Turkey Election Special: The "Kurdish Problem" and the Problem of Protests

In less than a week, Turkey will have a new government.

Anticipating the Parliamentary elections on Sunday, EA takes a look at the differences between the parties on key issues. Today: Protest and the Future of the Kurds.

Prime Minister Erdogan Recep Tayyip Erdogan has said, “There is no Kurdish problem but there are problems of Kurdish people”. After the killing of 12 members of the outlawed PKK (Kurdistan Workers Party) on 14 May, Deputy Prime Minister Bulent Arinc offered a more confusing formula, “There is a Kurdish problem but it is not productive to say that there is a problem as it is in the solution process."

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Turkey Analysis: The Shortcomings of Prime Minister Erdogan's "The Best Defence is a Good Offence"

UPDATE 22 APRIL: The Supreme Election Board, after eight hours of discussions, has reinstated the candidacy of seven independent candidates.

The Baord had vetoed 12 mostly Kurdish applicants, including two current MPs.

Six Peace and Democracy Party (BDP) candidates and one independent were re-instated. There was no word about the other five who had been blocked.

Protests broke out in several cities across Turkey, with at least one person shot and killed by police on Wednesday, after the board's initial decision.
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Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan was in Strasbourg, France last week, taking questions from the Council of Europe’s Parliamentary Assembly. When French MP Muriel Marland-Militello, whose grandfather was an Armenian born in Istanbul and escaped Turkey in 1915, asked how he would guarantee freedoms for religious minorities in Turkey, Erdogan said, “I believe this friend is French. She is also 'French” to Turkey', which is a saying in Turkish meaning that 'you don’t know anything about it'."

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Turkey Special: A Hard Look at Ankara's Policy of "Romantic Realism"

Last week, Turkish Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu wrote for The Guardian of London about his approach to foreign policy.

The context, Davutoglu explained, was a “natural” history, “flowing” from “abnormalities”  --- such as the division of peoples of the region by colonialism and Cold War --- to democracies spreading in the Middle East. In the course of time, he says, an ordinary Turk or Arab can change the history but you are bound to lose if you resist the “momentum of the history” which is giving the “dignity” of this region back.

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Turkey Special: Erdogan Government Reaches Out Abroad, Talks Tough at Home

Prime Minister Erdogan is striking a conservative posture at home, even as it holds out the unclenched first abroad. This does not mean he is seeking confrontation as an election strategy: there is no desire for a military clash with PKK, any more than there is a wish to use Iran and Syria against the US, but he is going to the leave no doubts. He is the man in charge.

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