ANKARA: Turkey’s highest court on Tuesday began hearing a case to shut down the main pro-Kurdish party on charges of backing PKK rebels, a verdict which could ruin government efforts to boost rights for minority Kurds.
There have been protests and shootings ahead of a ruling by the Constitutional Court, which could decide to disband the Democratic Society Party (DTP), the largest pro-Kurdish party in Turkey’s Parliament.
A verdict to close the party could undermine Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan’s AK Party’s drive to improve rights of Kurdish citizens, aimed at ending a long-running conflict with Kurdish separatists.
PKK guerrillas have fought for 25 years for a Kurdish homeland in southeastern Turkey. About 40,000 people have died in the violence.
Investors in Turkey, an EU-candidate country, worry the court ruling may raise political instability ahead of a general election set for 2011 and at a time when the economy has begun crawling back from a steep recession. “A verdict to close down DTP will lead to nothing but chaos,” wrote Okay Gonensin, a columnist in the liberal Radikal newspaper.
Several pro-Kurdish parties have been banned in the past.
The case to close down the DTP was brought by Turkey’s Chief Prosecutor Abdurrahman Yalcinkaya, who tried unsuccessfully to close down Erdogan’s party in 2008 on grounds it contravened the country’s secular constitution.
Judges among the 11-member court have told Reuters they want to reach a verdict in the next two weeks. The EU has criticized the lawsuit against the DTP, warning Turkey that banning the party would violate Kurdish rights, and analysts fear it would strengthen the hand of the militant Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) separatist group.
“If the party is closed down, the influence of the PKK in the Kurdish issue will increase. Nine Kurdish parties have been shut so far, but PKK activity in the area has always continued,” said Gonensin.
