Top Stories From The Press of Turke

[kurdeng at aps.nl]

Subject: Top Stories From The Press of Turkey for August 4th


      ANKARA, Aug 4 (Reuter) - These are the leading stories in the Turkish
press on Friday. Reuters has not verified these stories and does not vouch
for their accuracy.

    MILLIYET

    -- Two teenagers forced into a car in Istanbul and later shot dead in
apparent attack by left-wing militant group.

    HURRIYET

    -- Report sponsored by businessman close to Prime Minister Tansu Ciller
criticises police special forces in the southeast for alienating civilians
and says people in the region do not believe this government can solve their
problems.

    CUMHURIYET

    -- The role of the police special teams in the southeast criticised by
two party leaders.

    -- About 100,000 workers expected to march in Ankara on Saturday to
protest at the government's labour policies.

    YENI YUZYIL

    -- Turkish Union of Chambers and Bourses (TOBB) says in a report that
support for Kurdish rebels would decrease if the government gave cultural
rights to Kurds.

    -- Turkey losing its influence over warring Kurdish groups in northern
Iraq to the United States.

    YENI POLITIKA

    -- Fantasy Kurdish report. TOBB southeast report claims that million of
Kurds have migrated because of unemployment when the real reason was pressure
from the security forces.

    DUNYA

    -- Instability in the southeast preventing economic development.

    -- TOBB report says Kurds do not want an independent state.

Respected Business Organization Urges More Rights For Kurds
      By Alistair Bell

    ANKARA, Aug 3 (Reuter) - A report commissioned by an influential Turkish
business group on Thursday urged the government to improve its treatment of
the country's more than 10 million Kurds to end an 11-year-old separatist
rebellion.

    The report released by the Union of Chambers and Trade Bourses (TOBB)
said support for Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) rebels would weaken if the
government heeded Kurds' social and economic grievances and tolerated
pro-Kurdish sentiments.

    ``Suspending freedoms and postponing democratic rights in the fight
against terrorism is imitating the terrorists,'' the report said.

    But TOBB chairman Yalim Erez, known to be a confidant of Prime Minister
Tansu Ciller, distanced himself from the more controversial aspects of the
168-page report.

    ``The report is not our own opinion,'' Erez repeatedly told a news
conference. ``Eighty-five percent of those who say they are of Kurdish origin
say 'no' to an independent Kurdish state,'' he said, quoting a section of the
report.

    Turkey has often been criticised in the West for denying democratic
rights to the Kurds and alienating civilians in a heavy-handed struggle with
the guerrillas in the southeast.

    Turkish establishment groups have rarely questioned the official view
that the PKK rebellion is nothing but a ``terrorist'' problem. The report
included an opinion poll which raises the taboo subject of Kurdish autonomy.

    High-profile studies in the past have largely neglected the opinions of
Kurds affected by the violence.

    Most of the Kurds would opt for autonomy in the southeast or being part
of a national federation if they had the chance to change Turkey's political
make-up, according to an opinion poll included in the report.

    Forming separatist political parties or advocating the division of Turkey
in any way are against the law.

    More than 17,500 people have been killed in the PKK's fight for
independence or autonomy in impoverished southeast Turkey.

    The TOBB said its report was the first ever ``scientific study'' of its
kind on the southeast.

    The report criticised the practice by Ciller and previous leaders of
treating the Kurdish problem as solely a security issue.

    ``Pushing forward with economic, administrative and cultural initiatives
independent of the (military's) armed campaign would have benefits,'' it
said.

    A planned customs union with the European Union next year has been linked
to Turkey improving its human rights record.

    The report said 34 percent of the more than 1,200 people interviewed,
most of them Kurds, acknowledged having friends or relatives among the
guerrillas.

    The vast majority of interviewees were against a separate Kurdish state.
The Marxist PKK stressed independence in the first years after it took up
arms in 1984 but it has often toned down its stance to demands for Kurdish
autonomy recently.

    More than 40 percent of those asked said they favoured a federal
political system in Turkey. Thirteen percent wanted a Kurdish state while
another 13 percent were for autonomy.

    But many of them were unable to explain the meaning of ``federation,'' it
said.

    Thousands of rebel prisoners in Turkish jails and their supporters have
been on hunger strike since July 14 to demand the government holds talks with
the PKK to end the conflict. Two people, including a Kurdish woman in
Germany, have died.

    ``The solution is not in coming to agreement with the PKK but with the
local people,'' the report said.

PKK Blamed For Attack in Paris
      PARIS, Aug 3 (Reuter) - A Turkish diplomat on Thursday blamed the
Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) for a firebomb attack that injured 11 people
at a Turkish sports and cultural centre in eastern Paris.

    Dogan Akdur, charge d'affaires of the Turkish embassy, told Reuters the
attack showed all the signs of the PKK, which has been fighting Ankara for 11
years for independence or autonomy in south-east Turkey.

    Police said six of the 11 Turks hurt in the attack on Wednesday night
were taken to hospital. Five were later discharged. Three men were seen by
neighbours running away from the scene after the three firebombs were thrown.


    Over two dozen Turkish targets have been attacked in Germany in the last
10 days in what authorities believe is a campaign coordinated by the PKK.

    ``In light of what is happening in Germany there is good reason to
presume this is the same organisation,'' Akdur said.

    He said he had asked the French authorities to be alert against further
attacks.


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