TRKNWS-L Turkish Daily News (January 16, 1996)

From: TRKNWS-L <trh@aimnet.com>

Turkish News Directory

CONTENTS

TURKISH DAILY NEWS

16 January 1996

[01] Turkey: Israel sets terrorism condition to Syria

Turkish Daily News

ANKARA- Israel has told Turkey that it will not sign a peace agreement with Syria as long as that country continues its support of terrorism, a Turkish Foreign Ministry spokesman said on Monday.

Spokesman Nurettin Nurkan, describing the visit of Foreign Ministry undersecretary Onur Oymen to Israel last week, said that Ankara had been assured by Prime Minister Shimon Peres that a peace deal between Syria and Israel could not be signed unless the support of Damascus for terrorist organizations, which includes outlawed Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK), was "completely cut." "Israeli officials made it very clear that they will make no agreement with any country that supports terrorism," Nurkan said.

Nurkan's announcement came after a report -- prepared by Greece -- that Abdullah Ocalan, the leader of the outlawed PKK who lives in Damascus and Rifat Assad, the brother of Syrian leader Hafez Assad, were cooperating in drug smuggling.

The spokesman said that he had seen the report, quoted in a newspaper, and could not deny or confirm the allegation.

"However, we are aware of the Syrian support of terrorism and clearly, this should be cut in line with Syria's international obligations," he said.

The Israeli support on the issue, at a time when U.S. Secretary of State Warren Christopher sounded hopeful due to what he called positive signs in the Syrian attitude toward Syrian-Israeli peace, is critical for Turkey's argument that Syria, unless it abandons its support for terrorism, cannot be a reliable partner in the Middle East peace process.

"Turkey and Israel have noted the regional danger posed by terrorism and expressed full consensus that no credit should be given to countries which see and use terrorism as a method to further their political aims," Nurkan said.

The two sides also maintained that the development of democracy in the region -- again an obvious reference to the Syrian political system -- was necessary for peace in the region.

During the visit, which diplomats called "a particularly important one in bilateral ties," Undersecretary Oymen gave Prime Minister Peres a message of Prime Minister Tansu Ciller.

In the message, Ciller said that the Turkish government was "determined to develop" bilateral relations with Israel and regular consultation mechanisms would contribute to the relationship.

The assurance comes at a time when Israeli strategists and even official circles express concern over the results of Turkey's general elections where the Welfare Party, which employs anti-Jewish rhetoric, emerged as the first party.

Ciller thanked Peres for his support for the realization of the customs union between Turkey and the European Union, and Peres told Oymen that Israel's support will continue until Turkey's ultimate goal of full membership was realized.

The two countries have also agreed that a Free Trade Agreement between Turkey and Israel, along with two largely-routine economic accords, should be signed during the visit of President Suleyman Demirel.

Demirel, whose visit to Israel was cancelled because of the assassination of Yitzhak Rabin, is due to visit Israel in March.

[02] Erbakan hangs on to hope, seeks Ecevit's support for RP power bid

TDN Parliament Bureau

ANKARA- Fighting to find partners that will allow him to lead a coalition government after his party's election victory, Islamist Welfare Party (RP) leader Necmettin Erbakan on Monday sought support from Democratic Left Party (DSP) leader Bulent Ecevit and elicited lukewarm response from the leftist leader, the most vocal critic of his party's anti-secular views.

In the Dec. 24 election, Erbakan's RP left behind mainstream secular parties, winning 158 seats in the 550-member legislature but his party's anti-secular and anti-West campaign rhetoric compromised its chances of finding government partners although the Islamist party later moderated its position.

Assigned by President Suleyman Demirel last week to form a coalition that will replace the partnership between caretaker Prime Minister Tansu Ciller's center-right True Path Party (DYP) and the social democrat Republican People's Party (CHP), Erbakan has so far made dubious progress.

Ciller has rejected outright the offer of partnership, while Motherland Party (ANAP) leader Mesut Yilmaz has told the Islamist leader that he prefers a center-right coalition with the DYP although he stopped short of shutting the door completely on a partnership with the RP.

In Monday's meeting Erbakan did not make a direct partnership offer to Ecevit on the grounds that the parliamentary strength of the two parties fails to approach the required majority, but asked him to enter or support a coalition the RP may set up with another party. The DSP leader turned down the invitation to participate in a RP-led coalition on the grounds that there was no "numerical necessity" for his party's participation in such a government. But he refrained from a categorical rejection of the support Erbakan sought. "A civilized dialogue has been established between the DSP and the RP. We shall look to see how it goes in the coming term," Ecevit declared after the meeting.

Both leaders said they had agreed on the necessity of a quick solution to the government puzzle, criticizing Ciller for insisting on her staying prime minister as a precondition for entering a coalition.

This has so far barred a center-right coalition between her DYP and ANAP, with Ciller snubbing repeated calls from Yilmaz for a compromise.

Focusing on the impasse, Erbakan told reporters after his meeting with Ecevit that if a government was to be formed without the RP's participation, it should be formed without further delay. "The precondition put forth by Mrs. Ciller is preventing the formation of a government ... we have to put aside such conditions and adopt a constructive approach," the Islamist leader said.

Erbakan and Ecevit both came against Ciller's preference for another election as the way out of the deadlock.

"There is no point in dragging the country into another election contest just to establish who from the center-right will become the prime minister," Ecevit said in the press conference after his talks with the Islamist leader.

Despite pressure from the business community and a media campaign, a DYP-ANAP coalition, popularly dubbed "Motherpath," has not progressed beyond being a theoretical possibility with Ciller insisting she has the right to lead it since her DYP has the second largest number of seat in Parliament (135) after the RP, and Yilmaz implacably opposed to seeing Ciller keeping her post, arguing that ANAP ended up slightly ahead of DYP in the distribution of votes in the poll.

ANAP bagged 132 seats in the election, but increased the total by one on Monday, with a former DSP deputy joining its ranks, just weeks after the election.

An embarrassed Yilmaz, who successfully campaigned on a platform of superior political ethics, told reporters earlier in the day that he had elicited Ecevit's consent before allowing the DSP defector to join his party. But he dismissed media speculation that the recruitment was the part of a plan to put his party ahead of the DYP in the number of parliamentary seats as well to rob Ciller of any remaining grounds to claim the right to head the government.

After his meeting with Ecevit, Erbakan said he would complete the rounds of exploratory meetings with one with CHP leader Deniz Baykal on Tuesday, after which he said he would start real efforts towards forming the government.

"God willing, we will form the government, because there is no other way," the Islamist leader said optimistically.

He rapped business leaders for lobbying for a DYP-ANAP coalition, saying it would automatically mark the government as one set to maximize their interests. "Such a government would be still-born," Erbakan argued.

The veteran Islamist politician said the RP and the DSP could cooperate in the Parliament since they had similar (nationalistic) views regarding the Cyprus dispute, the (need for lifting of the) U.N. sanctions against Iraq, the Turkey-based Western air force protecting the Iraqi Kurds and the improvement of the terms of the customs union with the EU.

Erbakan said he had also calmed down the fears of the DSP leader regarding the RP's approach to the issue of secularism.

After his meeting with Erbakan, Ecevit also met separately with Yilmaz. After the hour-long meeting, both leaders attacked Ciller for her hardline stance. Yilmaz said Ciller was making the formation of the government difficult while Erbakan was trying to facilitate it. Ecevit, meanwhile, reasserted the need for a face-to-face meeting between Yilmaz and Ciller.

On Saturday, Yilmaz renewed his call to Ciller for a meeting to discuss a government formula barring her continued premiership.

[03] Election delayed for Parliament speaker

By Kemal Balci

TDN Parliament Bureau

ANKARA- Political parties have launched a bid to win themselves an extra week in which to form a new government by delaying the appointment of the speaker. Following the election of the Parliament's secretariat the clock starts ticking and a would-be government has 45 days to secure a vote of confidence.

The secretariat is only elected after the speaker's seat is filled. With the conviction that no candidate for Parliament speaker will win the minimum two-thirds of vote in the first and second rounds, political parties have moved to postpone the third and fourth rounds to Tuesday Jan. 23. In the later rounds a candidate can be elected with a smaller majority. The ten-day period for nominations for the post of Parliament speaker expires on Wednesday Jan. 17; the first round of balloting will take place on Thursday.

According to the Constitution a candidate must get at least two-thirds of the 550-seat Parliament to win the first or second rounds of secret voting. If no candidate clears that hurdle, the one that gets a minimum of 276 votes in the third round will be elected by a simple majority. If no candidate clears that hurdle either, there will be fourth round between only two candidates.

These will be the two candidates with the largest third round votes. Whoever gets the most votes in the fourth round will be elected.

One day after the election of the new speaker, the members of the Parliament's secretariat will be elected. That involves the election of the acting speakers, secretaries and administrative officials in numbers assigned to political parties in proportion to their number of seats in Parliament.

One-week postponement

Under the existing rules the first and second rounds of balloting to elect the new speaker will be held on Thursday after the expiry of the ten-day nomination period. Since Parliament convenes every Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday the consultative board, consisting of party representatives, is expected to postpone the third and fourth rounds until Tuesday, Jan. 23. If the majority of Parliament supports that decision the new speaker will be elected on Jan. 23 at the earliest, and the members of the secretariat on Jan. 24.

With such a change in the calendar, deputies will have extended by nearly one week the 45-day period which officially starts with the election of the Parliament's secretariat. The Constitution says that if no government manages to win a vote of confidence in Parliament by the end of the 45-day deadline, the president of the Republic may dissolve Parliament, and appoint a caretaker government which would stage a new election in 90 days.

Another aim of the postponement drive is to give the True Path Party (DYP) and the Motherland Party (ANAP) more time to form the proposed "Motherpath" government once Welfare Party (RP) leader Necmettin Erbakan returns the mandate to President Suleyman Demirel. Thus the ANAP and DYP leaders will have an extra week to reach agreement before the 45-day formal period start. Without handing the mandate to another party leader, President Demirel will let them use that extra week to have discussions in which he himself may intervene if required.

Candidates line up

On Monday, with two days to go before the ten-day nomination period expires, the first candidate announced his candidacy for Parliament speaker. That was ANAP Deputy for Istanbul Ali Talip Ozdemir. But at this stage his chances of election do not look strong. The agreement for the composition of the new coalition will affect the election of the speaker. There is a widely-held conviction that the nature of the solution to the government problem will determine the party and identity of the new Parliament speaker.

Political circles speculate that Ali Talip Ozdemir has formally applied to become a candidate merely to strengthen both his bargaining position for a place in the coalition government to be formed as well as his position within his own party.

In ANAP circles the name of Gumushane Deputy Oltan Sungurlu comes up as the strongest potential candidate. ANAP officials say that party leader Mesut Yilmaz has asked Sungurlu, a former minister, whether he would consider running for the post, and is planning to mention Sungurlu's name in future talks on a coalition. Being a conservative, Sungurlu may be expected to draw votes from the DYP and RP deputies too. With the conviction that Democratic Left Party (DSP) votes will carry great weight in the election of a new Parliament speaker, Sungurlu is reportedly trying to get support from the DSP too.

The liberal wing of ANAP, meanwhile, say that either Mustafa Kalemli or Kaya Erdem, both former ministers, may be their candidate. But these names are expected to win the votes of the conservative majority in Parliament unless they are mentioned as the name the parties agree on during the coalition talks.

ANAP candidates are considered to be in a luckier position to get the coveted post because no one doubts that ANAP will ensure that the post is earmarked for its candidate during talks for a potential coalition either with the RP or the DYP. Meanwhile, the DYP's Ismet Sezgin is vigorously lobbying to strengthen his own chances. Even though Sezgin may get votes from ANAP liberals and Republican People's Party (CHP) deputies, it is not likely that he will get votes from the conservatives in the ranks of the DYP, ANAP or the RP or from the DSP. The RP is preparing to nominate Yasin Hatipoglu.

[04] Turkey, Iran to sign gas and pipeline deal within 10 days

ANKARA- Iran and Turkey have delayed for 10 days the signing of a deal for the sale of 10 billion cubic meters of Iranian natural gas beginning in 1999 and the construction of a pipeline to carry it, a Turkish Cabinet minister said Monday.

Energy Minister Sinasi Altiner told reporters at Esenboga Airport in Ankara that Turkey would buy a total of 10 billion cubic meters of Iranian gas from 1999 until 2020.

"The final agreement will be signed within a week or 10 days at the latest," Altiner said. The minister ruled out any technical problems in finalizing the gas deal.

Turkey and Iran agreed in principle in May on the 21-year supply deal under which Turkey will buy an estimated $20 billion worth of Iranian natural gas starting in 1999.

The agreement envisages that Turkey, which is trying to lessen its dependence on coal and oil for power, will get two billion cubic meters (70.6 billion cubic feet) of natural gas starting in late 1999, and the amount will be raised gradually to 10 billion cubic metres by the year 2002.

A pipeline from the Iranian city of Tabriz to Turkey's southern port of Ceyhan, where an existing terminal for piped Iraqi crude has been sitting unused since the 1990 trade embargo on Baghdad, is to be built as part of the deal.

Iranian Oil Minister Gholamreza Aghazadeh, quoted by an Iranian newspaper, said the agreement received final approval during weekend talks in Tehran with Turkish Energy Minister Sinasi Altiner but that its signing was delayed by a week because of "problems with Turkey's trade relations." He did not elaborate.

Sinasi, quoted by the daily Jomhuri Eslami, said he was returning to Turkey for "further review of technical problems" and would return to Tehran next week to sign the deal.

The original agreement suggested the pipeline be an extension to an proposed natural gas link from Turkmenistan to Iran, but officials said uncertainties about the Turkmen deal forced a separate Iranian link. "The agreement will cover the building of a 190-km (120-mile) section on Iranian territory and 1,200 km (750 miles) in Turkey along the existing Iraqi oil pipeline in the southeast," Reuters quoted one Turkish official as saying.

Turkey, whose current annual gas needs of eight billion cubic meters are expected to shoot up to 30 billion cubic meters by 2005 and 40 billion by 2010, buys six billion cubic meters a year from Russia.

Officials from BOTAS, the national pipeline company, said Turkey planned to import about nine billion cubic meters of natural gas this year. They said a recent agreement with Algeria had raised the LNG imports of BOTAS to the equivalent of three billion cubic meters, effective from 1996, from two billion cubic meters.

BOTAS will also get LNG equivalent to a maximum of 375 million cubic meters of gas from Australia's Northwest Shelf joint venture. It received the first cargo of 125 million cubic meters in Sept.

Turkey will be tapping an additional two billion cubic meters of natural gas from Russia beginning in 1997 and another 2.5 billion cubic meters as of 1998. Nigeria would also be supplying LNG, equivalent to 900 million cubic meters of gas, under an agreement signed in Nov. If agreed to by both sides, the Nigerian supply may come in beginning in 1998.

BOTAS is close to an agreement with Qatar for the supply of LNG equivalent to two billion cubic meters of gas beginning in 1999.

[05] Israel wants to market Turkish water

ANKARA- Israel has expressed an interest in the international marketing of the waters of the Turkish rivers Seyhan and Ceyhan.

The issue, brought on the agenda during the visit of Undersecretary Onur Oymen to Israel, will be discussed further at a technical level.

The initial Israeli proposal is to transport the water by tanker to prospective buyers but this calls for the building of a station in the area. The two rivers discharge into the Mediterranean, close to the Turco-Syrian border.

"Israel is interested in the international marketing of Turkish waters," Foreign Ministry spokesman Nurettin Nurkan said.

A Turkish diplomat said that the modalities would be discussed in the coming days among experts.

The Seyhan and Ceyhan, which flow through Cukurova, were an essential source of water in the late President Turgut Ozal's "Peace Pipeline Project." Under this project, Turkey aimed to link its Arab neighbors with a "waterline" that would meet part of their needs, but the project, which called for water pipelines throughout the Arabian peninsula, was dismisses as "economically and politically infeasible" by Turkey's Arabic neighbors.

The average flow of the two rivers is 39.17 million cubic meters per day. Planned Turkish use for those rivers is 23.04 million cubic meters thus leaving 16.1 million available. Under the Peace Pipeline Project, Turkey planned to give 6 million cubic meters a day.

[06] Turkey's cotton output seen up at 836,655 tons

ANKARA- Turkey's cotton production in 1995/96 (Oct-July) rose to a provisional 836,655 tons from 628,286 in 1994/95, and above an earlier estimate of 803,000 tons, an official report said.

The report, prepared by the National Cotton Committee, said total cotton supply, which included imports and stocks carried over from the previous year, would go up to 1,074,227 tons in 1995/96 from 988,571 tons the previous season.

Turkey had initial stocks of 137,572 tons at the start of the season, and the report said 24,227 tons from this season's output would be kept as stocks for 1996/97. Turkey will have consumed 900,000 tons of cotton by the end of 1995/96, up from 850,000 tons in the season earlier.

In December Turkey ended a duty on cotton exports of 20 cents per kg to allow exports of up to 50,000 tons, helping use up the supply surplus.

Turkey's textile producers opposed the exports, saying it would force the industry to import cotton instead of gaining access to cheaper but higher quality Turkish cotton.

The report envisaged 1995-96 cotton imports of about 100,000 tons, down sharply from 236,066 tons in 1994-95. Area sown to cotton would also rise to 741,609 hectares in 1995-96 from 655,000. Yield per hectare is seen at 1,128 kg.

Cotton output is predicted to fall to 787,000 tons in 1996-97 but officials said the report did not take into account a possible output rise in the southeast where more land would be gradually irrigated through a giant project began in 1995.