flash bulletin

14 December 2004

1. "What do the Kurds want in Turkey?", declaration about what do the Kurds want in Turkey.

2. "Reacting To Kurds", the ads taken out last week by leading Kurdish groups in the International Herald Tribune and Le Monde set off a firestorm in our country. They outlined what Kurds living in Turkey want from Ankara in its European Union membership bid.

3. "Human rights record haunts Turkey’s EU ambitions", European leaders this week are expected to give Turkey a date on which it can begin negotiations on joining the EU. One issue has been whether the country’s record on human rights has improved.

4. "Turkey ’must admit WWI genocide’", France has said it will ask Turkey to acknowledge the mass killing of Armenians from 1915 as genocide when it begins EU accession talks.

5. "EU is not being fair to Turkey", like it or not, the playing field for Turkey's European Union entry bid is not quite as level as it has been for other candidates, past or present.

6. "No date set for EU Turkey talks", the European Union edged closer to giving Turkey the green light on membership talks, but jitters over bringing the relatively poor Muslim nation into the fold prevented a decision on a starting date.

7. "Turkey's Self-Emasculation", under the new Islamist government, Turkey's foreign policy has been a complete disaster, unrivalled in the country's long and proud history.

8. "As Kurds return to oil-rich city, a fragile detente", some Arabs have chafed at the "Kurdization" now occurring, and some worry that the tense calm could crumble, pushing Kirkuk into the maelstrom of violence engulfing much of Iraq.

1. - International Herald Tribune / Le Monde - "What do the Kurds want in Turkey?":

12 December 2004 / posted by the Kurdish Institute of Paris

The Kurds make up about a quarter of the population of Turkey, numbering between 15 and 20 million, according to the October 2004 Report of the European Commission. Like all historically constituted human communities, they have the right to live in dignity in the land of their ancestors, and to preserve their identity, culture and language and hand them down freely to their children.

Having been victims of great injustice throughout the 20th century, the Kurds now pin their hopes for a better future on the process Turkey must undergo to become a member of the European Union, which they perceive as being, above all, a multicultural area of peace, democracy and pluralism. To join this family of democracies, Turkey itself must become a true democracy, with respect for its own cultural diversity and political pluralism. In particular, it must guarantee its Kurdish citizens the same rights that the Basques, Catalans, Scots, Lapps, South Tyroleans and Walloons enjoy in the democratic countries of Europe - and which it is itself demanding for the Turkish minority in Cyprus.

Public conscience will not abide a policy of double standards, which would eventually undermine the moral credibility of the European Union and tarnish the image of the Turkish government in European public opinion.

The European process offers both Turks and Kurds new and promising prospects, and gives them a chance for reconciliation on the basis of a peaceful settlement of the Kurdish question, with due respect for existing borders. This opportunity must be appreciated at its true value.

We the undersigned, representing Kurdish society in all its political and cultural diversity, consider that such a settlement calls for:

- a new and democratic Constitution, recognising the existence of the Kurdish people, and guaranteeing it the right to a public school system and media in its own language and the right to form its own organisations, institutions and parties with the aim of contributing to the free expression of its culture and its political aspirations.

- a general amnesty in order to establish a climate of confidence and reconciliation and, once and for all, to turn the page on violence and armed conflict;

- the implementation, with European support, of a vast programme of economic development of the Kurdish region, particularly including rebuilding the more than 3,400 Kurdish villages destroyed in the 1990s, and incentives for the three million displaced Kurds to return to their homes.

We ask the Turkish authorities and the European leaders to do justice to the Kurds in Turkey by acceding to their legitimate demands in order to ensure regional peace and stability, and to consider the fulfilment of those demands to be an essential criterion by which to measure Turkey’s progress along the road to membership of the European Union.

FIRST SIGNATORIES TURKEY: Mehmet ABBASOGLU, Former President of the People’s Democratic Party (Dehap), Songul Erol ABDIL, Mayor of Tunceli; Nesimi ADAY, Poet, writer ; Muslum AKALIN, barrister, President of the Bar at Urfa (Edessa); Nilufer AKBAL, musician ; Abdullah AKENGIN, Mayor of Dicle ; Abdullah AKIN, former Mayor of Batman ; Ibrahim AKSOY, Former Mayor of Malatya ; Ihsan AKSOY, writer ; Haci AKYOL, barrister, former Mayor of the Yazihan, Malayata; Yusuf ALATAS, barrister, President of the Human Rights Associatîon of Turkey ; Mahmut ALINAK, barrister, former Member of Parliament for Sirnak ; Suleyman ANIK, Mayor of Dargecit, Mardin ; Firat ANLI, Mayor of Yenisehir, Diyarbakir ; M. Nezir ARAS, Mayor of Bulanik ; Rusen ARSLAN, lawyer, writer ; Ismail ARSLAN, Mayor of Ceylanpinar ; Mehmet Ali ASLAN, barrister, former President of the Workers’ Party of Turkey ; Naci ASLAN, Member of Parliament for Agri ; Sedat ASLANTAS, barrister, General Secretary of the Human Rights Foundation of Turkey ; Fahrettin ASTAN, Mayor of Besiri, Batman ; Nuran ATLI, Mayor of Mazidag ; Mustafa AVCI, General Secretary of the Confedaration of Public Service employees (KESK); Eshat AYATA, writer, publisher; Sukran AYDIN, Mayor of Bismil; Behrun AYGOREN, former Mayor of Dicle ; Huseyin AYYILDIZ, Secretary General of Tum-Belsen ; Ihsan BABAOGLU, Spokesman for the Democratic Platform, Diyarbakir; Tuncer BAKIRHAN, President of the Democratic People’s Party (Dehap); Murat BATGI, actor, Osman BAYDEMIR, Mayor of Diyarbakir ; Seyhmus BAYHAN, Mayor of Lice ; Mehmet Celal BAYKARA, barrister, President of the Foundation for Research on Kurdish Culture (KURTKAV) ; Sefik BEYAZ, President of the Istanbul Kurdish Institute ; Ekrem BILEK, former Mayor of Siirt; Nevzat BINGOL, journalist, writer ; Nadir BINGOL, Mayor of Ergani; Kemal BIRLIK, former Member of Parliament for Sirnak ; Murat BOZLAK, Former President of People’s Democratic Party (Hadep) ; Ali BUCAK, barrister, President of the Urfa Cultural Centre ; Aydin BUDAK, Mayor of Cizre ; Feridun CELIK, former Mayor of Diyarbakir ; Demir CELIK, Mayor of Varto (Mus) ; Omer CETIN, co-foun-der of the Research Foundation on Social Issues (TOSAV) ; Yusuf CETIN, President of free contemporary Actors’ Association (Casod); Murat CEYLAN, Mayor of Kurtalan ; Emnullah CIN, Mayor of Viransehir ; Muzaffer DEMIR, Former member of Parlement for Mus ; Selim DEMIR, Mayor of Kozluk ; Cafer DEMIR, President of Elazig Chapter of Human Rights Association ; Ahmet Turan DEMIR, President of the Free Society Party (OTP) ; Abdullah DEMIRTAS, Mayor of Surici, Diyarbakir ; Hatip DICLE, former Member of Parliament for Diyarbakir, former President of the Demoeracy Party {DEP) ; Ilhan DIKEN, President of the Diyarbakir Medical Assocoation ; Seyhmus DIKEN, writer ; Orhan DOGAN, former Member of Parliament for Sirnak ; Faik DURSUN, Mayor of Beytulsebap ; Tarik Ziya EKINCI, former Member of Parliament for Diyarbakir, former General Secretary of the Worker’s Party of Turkey (TIP) ; Tahsin EKINCI, lawyer ; Adnan EKMEN, former Minister, former Member of Parliament for Batman ; Serafettin ELCI, former Minister, former Member of Parliament for Mardin ; Nuretttin ELHUSEYNI, writer, translator ; Giyasettin EMRE, former Member of Parliament for Mus ; Hamit ENGIN, Mayor of Hazro ; Mehmet Ali EREN, barister, former Member of Parliament for Istanbul ; Ahmet ERTAK, Mayor of Sirnak ; Enver ETE, Spoksman for the Democratic Platform, Mardin ; Mehmet Fuat FIRAT, former Member of Parliament for Erzurum ; Umit FIRAT, publisher, writer ; Ibrahim GUCLU, lawyer, writer ; Nezir GULCAN, former Mayor of Kurtalan (Siirt); Ahmet GUMUSTEKIN, painter ; Hasim HASIMI, former Member of Parliament for Diyarbakir, former Mayor of Cizre ; Necdet IPEKYUZ, former President of the Diyarbakir Medical Association ; M. Tahir KAHAMANER, Mayor of Malazgirt ; Hüseyin KALKAN, Mayor of Batman ; Ramazan KAPAN, Mayor of Derik ; Hasip KAPLAN, barrister ; Seyhmus KARAHAN, former President of the Urfa Association of Civil Engineers ; Zulkuf KARATEKIN, Mayor of Karapinar, Diyarbakir: Selahattin KAYA, former Mayor of Bing?l; Hasan KAYA, former President of the Istanbul Kurdish Institute ; Ferzende KAYA, journalist; Mehmet KAYA, Mayor of Kocak?y, Diyarbakir ; Fikret KAYA, Mayor of Silvan ; Gulten KAYA, music publisher ; Eren KESKIN, Former President of Istanbul Chapter of Human Rights Association of Turkey (IHD) ; Abdullah KESKIN, publisher ; Abdullah KIRAN, writer ; Muhsin KIZILKAYA, writer; Servet KOCA-KAYA, musician ; Muhsin KONUR, Mayor of Silopi; Burhan KORHAN, Mayor of Besiri; Mukkades KUBILAY, Mayor of Dogubeyazid; Cabbar LEYGARA, barrister, former Mayor of Baglar, Diyarbakir; Ahmet MELIK, former Member of Parliament for Urfa; Yilmaz ODABASI, poet, writer ; Husnu OKCUOGLU, former Member of Parliament for Istanbul; Selim OLCER , former President of the Union of Medical Associations of Turkey; Eyup Sabri ONCEL, barrister, former President of the Urfa Bar; Esat ONER, Mayor of Gercus, Batman; Mahmut ORTAKAYA, former President of the Diyarbakir ; Medical Association ; Selim OZALP, former Mayor of Siirt : Sahabettin OZARSLANER, former Mayor of Van ; Mustafa OZER, barrister, former President of the Diyarbakir Bar ; Hicri OZGOREN, poet ; Osman OZGUVEN, Mayor of Dikili, Izmir; Yurdusev OZSOKMENLER, Mayor of Baglar, Diyarbakir; Mesut OZTURK, former Mayor of Van ; Fadil OZTURK, poet ; Kemal PARLAK, spokesman of the Democratic Consensus and Initiative for a solution to the Kurdish Question (DEMOS) ; Selim SADAK, former Member of Parliament for Sirnak ; Resul SADAL, Mayor of Idil ; Ethem SAHIN, Mayor of Suruc ; Sirri SAKIK, former Member of Parliament for Mus,; Rahmi SALTUK, musician ; Suzan SAMANCI, writer ; Menderes SAMANCILAR, actor ; Mehmet SANRI, publisher ; Naci SAPAN, President of the Association of Journalists of the South-East; Mehmet Emin SEVER, former Member of Parliament for Mus ; Yasar SEYMAN, President of the Press Trade Union of Turkey (BAS-SEN). Former vice-President of People’s Republican Party (CHP) ; Enver SEZGIN, writer ; Emir Ali SIMSEK, General Secretary of the Teachers’ Union (Egitim-Sen) ; Cihan SINCAR, Mayor of Kiziltepe ; Malmut SONMEZ, former Member of Parliament for Bing?l ; Mehmet TANHAN, Mayor of Nusaybin; Sezgin TANRIKULU, barrister, President of the Diyarbakir Bar; Nimet TANRIKULU, President of Tunceli Cultural Genler; Metin TEKCE, Mayor of Hakkari ; Hursit TEKIN, Mayor of Semdinli; Deniz TOPKAN, Spokesman for the Democratic Platform, Batman ; Ahmet TULGAR, journalist ; Ferhat TUNc, musician ; Sehnaz TURAN, barrister, President of the Foundation for Research into Society and the Law (TOHAV) ; Ahmet TURK, former Member of Parliament for Mardin ; Sehmus ULEK, barrister, Viee-President of the MAZLUM-DER (Association for Human Rights); Rojin ULKER, singer ; Mehmet UZUN, writer ; Behlul YAVUZ, former General Secretary of the Diyarbakir small shopkeepers and artisans Union ; Feridun YAZAR, barrister, former Mayor of Urfa, former President of the People’s Labour Party (HEP) ; Canip YILDIRIM, Publisher ; M. Salih YILDIZ, Mayor of Yuksekova ; Sedat YURTDAS, former Member of Parliament for Diyarbakir ; Leyla ZANA, Former member of Parliament for Diyarbakir, winner of the European Parliament’s Sakharov Prize ; Mehdi ZANA, Former Mayor of Diyarbakir ; Veysi ZEYDANLIOGLU, lawyer.

EUROPE: Aso AGACE, Director of the Women’s Training Centre, Germany ; Salih AKIN, Lecturer at Rouen University, France; Haci AKMAN, University Professor of Bergen, Norway ; Rohat ALAKOM, writer ; STOCKHOLM, Foundation for Kurdish Culture, Sweden ; Faruk ARAS, essayist, Sweden ; Nizamettin ARIC, musician and film director, Germany ; Gunay ASLAN, journalist, Germany ; Mustafa AYDOGAN, writer, Sweden; Kazim BABA, Politician, Germany ; Halîn Evrim BABA, member of the Berlin Regional Parliament, Germany ; Kurdo BAKSI, journalist, winner of the Olof Palme Peace Prize, Sweden ; Riza BARAN, President of the Fridriechhein-Kreuzberg, local Council, Germany ; Rojen BARNAS, writer and poet, Sweden ; Hamit BOZARSLAN, Lecturer at the School for Advanced Studies in Social Sciences, France ; Sermîn BOZARSLAN, President of the Federation of the Kurdish associations in Sweden ; Serhat BUCAK, Lawyer, Germany ; Yilmaz CAMLIBEL, writer, Germany ; Firat CEWERJ, writer and publisher, Sweden ; Ali CIFTCI, publisher, Sweden ; Mûrad CIVAN, research worker, Sweden ; Faysal DASLI, Journalist, Germany ; Seyhus DAGTEKIN, poet and novelist, winner of the International Prize for Poetry in the French Language, Franee ; Mehmet DEMIR, President of the Federation of Kurdish Assoeiations (YEKKOM), Germany ; Abdullrahman DURRE, former Mufti of Diyarbakir, Germany ; ELISHER, writer, Sweden ; Hasan Basri ELMAS, Lecturer at Paris-VIII University, France ; Derwesh FERHO, President of the Brussel’s Kurdish Institute, Belgium ; FOUNDATION of Kurds from Anatolia, Sweden ; Gülistan GURBAY, Researcher, Germany ; Metin INCESU, Director of the Center for Kurdish Studies (Navend), Allemagne ; Haydar ISIK, journalist, Germany ; Ahmet KAHRAMAN, Journalist, Germany ; Yasar KAYA, Former President of the Demoeracy Party (DEP), Germany ; Cahit MERVAN, Joumalist, Germany ; HfisenS METE, Writer, Sweden ; Kendal NEZAN, President of the Paris Kurdish Institute, France ; Ozz NUJEN, actor, Sweden ; Nihal OTURAN, Research Engineer, France ; Mehmet Ali OTURAN, University Professor, France ; Nalin PEKGUL, Presidenl of the National Federation of Women Social-Democrats of Sweden, former Member of the Swedish Parliament; Sivan PERWER, musician, Prise-winner of the Charles Cross Academy for the Music of the World. Germany ; REMZI, painter, Paris ; Serdar ROSHAN, writer, Sweden ; Mehmet SAHIN, Coordinator of the Kreise-Dialogue, Germany ; Giyasettin SAYAN, member of the Berlin Regional Parliament, Germany ; Abubekir SAYDAN, President of the International Center for Kurdish Human Rights, Germany ; Nizamettin TOGUC, Former member of Parliament for Batman. Holland ; Feleknas UCA, member of the European Parliament, Germany ; Ali YIGIT, Former member of Parliament for Mardin, President of the Union of Democratic Kurdish Federations in Europe (KONKURD), Holland ; Kerim YILDIZ, Esecutive Director ot the Kurdish Human Rights Project, London ; Kotan YILDIZ, Resarcher at the Technical University of Berlin, Reso ZILAN, Linguist, Sweden ; Ahmed ZIREK, actor, France.

2. - Radikal - "Reacting To Kurds":

13 December 2004 / opinion by Bulent Kahraman

The ads taken out last week by leading Kurdish groups in the International Herald Tribune and Le Monde set off a firestorm in our country. They outlined what Kurds living in Turkey want from Ankara in its European Union membership bid.

I don’t agree with the content of the ads. I do believe that their timing was off, and that since Leyla Zana and her friends were released Kurdish groups have been making a series of missteps. However, I don’t think that their methods are wrong. On the contrary, we should insist that such methods are indeed useful and necessary. Groups can use the foreign press to express their ideas.

If necessary, Turkey could do the same. Ankara is arguing that the ads treated it unfairly, ignoring the recent democratization efforts. I believe that the steps that we’ve taken up to now are very important. But let me ask you a question: Why should everyone agree with me? These steps might not satisfy all groups and all people. There may be some who are dissatisfied with Turkey’s reforms and they might use this method to express their disappointment.

What we should do now is to discuss their views calmly. However, Turkey’s immediate reaction to the ads was like a reflex action, because whenever our problems are put into the international spotlight we get angry and frustrated since we prefer to keep them behind closed door. This attitude springs from our introverted, communitarian and corporatist social structure. However, now is the time for open discussions. We need to embrace such processes if we want to transform ourselves into an open society.
There’s no point in branding the people who took out the ads as ‘separatists’ just because they preferred to air their grievances in the foreign press. They might be separatists, but here the problems they are discussing are Turkey’s. We must find solutions to these problems which can satisfy not only domestic groups but also the international community.

I personally believe that the Kurdish issue cannot be resolved by either separatism or Kurdish nationalism, which is exactly why I want separatists and Kurdish nationalists to come out and express their views very clearly. Any resolution, I think, will emerge from a process of persuasion and democratic negotiations. Such a participatory and two-way system is the foundation of all democratic ideals worldwide.

3. - The Guardian - "Human rights record haunts Turkey’s EU ambitions":

European leaders this week are expected to give Turkey a date on which it can begin negotiations on joining the EU. One issue has been whether the country’s record on human rights has improved.

VAN / 13 December 2004 / by Helena Smith

On October 6, the day Turkey was formally recommended by the European commission to start talks with the EU, Ayse Ozgur woke up in a bank.

For three weeks she had been on the run in eastern Turkey - from the man who raped her, a mother who had starved her and a father who had sold her in exchange for money and guns.

"In July," she sobbed, "I was raped, beaten by father, left hungry by my mother and locked up in the attic of our home. In August, after I became pregnant, I was made to marry my rapist because I had stained my family honour."

For weeks, Ayse Ozgur watched her body turn black and blue as her forced marriage turned into a catalogue of abuse.

"Every day he hit me. He broke my fingers, dislocated my arm and hurt my back," recalled the bony teenager, weeping inconsolably at a women’s support group in Van, a town on Turkey’s eastern fringe.

"I screamed and asked, ’Why are you doing this? Is there no God that you believe in?’" said the ethnic Kurd, who finally managed to escape on a bus from her home town, Hakkari.

"When I got to Van, I slept on the streets or in banks, underneath cash dispensers, and I cut my hair short so no one would recognise me. I counted the days until I turned 18. Then I went to the police."

In recent years Turkey has made huge strides in stamping out human rights abuses.

The death penalty has been abolished, the once dreaded state security courts dismantled, and cultural and linguistic rights broadened for the country’s Kurdish, Arabic and Bosnian communities.
Ahead of this week’s EU summit to decide whether to launch membership talks with the country, prime minister Tayyip Erdogan’s Islamist-oriented government has approved proposals to scale down police powers, in addition to other far-reaching constitutional and legislative reforms.

Yet human rights violations continue. Across the Muslim nation’s remote and impoverished south-east, women like Ayse Ozgur are still prone to crimes of violence.

To correct some of these inequities, Ankara’s parliament passed a new penal code in September bringing Turkey into line with EU states.

But lawyers, human rights activists, psychologists, academics and non-governmental organisations throughout Turkey say progress is often obstructed by a failure to implement the reforms on the ground.
"Passing legislation is one thing but changing mentalities has proved to be quite another," said Senal Saruhan, a feminist lawyer in Ankara who led the campaign to revise the penal code.

"Judges and prosecutors are a real problem. They should be educated in the new laws, given special classes in EU legislation, if application is to be at all successful."

Most Islamist MPs hold traditional views. Many openly condone forced marriages - including those of victims to their rapists - and only reluctantly agreed to penalise virginity testing in the new code.

"This government has not been easy to work with. It’s shown huge resistance on issues like honour crimes," said Pinar Ilkkaracan, who runs a human rights group in Istanbul.

"Women MPs from the [ruling] party were especially resistant and very much behind Erdogan’s attempts to criminalise adultery. You get the feeling they’re making these changes not because their heart’s in them, but because of the demands of Europe."

Within Turkey, some human rights activists speak of a "culture of violence". Although torture is no longer systematic, the number of complaints of ill-treatment in police vehicles and other places outside formal detention centres has shot up in the past year.

"There has been a lot of progress on the methods of torture being used," said Turkcan Baykal, a clinical psychologist who works at the Human Rights Association in the western city of Izmir.

"The aim now is not to leave any physical marks on a person’s body but to harm them psychologically; trauma that lasts for years. We get people in here every week but they are just the tip of the iceberg."

One human rights group said it often felt compelled to "sweeten" its reports so Turkey would stand a chance of being admitted to the EU.
"There are times when even we try to give a rosier picture of events [on the ground] because the desire of all of us is to get into the EU," said Zeki Yuksel, who heads the Human Rights Association in Van. "The alternative would be much worse."

Real progress, say activists, will come only if Turkey is constantly monitored by experts in Brussels.

"Abuse will drop, but it will not be eliminated easily," said Levent Korkut, who heads the Turkey branch of Amnesty International.

"It will stop, step by step, and only if Turkey is sufficiently monitored from abroad."

For Ayse Ozgur the months ahead will be anything but easy. She is too weak to end her pregnancy, and doctors say she has no option but to give birth to her rapist’s child.

"I have lost my youth. I have lost my innocence," she cried.

· Ayse Ozgur’s name has been changed

The ins and outs of membership

Leaders of the 25 countries of the European Union meet in Brussels on Thursday and Friday to discuss Turkey’s readiness to begin negotiations for EU membership. The summit is expected to set a date for talks to begin.

Membership criteria require that the candidate country must have achieved:

· Stability of institutions guaranteeing democracy, the rule of law, human rights and respect for and protection of minorities

· The existence of a functioning market economy as well as the capacity to cope with competitive pressure and market forces within the union

· The ability to take on the obligations of membership including adherence to the aims of political, economic and monetary union

EU countries in favour of Turkey joining:

Britain, Italy, Spain, Portugal, Finland, Sweden, Czech Republic, Slovakia, Ireland

EU countries against Turkey joining:

Austria, Luxembourg

EU countries divided over Turkish membership:

Germany (government for, opposition and public opinion against), France, Denmark, Hungary, Greece (government for, public opinion strongly against), Poland, Belgium, Netherlands, Slovenia, Cyprus, Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia

4. - BBC - "Turkey ’must admit WWI genocide’":

13 December 2004

France has said it will ask Turkey to acknowledge the mass killing of Armenians from 1915 as genocide when it begins EU accession talks.

French Foreign Minister Michel Barnier said Turkey had "a duty to remember".

Armenians say 1.5 million of their people died or were deported from their homelands under Turkish Ottoman rule.

France is among a group of nations that class the killings as genocide. Turkey denies any organised genocide, claiming they were quelling a civil uprising.

Mr Barnier said France did not consider Turkish acknowledgement a condition of EU entry, but insisted his country would raise the issue once talks opened.

Speaking to reporters after a meeting of EU foreign ministers to discuss plans to invite Turkey for accession talks, Mr Barnier said Turkey "must carry out this task as a memorial".

In addition, France believes that accession talks should not begin before the second half of 2005, Mr Barnier said. Turkey has pushed for immediate negotiations.

"I believe that when the time comes, Turkey should come to terms with its past, be reconciled with its own history and recognise this tragedy," Mr Barnier said.

’So-called genocide’

His comments drew no immediate official response from Turkey, which has consistently denied orchestrating genocide and the Armenian figures.

A foreign ministry spokesman in the Turkish capital, Ankara, told Reuters that Turkey has never and will never recognise "any so-called genocide".

Armenia alleges that the Young Turks, in 1915 the dominant party in the Ottoman Empire, systematically arranged the deportation and killing of 1.5 million Armenians.

Turkish relations with independent Armenia, which borders Turkey to the north, have long been coloured by the issue.

Around 300,000 Armenians live in France, more than in any other European country, and community leaders have pledged to pressure French President Jacques Chirac on the genocide issue during Turkish accession negotiations.

France passed a law officially recognising the Armenian genocide in 2001, cooling relations with Turkey and scuppering a major arms deal.

Another 14 nations, including Switzerland, Russia and Argentina, also classify the killings as genocide.

5. - Reuters - "EU is not being fair to Turkey":

ANKARA / 14 December 2004 / by Gill Tudor

Like it or not, the playing field for Turkey's European Union entry bid is not quite as level as it has been for other candidates, past or present.

The Turkish government and public alike are furious at what they see as unfair extra conditions, delays and second-class options discussed by the EU ahead of its historic decision on Friday, when it is expected to approve entry talks with Ankara.

Whether it stems from changes in the world political climate, an EU learning curve or plain old-fashioned prejudice, most would agree that this large, Muslim country of 70 million people is not being treated the same way as Poland or Bulgaria.

"It's true, we are being tougher on Turkey," said Katinka Barysch of London's Centre for European Reform think tank. Not only is the EU mulling options such as permanent curbs on Turkish migrant labour or an explicit Plan B option to full EU membership - steps that have not been taken for any previous candidate - but the time frame itself is also longer.

Ankara has been knocking at the EU's door since 1963, when the bloc had six members compared to today's 25. The EU is indicating it could not take in Turkey before 2015, a minimum 10-year marathon between starting talks and joining the club.

Contrast that with new members like Slovakia or Estonia, which went from starting talks to entry in just four years. Poland took six years. Current aspirants Bulgaria and Romania are scheduled to join in 2007 after a seven-year process.

Some argue that there is simply more to do in Turkey, a relatively poor, mainly agrarian country whose eastern borders touch Iran, Iraq and Syria and whose governments have only begun serious EU-orientated reforms over the past few years.

But even Dutch former European Commissioner Frits Bolkestein, who opposes Turkish membership, said last week Ankara was capable of completing entry talks in just five years.

"There is clearly a big gap but I think over five to seven years Turkey could get to where some of the other accession countries are now," said Bear Stearns economist Tim Ash.

BAD TIMING: Simple timing is one reason for the different treatment, with the question of Turkish entry becoming tangled up in some member countries with wrangling over the EU's new constitution.

The EU is still getting to grips with having 10 new members after its big May expansion, and is on a learning curve. "They haven't yet digested the last enlargement," Barysch said. "And just because the EU made mistakes in the past it doesn't mean it has to make them in the future."

Turkey is also a bigger mouthful to swallow. Its population matches the total of all 10 new members, and is projected to overtake the EU's current most populous country, Germany, by the time it is likely to enter the bloc in a decade or more.

"Turkey's not Slovenia or Malta," said one EU diplomat. And it is much poorer than western Europe. But that has not stopped other applicants - IMF figures show Bulgaria and Romania have significantly lower per capita income than Turkey.

CHRISTIAN CLUB?: Many non-Turkish commentators agree with the common Turkish view that racial or religious prejudice is looming large, and that ultimately the EU wants to remain a "Christian club".

Public opinion is strongly against Turkish entry in several countries including France, Germany and Austria, and has been seized on as a vote-winner by politicians of various hues.

French and Austrian leaders as well as Germany's conservative opposition want the EU to raise the possibility of an alternative to full membership - something analysts say might even provoke Turkey to storm away from the EU table.

Apart from fears of mass Turkish immigration, the reasons often cited for opposing Ankara's bid include cultural and religious differences and a belief that Turkey, which straddles both Europe and Asia, is somehow not really European.

Some opponents of Turkish entry have also tapped into heightened religious tensions after the September 11 attacks. The Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung said at the weekend that Germany's conservative opposition would introduce a resolution in parliament warning that Turkish entry would increase the risk of terrorism, gang crime and Islamic extremism in Europe.

"The bottom line is this grudging race issue that people are reluctant to talk about," Ash said. "It's prejudice. They're being treated differently and it isn't fair."

6. - AP - "No date set for EU Turkey talks":

BRUSSELS / 14 December 2004

The European Union edged closer to giving Turkey the green light on membership talks, but jitters over bringing the relatively poor Muslim nation into the fold prevented a decision on a starting date.

EU leaders meeting in Brussels on Thursday and Friday will decide on whether to set a date. They are unlikely to set a limit on how long the talks can go on for.

EU foreign ministers, meeting ahead of the summit on Monday, were unable to set a start date for the talks, which could last 10 or 15 years.

Dutch Foreign Minister Ben Bot, who chaired the meeting, told reporters that although key details had not been resolved, "We have the feeling we'll have a positive outcome."

He excluded any alternative to membership -- such as a looser union which some countries had suggested -- adding that Turkey has long been a candidate for membership.

French Foreign Minister Michel Barnier, whose country is wary of Turkey joining the EU, said "negotiations will be long, open-ended and difficult" and stressed membership was not yet a done deal.

The foreign ministers debated possible start dates and conditions to attach to the talks to assuage fears of bringing Turkey into the bloc.

Austria, Slovakia, Denmark and France have led opposition to Turkey becoming a member.

"An exact date should not be set too early," Barnier said. France wants negotiations to begin in late 2005 or 2006.

Dutch Prime Minister Jan Peter Balkenende, the host of this week's EU summit, said he expected negotiations to begin in the first half of 2005, in line with an EU promise made in December 2002.

However, he acknowledged this might not be possible. "The objective is accession, but we must also envision the possibility that the negotiations will not produce a 'yes'," Balkenende said.

Officials were drafting a summit declaration regarding Turkey.

The draft text, obtained by The Associated Press, praises Ankara for "decisive progress" in economic and political reforms. It also says the EU will monitor its commitment to "fundamental freedoms and to full respect of human rights, (especially) the zero-tolerance policy relating to torture and ill-treatment" of prisoners.

The EU particularly wants Turkey's parliament to approve laws on criminal procedures and the judicial police.

Germany and Italy kept up pressure on their EU partners for talks to begin in early 2005.

German Foreign Minister Joschka Fischer said the start of entry negotiations would trigger more democratic and economic reforms in Turkey.

The EU head office recommended on Oct. 6 that Turkey be put on the path to full membership.

To prevent it from backtracking on economic and political reforms, it suggested no deadline be set for membership and that entry talks could be suspended if reforms falter. Ankara also faces a "safeguard clause" curbing the number of Turkish immigrants heading to other EU countries.

If Turkey joins, its companies will face stiff competition from EU rivals. Turkey has a weak economy with a per capita income of about 5,000 euros ($6,500) -- a fraction of the EU average.

It is also at odds with other countries over EU-member Cyprus, divided into a Greek Cypriot south and a Turkish-controlled north since Turkey invaded in 1974.

Ankara has ruled out recognizing the island's Greek Cypriot government, which Nicosia is demanding. Turkey argues Greek Cypriots rejected a U.N. reunification plan for the island last summer, while Turkish Cypriots accepted it.

EU Enlargement Commissioner Olli Rehn told the European Parliament, which votes Wednesday on Turkish EU membership, that Ankara has worked hard to meet human rights concerns. Parliament's vote will indicate popular sentiment in the EU, but its decision will not be binding on the bloc's leaders.

For some Europeans, Turkey's accession "generates fears and concerns," Rehn said. "It is therefore our duty to address these concerns among public opinion by facilitating a dialogue."

7. - Global Politican - "Turkey's Self-Emasculation":

14 December 2004 / by Antero Leitzinger*

Under the new Islamist government, Turkey's foreign policy has been a complete disaster, unrivalled in the country's long and proud history. Few other countries in the world have ever managed to depart from their traditional foreign policies so rapidly while voluntarily missing so obvious chances for achieving great victories. Instead of participating in the liberation of Iraq, to which Turkey was invited by the USA, its closest ally, Turkey prostrated to France - to the very same country that just recently condemned Turkey for the Armenian genocide, and opposed NATO guarantees for Turkey's security. Instead of having the Turkish Army parading in Kirkuk as the protector of Iraqi Turks and Kurds, Turkey not only choose to side with the Arab Socialist Baath Party dictatorship of Saddam Hussein, but even went on expressing publicly concerns on Kirkuk's security on April 10th, the very day its inhabitants were celebrating their liberation by Kurdish freedom-fighters.

Turkey's disastrous choices and perverted image campaign in order to appeal to traditionally anti-Turkish left-wing peace activists and Arabic radicals, can no more be explained by the lack of experience of its new government, leading AK Party, and foreign minister Abdullah Gül. The only rational explanation must lie in Turkey's political self-emasculation. Apparently, it will present its application for EU membership as a political eunuch for Europe - as a harmless country without real military capabilities (not even a show of force beyond Cyprus, for over 80 years), and without an independent agenda to integrate its Kurdish minority. Instead of having a grateful Kurdish protectorate, or a friendly Iraqi government as its south-eastern neighbour, Turkey will be bordered by independent-minded Kurds who will have a leading role in shaping the foreign policy of Free Iraq.

The consequences of Turkish total failure in spring 2003 will be studied and regretted by scholars of military strategy and diplomacy for decades to come. The frustration felt in the Turkish Army and intelligence services, will boil for a long time. When the media will realize, that Turkey lost a unique chance to secure a role in forming future Iraqi policy, and to present its military force as the guarantor of peace and prosperity for the whole Kurdish people, added with the realization of being betrayed by the French and the disappointment of being left outside the EU anyway, the popularity of the current AK Party administration will fall to low bottom. How much humiliation can a government take? Since the party has a majority in the parliament, a crisis of Turkish democracy will be inevitable. A military coup would not be the worst possible result.

Just when Turkey was on the brink of becoming the leading country of the region, and a trusted pillar of the Free World, Turkish politicians and journalists failed to follow the example of Kemal Atatürk, who had led his country with convincing strength and vision. Instead of winning the top prize in the three weeks. war, Turkey became the worst casualty of the whole process, irresponsibly degenerating into a third-class power, and a destabilizing factor in the Middle East. The contrast can not be exaggerated. Consequences will be felt also in the Caucasus and Cyprus, where Turkey lost critical credibility and authority.

Imagine the Turkish Army having returned from a glorious march through Mosul and Kirkuk to Baghdad. There would have been many military decorations and promotions, valuable experience, some martyrs to be commemorated, and plenty of deserved self-assurance. The Turkish people as a whole would have felt a new sense of unity and pride. Turkey as the main Muslim member of the international coalition would have been remembered and loved in the USA, in Britain, and in several other courageous EU member states. The economy would have gained both through immediate US aid and Iraqi contracts. The Greek, Armenians, Syrians, and Iranians, would have respected Turkish concerns and taken Turkey's requests into account.

But this all did not materialize. The sole responsibility lies on the Turkish government, and all attempts to make any late recovery by attempts to bully the Kurds, to occupy Northern Iraq, or to act as an interested party to the reconstruction of Iraq, are vain, will be ridiculed, and only serve to emphasize Turkish confusion. It is sad, but the heavy work of generations of skilled Turkish diplomats, analysts, public relations officers, and private friends of Turkey, was wasted in a few weeks. Honour is hard to earn, shame even harder to loose.

Some years ago, foreign policy analysts wondered "Who lost Russia". Today, the question is, "How did Turkey lose itself?"

(The article was originally written in April 2003.)

* Antero Leitzinger is a political historian and a researcher for the Finnish Directorate of Immigration. He wrote several books on Turkey, the Middle East and the Caucasus.

8. - The Boston Globe - "As Kurds return to oil-rich city, a fragile detente":

KIRKUK / 14 December 2004 / by Thanassis Cambanis

Hassan Mohammed Amin brought his seven children to a 200-square-yard patch of mud and set up home on the edge of this city in August as part of an ambitious attempt to reverse Saddam Hussein's ethnic cleansing.

A 50-year-old Kurd who spent more than a decade as a refugee, Amin joined thousands of Kurds who have returned to Kirkuk over the past 6 months as part of a concerted plan by the two major Kurdish parties to solidify control of the oil-rich province in northern Iraq and absorb it into the autonomous Kurdish region.

The returning Kurds are seeking to undo Hussein's policy of "Arabization," whereby hundreds of thousands of Kurds and Turkomen were driven from Kirkuk in the 1980s and replaced by Arabs brought in from Iraq's south.

Some Arabs have chafed at the "Kurdization" now occurring, and some worry that the tense calm could crumble, pushing Kirkuk into the maelstrom of violence engulfing much of Iraq.

Still, the steady peace that has prevailed in Kirkuk has confounded observers, including many American officials, who predicted an ethnic civil war in the city as a result of the Kurdish determination to resettle here. The Arabs seem resigned to some kind of accommodation with the returning Kurds, who know that their strength is growing relentlessly.

"The Arabs can do nothing to us now," Amin said on a recent evening, digging a drainage ditch outside the one-room mud-brick hovel he built for his wife and children. "We will stay here forever."

In effect, the fragile detente postpones the two issues that could destabilize the entire northern region: who controls the northern oil fields, and what will happen to the roughly 200,000 "imported Arabs," mostly Shi'ites from Iraq's south pushed or lured to Kirkuk by Hussein with a combination of force and financial incentives.

After more than 20 years of Hussein's wholesale resettling of ethnic groups in Kirkuk and the surrounding province -- intended to forge an Arab majority next to the lucrative northern oil fields -- ethnic politics have now conclusively shifted to a battle for control between Kurds and another ethnic group, the Turkomen.

"Before we had Saddam. Now we have the Kurdish parties. For us Turkomen, it is the same," said Ali Mehdi, the Iraqi Turkomen Front's representative on Kirkuk's Provincial Council. Some displaced Turkomen are returning to Kirkuk as well, but their numbers are small and the few thousand who return will not have a big demographic impact compared with the tens or hundreds of thousands of returning Kurds.

The Turkomen Front -- an umbrella group with close ties to Ankara -- wants to hold provincial elections in January, before more Kurds move to Kirkuk and shift the demographic balance conclusively in their favor.

Last month Kurdish leaders won a surprising accord from a range of Arab parties who agreed to seek the postponement of provincial elections in Kirkuk even as national elections proceed in January. The Kurdish parties argued that there should be no provincial elections as long as Kirkuk's population reflects the demographic engineering of Hussein. They want elections in Kirkuk only after the city's ethnic balance has been "normalized," although what that means in practice is a subject of dispute among Kurds, Turkomen, and Arabs.

There are no reliable population figures for Kirkuk. Kurds, Turkomen, and Arabs all have claimed majority status. The city's population is about 800,000, officials think, with about the same number living in surrounding villages that are part of Kirkuk Province.

Based on sampling done this summer, Western officials who spoke on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the Kirkuk issue said that Kurds seem to be the largest ethnic group, with a plurality slightly greater than both the Arab and Turkomen populations.

"There's a balance of unhappiness," one official said. "None of the groups feel they have enough power. They all talk to each other. They're all targets of violence."

Mehdi, the Turkomen official, accused the Kurds of bringing thousands of people into the city who never before lived in Kirkuk, pretending they were returning refugees to boost their share.

The Turkomen resigned in protest from the local government committee in charge of resettling displaced people. They had called for a full-fledged investigation to root out the "fake refugees," people returning to the city of Kirkuk who were not originally from there.

"During Saddam's time there was Arabization. Now there's Kurdization," Mehdi said. "The Kurds control everything, and they want to change Kirkuk's demography. The government refuses to verify the IDPs," or internally displaced people.

Accusations have been rife since August that Kurds were pulling strings to manipulate a provincial census. That month, tens of thousands of Kurds like Amin suddenly flooded the city, pitching tents in unused fields, along highways, and in a soccer stadium.

But when the school year began in September and it became clear no census would be taken, most of those displaced people went back where they came from, mostly to the Kurdish region northwest of Kirkuk where they live in comfortable homes built with funds from the Kurdistan Regional Government.

Hameen Shareef, 61, lives with five of her grown children in a well-constructed cement settlement on the outskirts of Sulaimaniya, the capital city of the eastern part of the autonomous Kurdish region. Three of her sons already have moved to the city of Kirkuk, although they had originally been evicted from a village outside the city limits. The others are awaiting the right moment to go to Kirkuk.

"We will make the decision to go back when all the services we need are available," Shareef said, citing water, electricity and schools. "The only reason we haven't returned is we don't want to live in tents."

Under the leadership of a Kurd-dominated provincial government, however, thousands of Kurds have returned to the city -- but even that number is in dispute. Kurdish leaders say about 30,000 have come to the city, while rival Turkomens claim as many as 200,000 have moved to Kirkuk in the last six months.

Only two neighborhoods have been officially approved for resettlement by the provincial government. But along the major highways leading into Kirkuk from the north and east, returning Kurds are building hundreds of homes.

An oil flare burns in the background of the bustling Laylan Road settlement and stadium where 2,000 refugees live in tents. A few kilometers away, the ancient citadel is visible rising over the city center. Its dun-colored medieval walls housed a bustling multiethnic settlement until Hussein emptied it of its inhabitants. Now, the abandoned fortress faces a hilly cemetery with miles of white and green gravestones, and the expanding settlements of Kurdish returnees.

Ultimately, the Kurds want to secure the support of Iraq's national government in Baghdad for a negotiated settlement in Kirkuk. That requires finding a solution for the roughly 200,000 "Arabization Arabs" in the city, and control of the vast oil wealth on the plain just east of the city.

Kurds and Turkomen agree that the Arabs who came into the city beginning in the 1980s should be paid compensation to return to their original hometowns. But they do not say what should happen to Arabs who refuse to leave.

Only the "original Arabs," whose families hail from Kirkuk, have organized political representation in the US-appointed provincial government.

The question of Kirkuk's Arabs might end up being a resolved as part of a bigger deal over the fate of the city's oil. For now, the Ministry of Oil in Baghdad controls 10,000 jobs and the bulk of the area's economy through the North Oil Co.

At least six oil wells outside the city were on fire at the beginning of December, and the North Oil Co. hadn't decided who to hire to put them out (only a few specialized contractors, most of them American, can put out oil well fires). Insurgents have stepped up attacks against infrastructure, targeting critical parts of the oil company, like gas-oil separation plants, in addition to pipelines.

Long the exclusive province of Arabs, the company has added several hundred Kurds to its workforce, according to its director general, Adil M. Al Qazzaz.

The company has its own compound -- a gated city on the edge of Kirkuk -- and thousands of housing units for its workers. "Our dependence on Kirkuk is limited," Qazzaz said.

Some Iraqi leaders have privately bandied about the idea of letting the city of Kirkuk join the autonomous Kurdish region, if the oil fields remain under the control of the central government in Baghdad.

For the people of Kirkuk, however, the city's ethnic composition is the paramount question.

With so many outsiders moving to the city over the last decades in various ethnic gerrymandering campaigns, some Kirkuk natives want all of them to leave -- imported Arabs, Kurds and Turkomen alike.

"Only the people originally from Kirkuk should stay," said a 24-year-old Arab furniture salesman named Khalid Hussein.

"For now, it's peaceful here. I hope it stays that way."