050927 -'Judiciary Obstructs Democratization in Turkey'

From: Date: 27 Sep 2005, 06:01:14 PM
INTERNATIONAL 09.27.2005 Tuesday - ISTANBUL 18:31
A recent conference on Armenians during the decline of the Ottoman Empire in Turkey did not attract the expected level of attention from the European media.

Despite recent reforms that have been made in line with plans to become a member of the European Union (EU), Turkey’s judicial system was “riddled with loopholes” the British newspaper The Financial Times commented.

German Suddeutsche only reported that the conference location was changed at the last moment and that the “taboos” were gradually disappearing.

As for the cancellation of the conference on Armenians, The Financial Times said, “Nobody yet knows whether the progressives or the reactionaries have won the battle over free speech that has raged in Turkey for the past few days. One thing is clear, however: despite years of reforms, the country's justice system is riddled with loopholes.”

Commenting on Turkish novelist Orhan Pamuk, who will appear in court because due to his remarks on Armenians and Kurds to a Swiss newspaper, the Financial Times noted:

“The two incidents suggest how the criminal justice and judicial systems steeped in decades of nationalist ideology, reinforced by an authoritarian constitution, can betray a reforming government's best intentions.”

The Guardian said, “The European commission accused the Turkish judiciary of "provocation" on Friday, after an Istanbul court prevented the conference from opening.”
Ankara’s opponents in the EU would have been strengthened if the ban over the conference had succeeded, The Guardian wrote.
German newspaper Die Welt assessed that the conference would be boring news if organized in another country, but it caused a scandal in Turkey.

Turkey was absolutely against the so-called genocide thesis the newspaper continued, and that the government had launched a campaign to refute this opinion.
Die Welt claimed that mentioning the so-called Armenian genocide was a crime in Turkey. The conference, asserted in Die Welt, passed in a peaceful atmosphere and that none of the historians attending dared to utter the word “genocide” during their presentations.
Frankfurt, London
By Cihan News Agency
Published: Tuesday, September 27, 2005
zaman.com
[http://www.zaman.com/2005/09/27/newspaper_b.jpg]
FROM "Annette Melikian"

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