There is no winner in the Erdoğan-Baydemir polemic

Turkish Daily News, Opinion

By Cengiz Candar

September 6, 2007

The “Kurdish question” is a political issue and political issues are solved by political solutions, not by penal law.

The Tayyip Erdoğan-Osman Baydemir polemic became the last blow on Turkish political life which always has plenty of tension. The first sign of it came when the Democratic Society Party (DTP) leader Ahmet Türk criticized the government by saying, “There is no mention about the Kurdish issue,” during the parliamentary talks over the new government program, and when Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan replied, “You first recognize the outlawed Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) as a terrorist organization."

Diyarbakır Mayor Osman Baydemir, not using an attentive language, fueled contention between the Justice and Development Party (AKP) and the Democratic Society Party (DTP) to a further level. Full Text