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Turkey Country Assessment

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Turkey Country Assessment TURKEY COUNTRY REPORT October 2003 Country Information & Policy Unit IMMIGRATION AND NATIONALITY DIRECTORATE Home Office, United Kingdom Turkey October 2003 CONTENTS 1. SCOPE OF THE DOCUMENT 1.1 – 1.4 2. GEOGRAPHY 2.1 – 2.3 3. ECONOMY 3.1 – 3.5 4. HISTORY 4.1 – 4.68 5. STATE STRUCTURES The Constitution 5.1 – 5.5 Nationality law 5.6 – 5.8 Political system 5.9 – 5.16 Local Government 5.17 – 5.20 The Judiciary 5.21 – 5.31 Legal rights/detention 5.32- 5.66 Internal Security, including the police 5.67 - 5.76 Prisons 5.77 – 5.87 Military service 5.88 – 5.116 Medical services 5.117 - 5.122 Education 5.123 – 5.124 6. HUMAN RIGHTS 6a. HUMAN RIGHTS ISSUES Overview 6.1- 6.31 Freedom of speech and the media 6.32 – 6.50 Freedom of religion 6.51 – 6.58 Freedom of assembly and association 6.59 – 6.72 Employment rights 6.73 – 6.75 People trafficking 6.76 – 6.77 Freedom of movement/ internal flight 6.78 – 6.83 Nüfus card/ identity card 6.84 – 6.86 Treatment of foreigners seeking asylum in Turkey 6.87 – 6.92 Treatment of returned asylum seekers 6.93 – 6.113 6b. HUMAN RIGHTS – SPECIFIC GROUPS The Kurds 6.114 – 6.149 Alevis, including Alevi Kurds 6.150 – 6.158 Arabs 6.159 Caucasians 6.160 Armenians 6.161 – 6.162 Greeks 6.163 Syrian Orthodox Christians 6.164 – 6.166 Jews 6.167 Women 6.168 – 6.174 Children 6.175 – 6.188 Homosexuals, transsexuals, and transvestites 6.189 – 6.191 6c. HUMAN RIGHTS - OTHER ISSUES Members of illegal organisations 6.192 – 6.197 Activists in marginal activities for illegal organisations 6.198 – 6.199 Relatives of members of illegal organisations 6.200 – 6.202 Government monitoring of human rights 6.203 – 6.212 European Court of Human Rights 6.213 – 6.219 Human rights organisations 6.220 – 6.233 State of emergency 6.234 – 6.236 Blood feuds 6.237 ANNEX A: Chronology ANNEX B: Parties which contest parliamentary elections ANNEX C: Main leftist and/or illegal political organisations Turkey October 2003 ANNEX D: Martial Law and State of Emergency in Turkey ANNEX E: Statistical table: returns of asylum seekers ANNEX F: Administration of justice ANNEX G: Political criminal law ANNEX H: Prominent people ANNEX I: References to source material 1. SCOPE OF THE DOCUMENT 1.1 This country report has been produced by the Country Information and Policy Unit, Immigration and Nationality Directorate, Home Office, from information obtained from a wide variety of recognised sources. The document does not contain any Home Office opinion or policy. 1.2 The report has been prepared for background purposes for those involved in the asylum/ human rights determination process. The information it contains is not exhaustive. It concentrates on the issues most commonly raised in asylum/ human rights claims made in the United Kingdom. 1.3 The report is sourced throughout. It is intended to be used by caseworkers as a signpost to the source material, which has been made available to them. The vast majority of the source material is readily available in the public domain. 1.4 It is intended to revise the report on a six-monthly basis while the country remains within the top 35 asylum-seeker producing countries in the United Kingdom. 2. GEOGRAPHY 2.1 The Republic of Turkey (to use Turkey's official title) covers an area of 780,000 square kilometres (301,000 square miles), with a population, as recorded in the year 2000 census, of 67.8 million. Turkey is a passage of land between Europe and Asia, boasting land frontiers with Greece, Bulgaria, Armenia, Georgia, the Nakhichevan autonomous enclave of Azerbaijan, Iran, Iraq and Syria. Three percent of Turkey’s area is in Europe and ninety-seven percent is in Asia. The capital city is Ankara while other principal cities include Istanbul, Izmir and Adana. [1a][30q] Turkey has 81 provinces; hard copy source 68 is a map of the provinces. [2a][68] 2.2 The only official language is Turkish. However, a number of non-Turkish languages are also spoken including Kurdish (the Kurmanji and Zaza dialects) which is widely spoken in the south east along the Syrian and Iraqi frontiers. Smaller language groups include Caucasian, Greek and Armenian. [1a] [33] 2.3 More than 99% of the Turkish people are Muslims, although Turkey is a secular state (which in practice has a state-controlled Islam). [1a][2a][4a] (For further information on geography refer, refer to Europa Publications Turkey October 2003 "The Middle East and North Africa 2003" and “The Europa World Year Book 2003” sources 1a and 1d). Return to Contents 3. ECONOMY 3.1 Turkey has suffered from unstable economic conditions for much of the last twenty years. Since the early 1980s the previously centrally planned economy has been gradually liberalised. There have been periods of rapid growth interspersed with sudden, mostly short-lived crises, against a background of high inflation (usually in the range of 50-100% annually). [82] 3.2 In the light of these economic problems the government at the time began a three year US$4 billion Standby Agreement programme with IMF financing in January 2000. The primary objective was to reduce inflation to single-digit levels. Considerable progress was made as inflation fell from 63% to 33% during 2000. But delays in the implementation of structural reforms, endemic problems in the banking sector, and the widening foreign trade deficit all contributed to a financial crisis at the end of November 2000. The IMF moved quickly to bale Turkey out with a US $7500 million Supplementary Reserve Facility in December 2000. A further crisis was triggered by a political disagreement between President Sezer and Prime Minister Ecevit on 19 February 2001. This led to the TL being allowed to float on 22 February and to the end of the Standby Agreement in its original form. [82] 3.3. On 15 May 2001 the IMF Board approved a new economic programme, and agreed additional financial assistance for Turkey of US $8000 million [82] and in February 2002 the IMF approved an extra US $12,000 million to Turkey, raising Turkey’s debt to the organisation to $31,000 million; Turkey’s foreign debt increased to 78% of GDP by the end of 2001. [1a] 3.4 The exchange rate, as of 7October 2003 was 2,169,014 Turkish liras (TL) to £1 sterling. [66l] The average annual income is $2,090. [66g]. 3.5 The Financial Times has noted that a Byzantine bureaucracy and a reputation for corruption have won Turkey the dubious privilege of being ranked the fourth least transparent economy in the world – after China, Russia and Indonesia. [95] Turkey is understood to have a very large black economy that underpins the real economy. The comment has been made that only a small proportion of Turkish businesses (e.g. those linked to international companies) appear to operate fully above board and to pay all taxes. [82] The October 2002 EU "Regular Report on Turkey’s Progress Towards Accession" notes that several steps have been taken to prevent corruption and corrupt practices. It praises the Government’s adoption in January 2002 of an Action Plan on Enhancing Transparency and Good Governance in the Public Sector (which has implications for preventing corrupt practices), and says that due attention should now be given to its implementation. [76] Return to Contents 4. HISTORY See also "The Kurds" (chapter 6b) for Kurdish history. Turkey October 2003 4.1On 12 September 1980 in response to increased political violence between left and right factions the armed forces, led by General Kenan Evren, Chief of the General Staff, seized power in a bloodless coup. The coup leaders formed a five-man National Security Council. Martial law was declared throughout the country and the new government succeeded in reducing the level of political violence and in restoring law and order, but at the expense of compromising or suspending many democratic freedoms. A new Constitution was adopted in 1982. The 1983 General Election was won by the Motherland Party (ANAP) and its leader Turgut Özal was accordingly appointed Prime Minister. [1a] 4.2 Four years after the 1980 coup, which crushed the activities of urban insurgents and fundamentalists, Turkey faced a different threat from a similar source - rural insurgency, initially concentrated in the south-east region along the borders with Iran, Iraq and Syria. Almost all the rural insurgent groups had their origins in the student groups based in the cities, one particular case in point being Abdullah Öcalan's PKK (Kurdistan Workers' Party). The separatist activities soon spread to the cities. [1a] 4.3 In 1984, the PKK launched a violent guerrilla campaign against the Turkish authorities in the southeastern provinces. The government responded by arresting suspected Kurdish leaders, sending in more security forces, establishing local militia groups and imposing martial law later changed to states of emergency in the troubled provinces. The conflict continued until 1999 when the PKKs leader Abdullah Ocalan was captured by Turkish Special Forces and a ceasefire was established. [1d] On the 1 September 2003 the PKK ended its four-year cease-fire accusing the authorities of failing to grant Kurds greater political and cultural rights. [66k] 4.4. In July 1987, ten provinces in the southeast were placed under emergency rule due to an increased level of fighting; these were Van, Bitlis, Tunceli, Diyarbakır, Siirt, Bingöl, Batman, Hakkâri, Şirnak, and Mardin. [9a] The state of emergency lasted in Mardin until November 1996, in Batman, Bingöl and Bitlis until October 1997, in Siirt until November 1999, in Van until July 2000, and in Hakkâri and Tunceli until July 2002.
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