Tuesday, August 14, 2007

Secularist Turkey

Via BBC News:
Last Updated: Tuesday, 14 August 2007, 15:04 GMT 16:04 UK

Abdullah Gul arrives at news conference in Ankara 14 August 2007
Abdullah Gul has a strong parliamentary base for his bid
Turkish Foreign Minister Abdullah Gul has pledged to protect and strengthen the country's secular principles if he succeeds in a fresh presidential bid.

The former Islamist sparked huge controversy and protests in a failed bid for the post earlier this year.

Critics, including the army, feared an erosion of secular values despite Mr Gul's reassurances to the contrary.

Mr Gul's AK Party dominates the Turkish parliament, which chooses the president in a run of votes starting on Monday.

"Protection of secularism is one of my basic principles," Mr Gul told a news conference on Tuesday after submitting his application to parliament.

"Nobody should worry about this."


Read rest of story here.
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It's extremely important that Turkey maintain it's secular
government. It is the only power in the Middle East to be
a secular state.

maryt

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

I think the whole thing with Turky is much more complex than just "bad islamists" against "good secularists". Don't forget that the Turkish "secularists" are mostly extremely nationalistic, they are against Turkey joining the EU and they don't have any problem with a military coup d'etat if it serves their aims. Furthermore its the "secularist" establishment in the army and state that is extremely corrupt and wants to continue the oppression of the Kurds. The "islamists" on the other hand are relatively moderate in comparison with most other countries in the region, they have done many reforms in the last years for the benefit of the economy and the installment of civilised European standards. Their victory in the last elections is more a reward for that and a veto against the undemocratic military than a vote for any kind of radical islamism...

maryt/theteach said...

Swissguy, thanks for the enlightenment! You see I don't know that much about Turkey except that a secular state in the Middle East seems like a good thing. Thanks for the info. Moderate Islamists what a concept!

Anonymous said...

Very interesting comment by swissguy. I'll just say that hopefully they'll find a peacefull solution to this. We've already got enough going on over there.

maryt/theteach said...

Hi, jm4847, thanks for the comment. Will be visiting your blog today sometime. Swissguy, taught me a lot.