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The Associated Press

Published: June 16, 2008

ANKARA: The Associated Press

The governing party of Turkey, facing closure after the country s highest court charged it with engaging in anti-secular activity, on Monday rejected accusations that it had steered Turkey toward Islamic rule.

Abdurrahman Yalcinkaya, the top prosecutor in Turkey, accused the governing AK Party of violating secularism, which is protected by the Turkish Constitution, and has asked that the party be closed down.

Yalcinkaya also asked that President Abdullah Gul, Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan and about 70 other party officials be barred from politics for five years.

It could take several months for the court to reach a verdict. Analysts fear that a decision to disband the party, which holds a majority in Parliament, could throw the country into political and economic turmoil and could harm the country s relations with the European Union.

José Manuel Barroso, president of the European Commission, has warned that banning the AK Party would have a "major impact" on Turkey s ties with the EU.

In its defense, the party submitted more than 400 pages to the Constitutional Court on Monday, saying that closing down the party would amount to overturning the results of a democratic election.

"It is not true that the party has become the focal point of activities against secularism," the party said in its defense arguments. The case "is a violation of the right to free speech," it said, and "a violation of the right to free elections."

The AK Party, which came to power in 2002, won a new mandate in elections last year. "There is no evidence to support the claim that the party poses a risk to democracy in the short or long term," it said.

The chief prosecutor referred to a recent attempt by Parliament to abolish a ban on head scarves in universities as evidence that the party had become a "focal point of anti-secular activity."

The Constitutional Court struck down the amendment, saying that it violated secularism, and upheld the ban.

The decision was a major defeat for Erdogan, whose government is locked in a power struggle with secular groups supported by the military and other state institutions.

"The party s actions in the past six years have openly shown that it is the guarantee for the democratic, secular state," the party said in its defense, in an apparent reference to changes that seek to advance Turkey s bid to join the European Union. "There is no just reason that would necessitate sanctioning our party."

Party lawyers and the prosecutor were expected to make their cases before the court in coming weeks.

Source : http://www.iht.com/articles/2008/06/16/europe/turkey.php

Photo : http://memritv.org/image/901.12

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