A draft copy of a new 'harmonisation' package includes measuresto reduce military influence on civilian politics, reports Nicholas Birch in Istanbul
After weeks of silent preparations, the revolutionary nature of changes Turkey is preparing to push through as part of its bid for EU membership has begun to leak out.
Conscious of their sensitivity, the Turkish government refuses to discuss the contents of the seventh "harmonisation" package it has pledged to present to parliament before the summer recess in August.
But according to a draft copy published late last week by mass-circulation daily newspaper Hurriyet, plans include altering Turkey's two most controversial anti-terrorist laws, improving the transparency of defence budget auditing and limiting the jurisdiction of military courts.
Far more significantly, steps are to be taken to reduce military influence on civilian politics at its prime source, the National Security Council (NSC). A monthly meeting of civilian leaders and top brass, the NSC is an advisory body, on paper at least. In 1997, its "advice" was enough to force the resignation of the then Islamist coalition government.
"Previous reforms giving cultural rights to the Kurds were important, and made good copy," says Murat Yetkin, political commentator for the liberal newspaper Radikal. "Compared to this, though, they were tinkering. What we're facing now is the start of a total reworking of Turkish democracy."
According to Hurriyet, three major changes are planned for the NSC. Military presence on the council will be reduced from five to one. The position of secretary-general, occupied until now exclusively by generals, will be opened to "retired generals or ambassadors", and its broad powers limited.
The first issue is uncontroversial, analysts say. As early as 2001, when earlier reforms increased the number of civilians on the council, former military chief Huseyin Kivrikoglu told journalists the army wouldn't mind if "a hundred" more were invited.
A back-handed acknowledgement, argues political scientist Umit Cizre, that the army's hold on the council is "a function of a broader system of military influence, rather than a numerical disparity". According to Hurriyet columnist Cuneyt Ulsever, the NSC's real power is in the hands of the secretary-general. "Though he's obliged to discuss the monthly agenda with the president, he is the one who sets it," he says.
Other analysts go further. Once appointed by ministers on the recommendation of the chief of staff, Murat Yetkin explains, "the secretary-general immediately becomes more powerful than his military superiors, and in some cases, than the prime minister and president". Such power may have made sense under military rule in 1982, he adds, but it is "wholly illogical" today.
Those drafting the seventh package plan to remove clauses permitting the secretary-general to overrule civilian leaders. Whether the army is willing to accept such a radical reduction of its power remains to be seen. Some officers have already begun complaining about a "systematic campaign to discredit the military".
The NSC's hawkish secretary-general, Tuncer Kilinc, whose suggestion last spring that Turkey abandon the EU in favour of a rapprochement with Russia and Iran stirred furious debate, is no less adamant. "The NSC is now a civilian council," he said in mid-June. "Talk of further civilianisation is unnecessary and misleading." Ostensibly, his colleagues are more flexible. Both the chief of staff and his deputy have recently described Turkey's desire for a future within the EU as a continuation of the modernisation project begun by the country's founder, Mustafa Kemal Ataturk.
Yet analysts suspect the ideological gap between Gen Kilinc's hardline minority and the military mainstream is not as wide as it seems. They point to the communique released after June 26th's NSC meeting, with its promise that Turkey would fulfil its EU obligations "in a way that is in harmony with our republic's characteristics". The tone may be different from earlier military warnings that EU demands for Kurdish eduction and broadcasting were aimed at "breaking up our country in the name of 'cultural rights'," they say, but is the subtext?
Turkey's greatest misfortune, Murat Yetkin argues, is that it should fall to a government with its roots in political Islam to face the semi-taboo of the military's political power. Any other party, he believes, could win the top brass round in a matter of months. But the Justice and Development Party (AKP), whose leader's imprisonment in 1998 was part of an army-led crackdown on "reactionaries", is hampered by establishment perceptions that it secretly plans to turn Turkey into Iran.
And yet, while Yetkin has no doubt the following weeks will be tense, he sees encouraging signs. "The previous reform package had controversial items, but its passage was smoothed by support from opposition in parliament," he says. "[Opposition leader] Deniz Baykal has made it clear he backs the seventh package too." Others are less sure. "The military is stronger than the civilian government," says one political scientist who asked to remain anonymous.
"For the AKP to change that, it needs to step up its efforts to prove to Turks that it can govern the country well. That will take time, and possibly another election victory."