Article: Turkey to Rightfully Prohibit Erdogan's Islamic Terrorism Party

On March 14, 2008, Abdurrahman Yalcinkaya, the Court of Appeals Chief Prosecutor, demanded Turkey's Highest Court to shutdown the ruling AK (Justice and Development Party - JDP) Party for allegedly undermining secularism, and to ban from politics the president, the prime minister and a great number of ministers and senior party members. The Turkish Constitution explicitly prohibits anti-secular activities, and any effort to promote religious agendas out of the strictly private sphere is castigated and reprimanded. If a party becomes the focal point for religious propaganda, proselytizing and diffusion of anti-secular and anti-laic concepts, its activities have to be immediately banned, according to the Turkish Constitution which is in its totality enthusiastically adopted and supported by Turkey’s outright majority. As I plan to dedicate a series of articles to this globally critical issue that is at the epicenter of the relations between East and West, North and South, Islam and Christianity, Western Civilization and Pseudo-Islamic Primitivism, and Asia and Europe, I will highlight in this first article some of the basic arguments (and the related evidence attached) presented by Chief Prosecutor Abdurrahman Yalcinkaya. Parts of the indictment have been translated to English (Summary of the Indictment against the AK Party - and consist in and by themselves in the best justification of Abdurrahman Yalcinkaya’s rightful plesge. It makes sense that the document has been meticulously kept secret from Western audiences which are all manipulated and misguided by immoral and Anti-Christian, illegal and inhuman elites that deploy all possible efforts to foment Anti-Western hatred among Muslims’ hearts and minds in order to thus trigger a degradation of the worldwide conditions up to a total Clash of Religions. An eventual fall of the Turkish Secular Democratic establishment will open the Gates of Hell for the Entire Mankind, triggering events of cataclysmic dimensions in the Middle East that will affect the entire world, as they will drag the Mankind into the World History’s worst maelstrom – all machinated by the Apostate Freemasonic Lodge and its secret (?) master. Main Parts of the Indictment against the AK Party (JDP) 1. The Case (from p. 10 on) 2. Anti-secular Actions and Statements of Recep Tayyip Erdogan, the leader of the JDP and the Prime Minister (from p. 27 on) 3. Anti-secular Actions and Statements of Bulent Arinc, former Speaker of the Parliament (from p. 54 on) 4. Anti-secular Actions and Statements of Abdullah Gül, former Minister of Foreign Affairs (from p. 65 on) 5. Anti-secular Actions and Statements of Huseyin Celik, Minister of Education (from p. 70 on) 6. Anti-secular Actions and Statements of Deputies of the JDP (from p. 75 on) 7. Evaluation of the Anti-secular Actions of the JDP by the Public Prosecutor (from p. 113 on) 8. Conclusion by the Public Prosecutor (from p. 145 on) Excerpts Selected from the Indictment against the AK Party (JDP) 1. The Case (Theoretical Approach) “Democratic and secular state does not discriminate among its citizens on the basis of religious beliefs. Each person is free to choose his/her religion and to express his/her beliefs within the boundaries of the freedoms of religion and conscious”. “In a secular order, the state is impartial towards religions which does not mean that religious freedoms are unlimited. The state may make arrangements and introduce restrictions in this area for protecting rights and freedoms”. “Turkey’s implementation of the principle of secularism is different than certain Western countries”. “With the adoption of the principle of secularism, ..... people with different beliefs gained confidence by the fact that the state equally treated each one of them, enabling them to live together”. “Secularism, which is also the key to transition to democracy, is a philosophy of life in Turkey”. 2. Anti-secular Actions and Statements of Recep Tayyip Erdogan, the leader of the JDP and the Prime Minister (from p. 27 on) ‘‘Turkey, as a modern Muslim country, can be an example to the harmony of the civilizations”. “It would be wrong to bring together Islam and secularism as concepts. Because individuals cannot be secular. Some perceive secularism like a religion. If secularism is a religion, then a person cannot be a Muslim at the same time. Because a person cannot follow two religions at the same time. By definition, secularism is a system, and that the states and not the individuals can be secular. Belonging to a certain religion is an individual choice”. “There are Turks, Kurds, Lazes, Circassians, Georgians and Abkhazes and all others living in Turkey. There is an important religious bond that binds together all these ethnic elements we have. Because 99% of the Turkish population is Muslim”. [To the journalists:] “We have around 30 different ethnicities in Turkey. You write it often as well; religion is like cement in Turkey where 99% of the people are Muslims”. “I am not secular as an individual, but the state is. However I am responsible to protect the secular order. Yet the people of this country will be bothered if you present secularism as a religion to them. Turkey is going very well, the government is successful. Yet there are some who talk about secularism all the time, trying to reap some benefits through this discourse”. [On headscarf ban on the university students]: “I believe that [headscarf] is a reality of our country... There is a consensus in the society [on the freedom for head covering] but we cannot understand the dissonance between public institutions. Now that we have a societal consensus at place, we need to have also institutional consensus so that we do not turn into a society where people look upon each other suspiciously”. “Now those people [who are defending ban on headscarf of the university students] have this mentality: ‘OK, you work on the fields with your headscarf, but never become a sociologist or a psychologist.’ We have to leave this behind”. “I think the headscarf ban in universities is a mistake. A democratic country should provide religious freedom. This includes also that the citizens may represent their religions with some symbols with the condition that they shall be respectful to the laws. The headscarf ban is not liberal”. [On the headscarf ban in France]: “Banning is a method the French use. We, the Turks, prefer the Anglo-Saxon interpretation of secularism and we find it nonsense to prohibit certain things in the 21st century”. “My daughters could not study at Turkish universities because they cover their hair. We, as a family, are victims of this [ban]. We are against such discriminations. But the solution of this problem is not through the fact that we want it to be solved, but through participation and consensus of all political parties”. “This [headscarf ban] has been going on for 8 years now. Our girls who acquired the right to study at the Turkish universities cannot do with their hair covered. I think this is restricting freedoms of religion and conscious as well as education”. “Discriminating against women is a tradition of the pre-Islamic history. Such repressive and fanatic approaches that imprison the women in private sphere by isolating from the public sphere based on sexual discrimination cannot be called civilized”. “We are determined to remove all mistreatments by securing a consensus on freedoms. No one should doubt our intention”. “The man has a private sphere, a public sphere and a sphere belonging to the state. No one has the right to dominate these spheres. They are going to interfere with my home soon. They will say ‘you have to behave this or that way.’ I am sorry but Turkey is not an un-regulated, chaotic place. Everyone needs to know his/her limits. We do not want any tensions. We are patient so that no one would exploit [such tensions]. However those who are occupying the judiciary in the name of justice should not spend efforts to create those tensions themselves”. “Some people accuse [women covering their hair] by saying that they carry it as a political symbol. And they respond that ‘no, we do not’. Just imagine even if they wear [the headscarf] as a political symbol. Can you accept wearing a political symbol as a crime? Can you prohibit symbols and signs? Where can you find such a prohibition in terms of freedoms in the world”. 3. Anti-secular Actions and Statements of Bulent Arinc, former Speaker of the Parliament (from p. 54 on) “There are two necessities in expanding freedoms, eliminating prohibitions and democratization: The first is that the parliament takes decisions in line with the Constitution, and the second, a national consensus. In making a new legal arrangement it is one thing to ask the opinion of the public agencies, and yet another to look for their consensus. In democracies, no country seeks consensus of public agencies for democracy... If the members of the parliament cannot secure a consensus, the only authority that would provide that consensus is the will of the people. You cannot be so untrusting to the country’s regime. The Turkish regime is not that weak to be shaken and affected when you talk about an issue. No one has the intention of giving up the Republic, democracy and fundamental freedoms. Therefore we do not have a regime problem in Turkey, but a debate on who owns the regime... The state has been restricting the right to life and right to expression by some beliefs in public sphere instead of guaranteeing the citizens to live according to their beliefs. And it does so in the name of secularism which is a great inconsistency in terms of political science. This inconsistency has been disturbing the peace at home and creating a series of problems. It is this inconsistency stemming from differing interpretations which the intellectuals, politicians and academics need to solve”. “At the center of all debates are such issues as headscarf, secularism, Higher Education Council (HEC), high schools for imams, and the Koranic courses... Yet we believe that the real center of the debate is freedoms and who is going to determine the limits of freedoms. We defend the view that those limits can only be drawn by the parliament. This is a democratic requirement. Because the parliament is the place where the people are represented. Therefore the last word on Turkey’s fate can be said by this parliament. Yet for some reasons, some institutions or persons do not want to admit this truth”. “Democracy is not a regime of the elites. It is not a regime of a certain minority. It is not a regime of the rich. Democracy is there for everyone: all the poor, the sufferer, the victims and people in the streets. Democracy exists for each individual without any discrimination. No one can prevent the use of this right”. 4. Anti-secular Actions and Statements of Abdullah Gül, former Minister of Foreign Affairs (from p.65 on) [On the headscarf ban]: “Of course, such are prohibitions are not included in the EU’s human rights standards. All these will be removed when the day comes. I am indeed sure about that. Prohibitions that do not exist in Paris, London or Paris should not exist in Turkey as well. It is indeed so, because [headscarf] is a part of our culture. We see these issues as the ones that need to be solved in time, with prudence”. “As JDP, we see the issue of headscarf as part of the rights of free thought and expression. Whoever covers her hair and whoever not is free to do so. This is the gist of the issue for me”. “We are determined on the freedom of expression and belief: everyone should be permitted to live according to his beliefs. All individuals must feel safe away from fears and anxieties. They must freely express whatever they think and believe and live according to whatever they believe in. It is our mission to eliminate terror and torture and to strengthen freedoms of expression and beliefs. We will continue to be determined to realize all legal actions to this end”. “You cannot defend restrictions on the rights of the majority when you discuss the religious rights and freedoms for the minorities in Turkey. But these are our own problems. I believe that we will solve our own problems by ourselves. Of course this would require a course of time. No one should be proud of prohibitions. No one would be honored by defending and taking pride in prohibitions. We will settle this problem when an appropriate time comes by our own initiative... Our government is determined to eliminate all prohibitions”. “We are always in favor of positive freedoms... Turkey will be a society that is constantly becoming freer, democratized and widening the civil sphere. We are determined on that. As the society, as the parliament, as the government”.