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Al-Ahram Weekly 1 - 7 July 1999 Issue No. 436 
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Published in Cairo by AL-AHRAM established in 1875 |
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Al-Ahram Weekly 1 - 7 July 1999 Issue No. 436
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| Published in Cairo by AL-AHRAM established in 1875 |
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Egypt Region International Economy Opinion Culture Profile Features Special Interview Travel Living Sports Time Out Chronicles People Cartoons Letters Will Ocalan hang?
By Gareth JenkinsThe Turkish State Security Court sentenced Kurdistan Workers Party (PPK) leader Abdullah Ocalan to death on Tuesday (29 June). Reading out the verdict, Judge Turgut Okyay announced that Ocalan had been found guilty of treason, separatism and the killing of thousands of soldiers and civilians. Ocalan listened impassively as Okyay recommended that the death sentence be carried out and not commuted to life imprisonment.
As the sentence was announced, relatives of the soldiers slain in the 15 year-old war against the PKK, who had been allowed to attend trial on the prison island of Imrali as observers, broke into a raucous rendering of the Turkish national anthem. In the nearby town of Mudanya hundreds more who had been watching the verdict being read out on national television, danced, wept and chanted patriotic slogans, many of them clutching photographs of sons or husbands killed by the PKK.
But, amongst the general sense of relief at Ocalan's conviction, there is also the awareness that in many ways the verdict marks the beginning rather than the end of the process. Few doubted that Ocalan would be found guilty. The only question is whether the death sentence will now be implemented.
Under Turkish law a case involving a death sentence automatically goes to the Court of Appeal. If, as expected, the court upholds the sentence, it will be forwarded to parliament for approval. Even though there are currently 36 prisoners on death row in Turkey, parliament has chosen not to bring their cases onto its agenda; and thus, in effect, commuted their sentences to life imprisonment. But most Turks hold Ocalan personally responsible for the 35,000 deaths in the war with the PKK.
Although parliament may be able to delay debating his death sentence, public pressure will eventually force the issue onto the parliamentary agenda and there is no doubt that the majority of the Turkish public want to see Ocalan go to the gallows.
Turkish demonstrators held protests in several cities to demand the implementation of the death sentence issued against PKK leader Abdullah Ocalan on Tuesday
(photo: AFP)
"If the sentence comes to parliament for approval then we shall have to vote to hang him," said Labour Minister Yasar Okuyan. "Our support for the families of the martyrs -- those killed by the PKK -- was the main reason we did so well in the April elections," said a spokesman from the ultra nationalist National Movement Party, which is currently the second largest party in parliament. "Quite apart from our own feelings, and we are unanimous that Ocalan should hang, it would be political suicide for us to vote against the death sentence."
The military has also made it clear that it expects the sentence to be carried out. "The state should never kill its own citizens," said a high-ranking military source. "But Ocalan is a different case. He has been responsible for thousands of deaths. He needs to be made an example to discourage others who might try to follow him."
But Turks are also aware that hanging Ocalan would further strain Ankara's already tense relations with Europe. Ocalan's lawyers have announced that they will take his case to the European Court of Human Rights, claiming that he was illegally abducted when he was brought to Turkey from Kenya in February. There is also concern in Ankara that implementing the death sentence could call into question Turkish membership of the Council of Europe.
The government has already tried to minimize the possible damage. Throughout Ocalan's trial the Turkish authorities often seemed more concerned with demonstrating the fairness of the judicial proceedings than proving his guilt. In June, following European criticism of the presence of a military judge on the three-man panel that tries cases in State Security Courts, the government even amended the Turkish Constitution to enable all three judges on the panel to be civilians.
But the general public is less concerned about antagonising Europe, particularly after the EU's refusal to include Turkey as a candidate for membership at the Luxembourg Summit of December 1997. This was widely regarded as the national humiliation of Turkey. "Why should we care about what Europe thinks after Luxembourg and the support that countries like Greece have been giving to the PKK?" asked Adil, a 38 year-old lawyer.
But the process of appeal and parliamentary approval of the death sentence is likely to take several months. In the meantime, most Turks are more worried about the possible terrorist backlash from PKK supporters following Ocalan's conviction. After the announcement of the verdict, security was stepped up at Turkish embassies worldwide. On Tuesday the authorities in Istanbul announced that all police leave had been cancelled, while in the southeast, the scene of most of the fighting, security forces set up 24 hour road blocks to control access to large towns.
"Whether or not to hang Ocalan is a very difficult question," wrote columnist Ismet Berkan, in the left of centre daily Radikal. "If we hang him then perhaps terrorism will never stop. Even if the military suppresses it today then it may start again tomorrow."
