candidacy from politicians including Nicolas
Sarkozy, leader of French President Jacques Chirac's
Popular Movement party.
Judicial Independence
``The military mustn't undermine the judiciary, it
shouldn't compromise its independence,'' Sadullah
Ergin, deputy chief in parliament of the ruling
Justice and Development Party, said in a telephone
interview on March 20. ``Everybody must ensure that
the judiciary is allowed to perform its duties
without interference.''
Europe's politicians have criticized Turkey's
security forces for displacing hundreds of thousands
of Kurds from their homes during the armed campaign
against the PKK, who are labeled terrorists by the
U.S. government and EU.
The number of extra-judicial killings in Turkey is
increasing, the European Commission, the EU's
executive arm, said in a Nov. 9 report on Turkey's
progress towards membership, without providing
further details.
``Turkey should work towards greater accountability
and transparency in the conduct of security
affairs,'' the commission said. ``Civilian
authorities should fully exercise their supervisory
functions.''
Cultural Rights
Violence in Turkey's southeast is ``more than just a
security problem'' and the government should
``urgently'' address the need for more cultural
rights for its Kurds, EU enlargement spokeswoman
Krisztina Nagy told Bloomberg in a telephone
interview March 31. Her comments followed clashes
between the security forces and Kurdish protestors
in the city of Diyarbakir, where at least six people
have died since March 28.
The Justice and Development Party, or AKP, may be
unwilling to confront the military ahead of a
general election scheduled for November 2007, said
Dogu Ergil, a professor of politics at Ankara
University. The military suspects the AKP, which has
its roots in an Islamic movement, of seeking to
compromise Turkey's secular principles.
``The government, because of its Islamist roots, is
under surveillance by the secular establishment, led
by the military,'' Ergil said in an interview on
March 21. ``If the AKP acts then it might find
itself embroiled in a scandal of its own, hurting
its chances of re-election next year.''
Trusted
The army is more trusted than any other institution
in Turkey, the Hurriyet newspaper said on Dec. 6,
citing a survey of 1,179 people conducted in Ankara
by the Politics Center, an organization owned by an
AKP deputy.
While a crack-down on the army might lose the
government votes at parliamentary elections next
year, it would boost Turkey's popularity in the EU,
where only 31 percent of people back its membership,
Lagendijk said.
``The Semdinli incident could prove to be a highly
symbolic case, an historical turning point where the
army is forced to launch a crack down on its own
units,'' he said. ``But if the government doesn't
act, it will show that the road to membership for
Turkey is destined to be a long one.''
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