Mesut Yilmaz Expresses Serious Doubts About Aims Of 'Revelations' Regarding Fethullah Gülen

Reacting to the «revelations» on the «Nurcu» religious brotherhood and its leader Fethullah Gülen, accused of wishing to install an islamist regime in Turkey, the former Turkish Prime Minister, Mesut Yilmaz, declared to the Turkish daily Hurriyet on 23 June 1999 that «the 28 February earthquake is still going on ( ) The 28th February was an earthquake force 8 on the Richter scale in Turkey. With ANAP in office, the intensity dropped to force 5. Today these shakes continue to a lesser extent. So long as relations between religion and the State are not properly settled, this will continue». The leader of the Motherland Party (ANAP), which is the third largest component on the present coalition, declared, at a meeting of his parliamentary group, that the recordings made public about Fethullah Gülen had the aim of «arousing fear». «If they (the recordings) were supplied by a State organ, such as the Police Directorate, the Intelligence Services, or any other, and that the persons or organs gave this information to the press of their own accord, and at the time when they judged it opportune, then its a serious event. It means that they are trying to lay traps for people. One cannot expect that citizens place any confidence in such a State. The State cannot lay traps for people. We need a serious examination of this matter, worthy of the State. If there has been an attack on the secular principles of the State, it is the State's duty to examine this. No one can change the secular Republic ( ) Democracy and Human Rights cannot be put asside on the pretext of defending the regime». Mesut Yilmaz concluded by stating that «the State is in darkness, and there is darkness in the State. We owe it to ourselves to renew all the workings of the State».

Also Preseident Denies

Regarding the report, which was claimed to be presented to the National Security Council and include serious insults against the religion and the Prophet, and slanders and cast aspersions on Fethullah Gülen, President Suleyman Demirel said, "there is not such a report which reached the state authorities and the NSC as its was claimed."

Yilmaz Toes Line As National Security Council Launches Fresh Crusade Against "Religious Reaction"

The Turkish Prime Minister's pretense of independence lasted only days. The Generals issued a tough communique, and Yilmaz beat a hasty retreat from his suggesting that the Army "mind its own business" and leave it to the Government to deal with Islamist activities. Mr Yilmaz was obliged to publicly state that "the coalition Government considers that there are no differences between the Cabinet and the Army" in the fight against religious extremism.

Responding to the pressure, the Prime Minister announced, on Monday 23rd March, a series of new measures to control the activities of institutions suspected of supporting the Islamists, and closer supervision of private radio and Television broadcasts. According to the terms of this Bill, a Government organisation, the Department if Religious Affairs, will have the sole authority to allow the building of new mosques; penalties for dress code violations by civil servants will be increased and the law on demonstrations will be altered.

On Thursday 26th March, General Ismail Hakki Karadayi, Chief of the Armed Forces General Staff. met the Turkish Prime Minister, after discussions with the country's four most senior Armed Forces chiefs, to "get up to date on the situation". After this meeting, Mr Yilmaz stated that the tension had now dissipated, and that civilians and Armed forces were on the same wavelength.

After these preliminaries, the much anticipated March 27 meeting of the National Security Council (MGK) passed "normally". The MGK announced that "in the struggle against reactionary religious movements that aim at bringing down the secular regime, the existing laws must be applied without concessions and new laws must be rapidly adopted by Parliament". The Army insisted on a purge of all Islamist senior officials who had infiltrated the State machine, principally in the Ministry of Justice. Already five sub-prefects have been brought to Court and charged with fundamentalist activities.

and two prefects and 73 sub-prefects are subject to judicial enquiries run by a special Commission created from the ranks of the Ministry of the Interior accused of fundamentalist activities. According to the Army, "37 out of 80 provincial Governors, and 200 sub-prefects (actually in office now) are notorious partisans of Sharia (Koranic Law)". On Tuesday March 31st, three Turkish mayors were stripped of office by the Ministry of the Interior, as part of this purge. The Islamist Mayor of Istanbul, Recip Tayyip Erdogan charged with "explicit provocation of the people to hatred by religious, racial or regional discrimination" appeared the same day before the Diyarbekir State Security Court. In a speech last December, he had declared "the mosques are our barracks, their minarets our bayonets, their domes our helmets and the faithful our soldiers".

In the course of the meeting, a report was also given regarding the activities of Fethullah Gülen, the influential leader of a religious sect whose aim, the Army believes, is to help institute an Islamic regime.

The supporters of the dissolved Refah Islamist Party, against whom not a single act of violence has been proven, denounced the "persecution" of their sympathisers and criticized a "crusade that has all the appearance of a witch hunt". Moreover the Turkish Government placed a Bill before Parliament to change the voting system for municipal elections, from a limited form of proportional representation to one of straight majority with two rounds, which should work seriously against the Islamists who had succeeded in capturing several towns with votes of only 25% at the municipal elections in March 1994.

The Turkish Virtue Party (Fazilet), created in December following Refah's dissolution for anti-secular activity by the Constitutional Court has criticised the measures proposed by the Government, which they declare to be "incompatible with a modern state". As for Tansu Çiller, she contented herself with the following laconic sentence "Corporal Yilmaz came to heel as the first sound of the Generals' whistle"