HURRIYET- Columnist Muharrem Sarikaya writes on New Turkey (YT) Chairman Ismail Cem's and his party's ambiguous attitude towards the EU adjustment laws package prepared by Motherland Party (ANAP) leader Mesut Yilmaz. A summary of his column is as follows:
Is it true that New Turkey (YT) Chairman Ismail Cem rejected supporting the EU adjustment laws package prepared by the Motherland Party (ANAP)? Yesterday Cem denied all such accusations, saying that they would definitely stand behind the EU adjustment laws. However what some YT members told me the day before doesn't match Cem's statement. What lies behind this contradiction? Yesterday I had the chance to interview Cem. He answered my questions on the issue and reiterated the YT's full support for Turkey's EU membership bid, but added that he had a different proposal than the one ANAP leader Yilmaz came up with. Cem said that he had suggested to Yilmaz that the three laws on capital punishment and the right to education and broadcasting in mother tongues be excluded from the package and placed in a separate one, then that the latter be brought onto the agenda of the Parliament. Cem added that they had serious concerns about these three laws and the high probability of abuse of these rights. All in all, in my long interview with Cem, I got the impression that the YT doesn't want these three laws to be included in the package, believing that leaving them out of the package will ensure the easy passage of the other EU adjustment laws by Parliament. It seems to me that the YT will not add its signature to the package in its present version circulated by ANAP. On the other hand, Yilmaz told me that he had never received a pledge of unconditional support from the YT and that he also suggested that Cem bring the three most contentious laws together in a separate package, and then asked for the YT's support in that case, but that Cem gave him a clear 'No'. Now, which of these accounts is true?
SOURCE: OFFICE OF THE PRIME MINISTER, DIRECTORATE GENERAL OF PRESS AND INFORMATION