DIYARBAKIR, Turkey, 13 September 2007 — Turkey’s new president, Abdullah Gul, yesterday called for national unity and solidarity during his first trip as head of state to the country’s troubled, mainly Kurdish southeast region.
Choosing the impoverished southeast for his first visit outside Ankara since his election by Parliament last month, Gul seemed keen to show the Kurds they are valued and respected by a state they often accuse of neglecting or repressing them.
“If we can strengthen our unity, the brotherly feelings among us, everything will be better... Then you will see, the years of neglect will soon pass,” Gul told cheering crowds in the town of Yuksekova near the Iraqi border.
Residents hurled roses at his motorcade — his surname means ‘flower’ in Turkish — in a sign of welcome, although security was also very tight. The region remains dogged by Kurdish separatist violence and the army keeps a high profile. Gul’s ruling center-right Justice and Development (AK Party) performed well in July elections in the southeast, beating the pro-Kurdish Democratic Society Party (DTP) into second place in some areas.
Many Kurds hope the AK Party government will help boost investment and public services in the region, Turkey’s poorest. The AK Party government, in which Gul previously served as foreign minister, has also championed European Union reforms, easing some restrictions on the Kurdish language and culture.
The region’s economy has suffered greatly from separatist violence waged by the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) since 1984. Turkish authorities said the PKK might have been behind a foiled bomb attack in Ankara on Tuesday, when Gul’s southeast tour began.
The leader of Turkey’s main opposition party, worried that the secular republic is in danger under an Islamist-rooted government, was quoted yesterday as saying an army coup would not solve the country’s problems. Appearing on the 27th anniversary Turkey’s last full-blown military coup, Deniz Baykal’s remarks to the liberal newspaper Radikal underlined the delicacy of relations between Turkey’s politicians and its soldiers.
The 1980 coup, which ousted the government of Suleyman Demirel, led to suspension of Parliament and civil liberties and the imprisonment, torture and deaths of many Turkish citizens. The fiercely secular army has in recent months reaffirmed its right, under the military-inspired 1982 constitution, to intervene in politics if it feels the ruling AK Party threatens Turkey’s separation of state and religion.
Baykal, leader of the secularist Republican People’s Party (CHP), which is seen as close to the military, shares the army’s misgivings about the AK Party government but said it was for the politicians to oppose it. “Today both democracy and the republic which gave birth to it are experiencing problems. We are in a worrying process... but a military coup is not the answer to the problems facing Turkey,” Baykal told Radikal.
