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Dear Dermot, Suzy and group The majority party in the Turkish parliament - the Justice and Development Party - is a new force in Turkish politics. Some 90% of their representatives in Parliament are new MPs. I have read somewhere but can't put my hand on the source that there is a substantial Kurdish membership. For the moment they are an unknown quantity and it remains to be seen if they will continue the policy of mistreatment of the Kurds. This recent vote speaks very much in their favour. One of the reasons given for SUPPORTING the US deployment was that it would help prevent the emergence of a Kurdish state. In voting against the US deployment they have renounced the very big financial rewards they were being offered and run a real risk that US policy will now favour the Kurds (and punish Turkey by other means as they did Yemen, whose vote against the 1991 war was much less crucial than this Turkish vote). The indications are that the party leader, Recep Erdogan, though he recommended supporting the US, is not unhappy with the result. I can't see any motive for this other than the moral one. I think that at the moment the Turks, whatever other governments or the military might have done, deserve to be praised to the skies and it would be a wonderful thing if this facilitated their entry into the EEC. All the best Peter > From: Dermot Moynihan <dermoyn@onetel.net.uk> > Date: Sun, 02 Mar 2003 19:22:38 +0000 > To: "Suzy T. Kane" <suzytkane@starband.net>, "CASI Discuss List" > <casi-discuss@lists.casi.org.uk> > Subject: Re: [casi] Turkey Parliament Rejects U.S. Troops > > At 18:49 02/03/03, Suzy T. Kane wrote: > >> Hi, all. Does anyone have an e-mail address for Turkey's Prime Minister >> Abdullah Gul to congratulate his country for its example of democracy >> and to encourage the government to continue to listen to its people, 94% >> of whom, polls show, oppose a war with Iraq? Best, Suzy > > Suzy, some quite horrendous oppression goes on in Turkey - to congratulate > them for their so called democracy could be seen to condone that. Their > treatment of the Kurds is just one example. > > For the purpose of stopping this attack on Iraq we find ourselves in the > company of some extremely nasty types. None of them care in the slightest > for Iraqi lives. > > Seeing the enemy as being personalities such as Blair and Bush and their > supporters is to lose sight of the real enemy which is tyranny and > oppression everywhere. > > rgds > Dermot > > > _______________________________________________ > Sent via the discussion list of the Campaign Against Sanctions on Iraq. > To unsubscribe, visit http://lists.casi.org.uk/mailman/listinfo/casi-discuss > To contact the list manager, email casi-discuss-admin@lists.casi.org.uk > All postings are archived on CASI's website: http://www.casi.org.uk > _______________________________________________ Sent via the discussion list of the Campaign Against Sanctions on Iraq. To unsubscribe, visit http://lists.casi.org.uk/mailman/listinfo/casi-discuss To contact the list manager, email casi-discuss-admin@lists.casi.org.uk All postings are archived on CASI's website: http://www.casi.org.uk