"Plans to topple gov’t using civilians
Turkey votes to lift head-scarf ban, but battle continues | csmonitor.com
Journalist and educator Alper Görmüş has said his conviction about the military's plans of using civilian forces to uproot Turkey's ruling party from power has been proven once again by the recently published words of a retired general.
Hürriyet sums up the first day after the legislation in Anatolian universities and laments on the foreign news agencies' portrayal of Turkish women.
Alper Görmüş: Plans to topple gov’t using civilians
Journalist and educator Alper Görmüş has said his conviction about the military's plans of using civilian forces to uproot Turkey's ruling party from power has been proven once again by the recently published words of a retired general.Fear, division and confusion
My colleague Mehmet Ali Birand chose an abrupt and clever title for his article last Friday. "That's enough…" he seems to shout, writing about the story of his dear lawyer, Meral Müren. When they met in Ankara recently, she -- described as "a true intellectual and a true follower of Atatürk's reforms" by Birand -- told him tearfully, "If you think that I have the least right to ask anything of you, I ask you to protest what they're doing to this country."Are they second republicans or second kemalists
A currently ongoing headscarf debate has indeed become a litmus test for discerning democrats from pseudo-democrats and liberals from pseudo-liberals. There was really no need for a litmus test to check the democratic credentials of the oligarchy, as their track record is well known.The litmus test has helped us observe how some so-called liberals, democrats and some second republicans (a new generation of liberals) reacted in a given situation rather than talking in abstract concepts...............................It seems that pseudo-democrats, including the Turkish Industrialists and Businessmen's Association (TÜSIAD), want democracy only for themselves. In their understanding, the AK Party should get the votes of devout Anatolian people -- as well as from others -- but should not react to their democratic demands. It should only do what pseudo-democrats want as they think that they have moral and intellectual superiority. It seems that some of them are not only second republicans but also "second Kemalists," an EU-friendly version of Kemalists with democracy limited to themselves.
Turkey eases ban on Islamic headscarves
The Turkish parliament approved a divisive and controversial change to the constitution that will ease the ban on the wearing of the Muslim headscarf in universitiesBan on Head Scarves Voted Out in Turkey
ISTANBUL, Feb. 9 Turkey's parliament voted Saturday to end a more than 80-year-old ban on women wearing head scarves at universities, acknowledging the rising influence of conservative Islam in the most determinedly secular republic of the Muslim world.Meaning is in our heads, not on our heads by Jenny White
The Turkish government is about to change the law to allow female university students to attend classes with their heads covered -- but only with the scarf tied under the chin, rather than wrapped about the head in the currently popular style of the tesettür.Professor Jenny White is an anthropology instructor at Boston University and the author most recently of "The Abyssinian Proof."
"Once the constitution is changed, I will register to the faculty of 'Political Symbols'"
Source: Sabah, found here
Yusuf Kanlı: A new era
Turkey entered a new period on Saturday. Some 200,000 anxious secularists protesting in downtown Sıhhiye Square and appealing to the government not to continue with its constitutional amendment drive that aims to liberalize the wearing of turbans in universities and expressing fears that such moves would be detrimental to their secular lifestyle and the secularism principle of the modern Turkish republic... Almost at the same time, meeting few hundred meters away in Parliament, the divine coalition of the ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) and the opposition Nationalist Movement Party (MHP) ignored all appeals and voted with an unprecedented parliamentary majority to legislate the...Fomenters of tension busy at work
After weeks of debate over plans to lift the long-standing headscarf ban at universities, Parliament voted in favor of the removal of the ban with a record 411 deputies in favor in a second round of voting on Saturday.A record vote for freedom
The Turkish Parliament on Saturday witnessed a historic day with the second round of voting to approve constitutional changes that would lift the ban on headscarves in Turkish universities.Wild minority and the headscarf ban
What we are looking at these days is an incredible level of harmony between the representation of the people of Turkey in the Turkish Parliament and the figures we are seeing reflected in polls.Anıtkabir and crowds
Is the road to Anıtkabir made of stone? There are some pieces of news that I don’t read just as “news.” Sometimes I try to focus on the bits of the news that aren’t actually written, what lies between the lines, so to speak.Turkey must defeat Ergenekon by Joost Lagendijk
If only half of the rumors about Ergenekon are true, the complete eradication of this secret network is crucial for Turkey's future.NYT THE SATURDAY PROFILE; Under a Scarf, a Turkish Lawyer Fighting to Wear It
Path cleared for new constitution by MÜMTAZ’ER TÜRKÖNE
A speech by Republican People's Party (CHP) leader Deniz Baykal, delivered during his party's group meeting in Parliament, was the most debated event of the week.Atatürk and the ‘Atatürkist system of thought’
Atilla Yayla, a respected professor of political science and the president of an association dedicated to the dissemination of liberal views and ideas, was recently sentenced to 15 months in prison for allegedly insulting the memory of Atatürk. A court in İzmir ruled that Yayla had violated Law No. 5816 by making the following statement at a conference: "In the future we will be asked the question 'Why are this man's [Atatürk's] statues and photographs all over the place?' You cannot bury this issue. This will certainly be debated."Democracy without democratic opposition
The main problem in Turkish politics is the absence of a democratic and reformist opposition that would push the governing Justice and Development Party (AK Party) to be more assertive in its reform agenda.Time to end victimization
There is a disturbing sense of déjà vu in Turkey's current polarization over the headscarf issue. It seems like every few months a new crisis erupts on Turkey's two intractable problems: Islam and the Kurdish question. When one is slightly off the agenda, the other takes over.In Spain, Turkey and the Netherlands, rules for Islamic head scarves and burqas changing | Dallas Morning News | News for Dallas, Texas | Headline | International News
AKI - Adnkronos international Turkey: Nobel laureate Pamuk defends the veil
Bianet :: Government Supports Headscarf but Ignores Women’s Rights
Jacobin culture
It is extremely difficult to understand a contemporary intellectual who defines himself as modern. He makes a world of his own based on his own truth and forces everyone to act in compliance with that world.Once upon a time: Merve Kavakçı and the headscarf
In 1999 Merve Kavakçı was thrown out of Parliament -- and the country -- for wearing the Islamic headscarf.A triangular point for democracy
For years we have been saying that the “religion and religiosity” issue in Turkey’s modernity is like a litmus test for the active mind.Headscarf consent
Overcoming problems posed by a topic like that of the headscarf by making changes to the Constitution is in fact anathema to the essence of a constitutioA solution without the MHP more legitimate?
Is the growing alliance between the AK Party and the MHP only aimed at finding a solution to the headscarf problem? Or are there other shared movements on the horizon?Roles shifting in the headscarf debate
A debate over the headscarf is revealing new dimensions of political discourse in Turkey. While conservatives and liberals use the universal language of basic rights and liberties, laicists use a heavily religious language to prove that the headscarf is not a religious obligation.DTP antipathy towards the headscarf
The Democratic Society Party’s (DTP) “hawkish” stance on the headscarf matter is a clear example of how distanced its politics are from societal values.AK Party-MHP alliance: Flirtation or long-term affair?
The alliance between the ruling Justice and Development Party (AK Party) and the Nationalist Movement Party (MHP) to remove the headscarf ban at universities has inevitably raised concerns about the continuation of this alliance in other areas among liberal intellectuals who strongly support Turkey’s EU bid.What Parliament will discuss is not the scarf
The headscarf ban is the name of an issue introduced by non-political processes or non-parliamentary factors. Neither has Parliament made such a decision nor is there any legal provision that imposes such a ban.There is pressure in our neighborhood
It is ironic for those who argue that headscarf freedom will lead to neighborhood pressure to feel their own neighborhood pressure.Come on, surprise us
Is the lifting of the headscarf ban at university campuses seen by the EU and the rest of the world as a political reform?Reactions: Turkey's headscarf ban
GulfNews
Turkey at Odds over Headscarf Ban
TIME
LETTERS FROM ISTANBUL: MEDIA, TURBAN AND BAN : EUROPEUS
Washington Post Time for Kurdish Realism By Michael O'Hanlon and Omer Taspinar The U.S. has partially repaid its debt to the Kurds. They should help us stabilize Iraq.
Should we worry about freedom of religion and belief in Turkey?by Talip Küçükcan*
Freedom of religion and worship is a fundamental human right that everyone should enjoy regardless of race, ethnicity, nationality or religious preference. The right to follow a particular religion and practice its rituals is recognized as legitimate by the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and the European Convention on Human Rights. 