Tuesday, August 28, Foreign Minister Abdullah Gul, a devout Muslim, as the country’s new president.
The election came despite fears from critics that he will undermine Turkey’s secular system at a time of perceived Islamic extremism. This year in April a German man and two Turks, all former Muslims, were found with their hands and legs tied and their throats slit at the Zirve publishing house in the town of Malatya.
45-year old German interpreter Tilman Ekkehart Geske, had been living in Malatya since 2003 and worked closely with two other Turkish Christians, Necati Aydin, 35, and Ugur Yuksel 32. In January, journalist Hrant Dink, one of the most prominent voices of Turkey’s shrinking Armenian community, was killed by a an Islamic militant gunman entrance to his newspaper’s offices.
Dink, a 53-year-old Turkish citizen of Armenian descent, had gone on trial numerous times for speaking out about the mass killings of Armenians by Turks at the beginning of the 20th century. He had also received threats from nationalists, who viewed him as a traitor.
PRIEST KILLED
Last year Catholic Priest Andrea Santano was shot in the back at his church in the town Trabzon, by a Muslim militant. In addition, the World Council of Churches (WCC) said in May it had urged Turkish authorities to improve protection of Turkey’s Christian minority amid reports of death threats against key church leaders.
In a letter to the Permanent Mission of Turkey to the United Nations Office at Geneva, Switzerland, seen by BosNewsLife, WCC General Secretary Samuel Kobia said there are reports "of plots against the lives of the heads of two WCC member churches in Turkey," identified as Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew I, and Armenian Patriarch Mesrob II.
It was unclear Tuesday, August 28, if and when President Gul will tackle Muslim extremism in
the country, as demanded by secularists. The vote Tuesday, August 28, was the third round of balloting in the election. Only a simple majority in the 550-seat chamber was necessary for victory today, instead of the two-thirds required in the previous rounds. Gul got 339 votes.
BALLOT FAILED
Gul, of the ruling Justice and Development Party, failed earlier this month to win the two-thirds majority required for a first or second round victory. With his wife publicly wearing a head scarf often at his side, Gul is Turkey’s first head of state with a background in political Islam. He has pledged however to uphold the nation’s strong secular traditions separating government and religion.
However underscoring tensions, Turkey’s military chief already warned of threats to those traditions, vowing that the military will protect Turkey’s secular and democratic structures.
General Yasar Buyukanit, head of the staunchly secularist military, said "centers of evil" are trying to undermine Turkish secularism. Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan has warned the military to stay out of politics, the Voice Of America (VOA) network reported. (With reporting from Turkey and BosNewsLife Research).
