The Trial of the Conscience of Democracy in Turkey
The trial of the celebrated Turkish writer Orhan Pamuk has come to my notice and I have to publish the article of Frits Bolkestein who was a member of the European Commission, 1999-2004, and is a former Dutch minister of defence.
The article of Frits Bolkestein speaks of the hypocrisy of Turkey in the efforts to join the EU. But, her violations of human rights betray her interests in the EU. And I am in total support of the views of Bolkestein.
Orhan Pamuk spoke the truth of what was well known in the history of Turkey, the first genocide of the 20th century. Turkish genocide of 1.5 million Armenians in 1915 and 1916. And the second genocide when over 30,000 Kurds and over 1,000,000 Armenians were massacred during the separatist ethnic wars of the 1980s and 1990s in Turkey.So, it is wrong to say the truth?
I stand by the testimony of Orhan Pamuk and I hereby call on all the people who believe in Truth, Justice and Liberty to join us to stand by Orhan Pamuk to condemn his trial in Turkey.
"It is not Orhan Pamuk who will stand trial tomorrow, but Turkey,"
Olli Rehn, the EU commissioner in charge of enlargement for the alliance, said in a statement Thursday.
His view was echoed by scores of European lawmakers, human rights activists and others who have streamed to Turkey to observe the trial.
"This is a litmus test whether Turkey is seriously committed to the freedom of expression and reforms that enhance the rule of law and benefit all Turkish citizens,"
added Rehn, a self-proclaimed fan of Pamuk's.
Behind the Pamuk trial:
• The celebrated Turkish author told a Swiss newspaper in February that "30,000 Kurds and a million Armenians were killed in these lands and nobody but me dares to talk about it." He said security forces shared responsibility for the death of the Kurds in southeast
Turkey during separatist fighting in the 1980s and 1990s.
• The case was brought for "insulting Turkish identity" under article 301 of the criminal code. Pamuk faces up to three years in jail if convicted.
• Pamuk's novels, translated into dozens of languages, include "My
Name is Red," "Snow," and "The White Castle." The novels deal with the clash between past and present, East and West, secularism and Islamism.
• Pamuk won the Peace Prize of Germany's book trade association,
Germany's highest literary honor, in October.
Source: Reuters
http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/default.asp?page=2005%5C12%5C16%5Cstory_16-12-2005_pg3_4
What’s wrong with Turkey? —Frits Bolkestein
Turkey should not be admitted to the EU, because it is not a European country. Christianity, feudalism, the Renaissance, the Enlightenment, democracy, and industrialisation have made us what we Europeans are, but they have not made Turks who they areOn December 16, Orhan Pamuk, one of Turkey’s most famous writers, will enter an Istanbul court to face a charge of “insulting the national identity” after he advocated open discussion of the Turkish genocide of 1.5 million Armenians in 1915 and 1916. Pamuk faces three years in prison. Turkey’s effort to fine and imprison those who do not toe the official line convinces me that I was correct to oppose opening negotiations on the country’s European Union membership.
In December 1999, the European Council granted Turkey the status of EU candidate-member, implying that Turkey would accede to the Union at some future, unspecified date. The Council subsequently asked the European Commission to decide by October 2004 whether Turkey had sufficiently fulfilled the political criteria — including democracy, the rule of law, and respect for the rights of ethnic minorities — for membership. That decision was one of the last taken by Romano Prodi’s commission, of which I was a member. Of its 30 members, 29 said that Turkey had fulfilled the criteria sufficiently to proceed. I was the lone dissenter.The Commission’s own report on Turkey, prepared by Günter Verheugen, who was then in charge of EU enlargement, shaped my decision. This report mentioned that in 2003 some 21,870 Turks submitted asylum claims in the EU, of which 2,127 were accepted. In other words, the EU’s own governments acknowledged in 2003 that the Turkish government had persecuted more than 2,000 of its citizens.Meanwhile, the Commission published a progress report on Turkey that granted that reforms were continuing, albeit at a slower pace, under Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s mildly Islamic-minded government. Yet the report also presented serious misgivings: human rights violations, including torture, continued; the military’s influence remained too high; freedom of speech was not universally observed; non-Muslim religious and cultural minorities faced discrimination; and violence against women was not opposed strongly enough.Not much has changed since accession talks began this October. Beyond the current persecution of Pamuk, unacceptable behaviour abounds.
In March 2005, the police violently disrupted a demonstration to celebrate International Women’s Day. In May, the largest teachers’ union was banned for promoting the education of Turkey’s 14 million Kurds in their own language.Indeed, intolerance goes right to the top of the Turkish government. Foreign Minister Abdullah Gül abruptly cancelled a recent press conference in Copenhagen when he spied a Kurdish journalist in the audience and the Danes refused to evict him.Such actions and attitudes amply justify my dissent of October 2004. But, even if these shortcomings were removed, Turkey should still not be admitted to the EU, because it is not a European country. Christianity, feudalism, the Renaissance, the Enlightenment, democracy, and industrialisation have made us what we Europeans are, but they have not made Turks who they are. So I am not convinced that reforms in Turkey implemented at the insistence of the European Commission would continue after accession. Indeed, I suspect that there will be backsliding.Moreover, Turkey’s accession would lead inevitably to that of Ukraine, Belarus, and Moldova, and perhaps of Georgia, Armenia, and Azerbaijan. The first three of these countries are certainly more European than Turkey. Leaving the three Caucasian republics aside but including the successor states to Yugoslavia, this would mean an EU of some 35 members. What sort of Union would that be?The EU is not simply a club of friends. It is based on freedom of movement of goods, services, capital, and people. The Commission, as the guardian of the Union’s treaties, must protect these four fundamental freedoms, which means that it must sometimes persuade, and if necessary force, member states to change their laws.
The alcohol policy in Sweden, the Volkswagen-law in Germany, and discrimination against foreign investment funds in France are examples of cases that made the Commission unpopular. But they were necessary. By the time I left the Commission, I was sitting on a pile of 1,500 such infringement proceedings. In short, EU membership entails having to accept incisive measures that deeply affect a state’s internal affairs. That will be impossible with such disparate members.
The EU would fall victim to what the historian Paul Kennedy calls “imperial overreach”. The EU would become unacceptably diluted. That is why former French president Valéry Giscard d’Estaing feared that Turkey’s entry would lead to the EU’s break-up, and why former German chancellor Helmut Schmidt said, “Accession of Turkey would be more than the EU could bear.” But the strongest reason to oppose Turkey’s accession is a question of democracy: a majority of the EU’s population simply does not want it.
—DT-PS-IHS
Frits Bolkestein was a member of the European Commission, 1999-2004, and is a former Dutch minister of defence.
