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Turkish Parliament Backs End to Death Penalty
ANKARA (Reuters) - Turkey's parliament voted on Friday in favor of lifting the death penalty in peacetime, a key step toward its ambition of joining the EU and a sign it could go on to ratify a range of sweeping human rights reforms.
Parliament voted by 256 to 162 to lift the death penalty, a watershed for a country that only three years ago was considering hanging Kurdish guerrilla leader Abdullah Ocalan, blaming him for more than 30,000 deaths.
The death penalty vote was the first of a series of reforms under debate in the assembly on Friday. Each item will be voted on individually before a final vote on whether to ratify the whole package.
Friday's session looked set to continue late into the night as it discusses and votes on each of 13 reforms which would also ease curbs on Kurdish language education and broadcasting and increase freedom of expression and association.
The package is being rushed through parliament by pro-EU forces who want to complete the reforms before campaigning starts for a general election on November 3 that was officially called on Wednesday.
Ankara wants the European Union ( news - web sites) to set a date by the end of the year for Turkey to start membership talks. The EU wants to see reforms passed and implemented before it sets a date.
Markets are hoping progress toward the EU will help attract foreign investment to haul Turkey's economy out of recession and bolster a $16 billion IMF ( news - web sites) loan program. Stocks and the lira rose on Friday amid hopes the reforms would pass.
The speed with which the package has progressed so far has surprised many who thought the often controversial reforms might be bogged down in the assembly. There are still fears, however, that politicians, their eyes on the polls, may want to avoid tackling issues that could alienate nationalist voters.
"Historic days in parliament," was the headline in Radikal newspaper on Friday. "Hopes rise for Europe," was Milliyet's.
"It's clear that the parties' positions on the EU issue are a key element of the election campaign," said Deutsche Bank economist Marco Annunziata, optimistic the laws would pass.
"They have much more to gain by going to elections being able to say we have pushed through the EU reforms," he said.
MHP OPPOSES SOME MEASURES
The package is supported by all but one of the parties in parliament. Only the Nationalist Action Party (MHP), the largest party with 126 of the 550 seats, opposes some of the measures.
MHP deputy Ismail Kose said on Thursday the Kurdish language reforms met the demands of Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) rebels. More than 30,000 people, mostly Kurds, have been killed in fighting between security forces and the PKK, led by Ocalan.
"What the traitor who shed the blood of 30,000 people proposed is now before parliament," Kose said.
Ocalan was captured and sentenced to death for treason in 1999 amid massive popular calls for him to hang. He is currently the only inmate of a special island prison, awaiting an appeal to the European Court of Human Rights. The reform package would abolish the death penalty except in times of war or near-war and could, if passed, mean Ocalan would never hang.
Even if the reform package is passed in full, the EU is unlikely to fix a date for the start of membership talks when it meets in Copenhagen in December to decide on admitting up to 10 mainly east European countries to the bloc in 2004 or 2005.
But the package, combined with the lifting of emergency rule in two southeastern provinces this month, would amount to a serious demonstration of Turkey's commitment to make the changes needed to qualify for EU membership, one Western diplomat said.
ANKARA (Reuters) - Turkey's parliament voted on Friday in favor of lifting the death penalty in peacetime, a key step toward its ambition of joining the EU and a sign it could go on to ratify a range of sweeping human rights reforms.
Parliament voted by 256 to 162 to lift the death penalty, a watershed for a country that only three years ago was considering hanging Kurdish guerrilla leader Abdullah Ocalan, blaming him for more than 30,000 deaths.
The death penalty vote was the first of a series of reforms under debate in the assembly on Friday. Each item will be voted on individually before a final vote on whether to ratify the whole package.
Friday's session looked set to continue late into the night as it discusses and votes on each of 13 reforms which would also ease curbs on Kurdish language education and broadcasting and increase freedom of expression and association.
The package is being rushed through parliament by pro-EU forces who want to complete the reforms before campaigning starts for a general election on November 3 that was officially called on Wednesday.
Ankara wants the European Union ( news - web sites) to set a date by the end of the year for Turkey to start membership talks. The EU wants to see reforms passed and implemented before it sets a date.
Markets are hoping progress toward the EU will help attract foreign investment to haul Turkey's economy out of recession and bolster a $16 billion IMF ( news - web sites) loan program. Stocks and the lira rose on Friday amid hopes the reforms would pass.
The speed with which the package has progressed so far has surprised many who thought the often controversial reforms might be bogged down in the assembly. There are still fears, however, that politicians, their eyes on the polls, may want to avoid tackling issues that could alienate nationalist voters.
"Historic days in parliament," was the headline in Radikal newspaper on Friday. "Hopes rise for Europe," was Milliyet's.
"It's clear that the parties' positions on the EU issue are a key element of the election campaign," said Deutsche Bank economist Marco Annunziata, optimistic the laws would pass.
"They have much more to gain by going to elections being able to say we have pushed through the EU reforms," he said.
MHP OPPOSES SOME MEASURES
The package is supported by all but one of the parties in parliament. Only the Nationalist Action Party (MHP), the largest party with 126 of the 550 seats, opposes some of the measures.
MHP deputy Ismail Kose said on Thursday the Kurdish language reforms met the demands of Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) rebels. More than 30,000 people, mostly Kurds, have been killed in fighting between security forces and the PKK, led by Ocalan.
"What the traitor who shed the blood of 30,000 people proposed is now before parliament," Kose said.
Ocalan was captured and sentenced to death for treason in 1999 amid massive popular calls for him to hang. He is currently the only inmate of a special island prison, awaiting an appeal to the European Court of Human Rights. The reform package would abolish the death penalty except in times of war or near-war and could, if passed, mean Ocalan would never hang.
Even if the reform package is passed in full, the EU is unlikely to fix a date for the start of membership talks when it meets in Copenhagen in December to decide on admitting up to 10 mainly east European countries to the bloc in 2004 or 2005.
But the package, combined with the lifting of emergency rule in two southeastern provinces this month, would amount to a serious demonstration of Turkey's commitment to make the changes needed to qualify for EU membership, one Western diplomat said.
and nothing changes of course.
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