mainstream news

[kurdeng at aps.nl]

ANKARA, Oct 25 (Reuter) - A key Turkish commission recommended on Wednesday
that parliament speedily pass an amendment to a law restricting freedom of
expression that could seal a trade pact with Europe ahead of polls planned
for December.

The recommendation by the justice commission of members from parliament's
four largest parties paves the way to a parliament decision on changing
article 8 of Turkey's tough anti-terror law, often used against peaceful
advocates of Kurdish rights.

The justice commission has the right to approve or block the discussion of
bills in parliament. Wednesday's decision means parliament will debate the
bill, put forward by Prime Minister Tansu Ciller's government, by early
next week.

Ciller is keen to have a long-sought customs union deal with Europe sealed
just before planned general polls in December, but she will have to work
hard to persuade staunch conservatives -- some in her own party -- to
approve the bill.

The bill proposes that the penalty for "separatist propaganda" be decreased
to a maximum of three years from the current five. It also leaves the door
open for jail terms to be suspended or converted into a fine and for
sentences to be applied retroactively.

"Our commission has agreed to recommend that parliament speedily debate
article 8," commission head Ali Yalcin Ogutcan told reporters after the
body voted by a large majority to pass the bill on to parliament.

Parliament sources said the commission is in essence recommending that the
article be changed. A commission member told Reuters: "A small change in
the phrasing will allow judges to convict a considerably smaller number of
people." But it is unclear whether the proposed changes would be enough to
satisfy the rights-conscious European Parliament.

European Parliament members have urged changing or scrapping the law in
exchange for them ratifying a customs union pact between Turkey and the EU.
A vote is due by the end of the year.

Ciller's True Path Party (DYP) and the social democrats want general polls
on December 24, ahead of polls due next October.

Conservative deputies say changing the law will encourage the 11-year
separatist insurgency by Kurdish guerrillas in southeast Turkey which has
claimed more than 18,000 lives.

Ciller's right-wing minority government, which lost a vote of confidence 10
days ago, is still in power on a caretaker basis. She has virtually agreed
with the social democrats on the terms of reviving their right-left
coalition which collapsed last month in a row about domestic security and
human rights.

(2)

ANKARA, Oct 25 (Reuter) - Turkish labour unions are hopeful that a
five-week-old public workers' pay strike that has rocked the political
arena will be solved soon, a labour confederation spokesman said on
Wednesday.

"Everything is going well. With a bit of nudging, this is going to be
finalised," Yildirim Koc, a senior official from the labour confederation
Turk-Is, told Reuters.

"We held talks yesterday, and we are expecting a call from the labour
minister about resuming those talks later today," Koc said. "Things could
be solved in today's meetings."

The labour strike by up to 335,000 public workers began on September 20
over an initial government pay rise offer of 5.4 percent for 1995. Annual
inflation is expected to hit 70 percent.

The strike was influential in Prime Minister Tansu Ciller's 10-day minority
government being toppled in a vote of confidence on October 15. After
losing the confidence vote, Ciller has come full circle to revive her
right-left coalition, which collapsed the day the strike began when she
resigned in a rift with the leader of her social democrat partners.

The government has since raised its pay rise offer, but Koc declined to
give the latest figures. The Anatolian news agency said the government and
Turk-Is disagreed mainly over percentage rises for the second year.

At its height, the strike idled ports, railways and sugar production, and
cost Turkey $10 million a day in exports alone. Around 200,000 workers are
still on strike after the government ordered workers in some key sectors
back to work.


ANKARA, Oct 25 (Reuter) - The European Human Rights Commission has agreed
to hear a case by a pro-Kurdish Istanbul daily that complained Turkish
authorities harassed it and forced it to shut down, the paper's lawyer said
on Wednesday.

"The commission has accepted the case by Ozgur Gundem newspaper against
Turkey ..which has acted in a biased manner against the paper to block its
freedom of expression and right to information," attorney Osman Ergin told
Reuters.

Ankara denounced the decision to hear the case, calling it a misuse of
European human rights laws.

Members of the European Parliament, expected to vote in December on customs
union with Turkey, want Ankara to amend or scrap elements of a special
anti-terror law, used to jail scores of people for writings and speeches on
the Kurdish issue.

Prime Minister Tansu Ciller's government on Monday put forward a bill to
parliament to soften the anti-terrorism law's tough article 8. But Turkish
officials said the Ozgur Gundem case was about combating "terrorism," not
about free speech or other human rights.

"The decision of the commission on a case closely tied with the support of
terrorism through the press will be...proof of just how principled and
objective a stance the monitoring bodies in Strasbourg take towards the
fight against terrorism," Foreign Ministry spokesman Nurettin Nurkan told a
news briefing.

Ozgur Gundem shut down almost two years after its May 1992 founding because
of closure orders issued by an Istanbul state security court for publishing
"separatist propaganda" and encouraging Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK)
guerrillas.

Gundem's successor Ozgur Ulke and the latest pro-Kurdish daily Yeni
Politika shut down after a court deemed them to be essentially the same as
Ozgur Gundem.

A Reuters correspondent, Aliza Marcus, has been charged by an Istanbul
security court under Turkey's laws on the freedom of expression for an
article that appeared in Ozgur Ulke under her byline. She faces up to three
years in jail.

(5) Baghdad team meets Turks on north Iraq, UN embargo

ANKARA, Oct 25 (Reuter) - Iraqi deputy foreign minister Saad Abdel-Majid
al-Faisal met his Turkish opposite number Onur Oymen on Wednesday for talks
focusing on Kurdish-controlled northern Iraq and a U.N. embargo on Baghdad,
the foreign ministry said.

"They met today and the Iraqi delegation is due to meet the Foreign
Minister Coskun Kirca late today or Thursday," Foreign Ministry spokesman
Nurettin Nurkan told Reuters.

Nurkan said the Iraqi and Turkish delegations discussed bilateral issues,
focusing on northern Iraq and the United Nations embargo imposed on Iraq
for its 1990 invasion of Kuwait. He gave no further details.

Both Ankara and Baghdad are concerned at instability in the three northern
provinces of Iraq, controlled by Iraqi Kurds under Western air protection
since the end of the Gulf War, as Kurdish militias fight to settle
longstanding feuds.

Iraq wants the mandate of the allied air force, which Turkey votes on every
six months, to be terminated. Nurkan said the matter was for parliament to
decide, and that Ankara could give the visiting delegation no promises.

The warring Iraqi Kurds have recently been drawn to the negotiating table
with U.S.-sponsored talks in Dublin, but one militia is now fighting the
Turkey-based Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK), which launches attacks on
Turkey from bases in the area.

More than 18,000 people have been killed in Turkey in the PKK's 11-year-old
fight for Kurdish independence or autonomy.

Nurkan said Turkey, which mounted a 35,000-man six-week military incursion
into the region in March, was still staging small-scale attacks against the
PKK there. "But there is no question of a wide-ranging operation inside
Iraq at the moment," he said.

Emergency Rule Governor Unal Erkan, based in Diyarbakir, told Reuters that
troops had staged an air attack on PKK targets in northern Iraq on Tuesday.
"We sometimes launch air operations against the terrorists, who escape from
the attacks of the KDP (Kurdistan Democratic Party) and settle near our
borders -- there was one bombing raid on Tuesday," he said.

The KDP, which shares power with a rival militia in northern Iraq, said on
Monday it had launched a big drive against the final PKK stronghold in the
rugged Khwakurk district near Iraq's border with Iran in an operation begun
on Sunday.

In Turkey, the emergency rule governor's office said troops had killed 18
PKK rebels in separate clashes in the provinces of Diyarbakir, Bitlis,
Tunceli and Batman.


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 * Origin: APS Amsterdam (aps.nl), bbs +31-20-6842147 (16:31/2.0)