[Congressional Record Volume 141, Number 33 (Wednesday, February 22, 1995)]
[Senate]
[Page S2978]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]


                       TURKEY'S CONFIDENT LEADER

 Mr. SIMON. Mr. President, recently, Lally Weymouth had an op-
ed piece in the Washington Post about Turkey's remarkable Prime 
Minister.
  It's a great tribute to her.
  The political storms are not easy to weather in Turkey, but one of 
the things that our friends in Turkey must understand is that an 
improved relationship with the United States, and much of Western 
Europe, is in the interest of all of us, but it is not likely to happen 
until Turkey faces up to the Cyprus question and the Armenia question.
  I recognize that is easy for a politician of the United States to 
say, and not easy for a political leader in Turkey to say because of 
the decades of emotion on these issues.
  But if the people in the Middle East can get together, even though it 
is not all smooth, and if the people in Northern Ireland can get 
together, then it seems to me, the Turks, the Greeks, and the Armenians 
ought to be able to work out a better relationship than the one they 
now have, and that is in the interest of all parties.
  I ask that the Lally Weymouth column be printed in the Record.
  The column follows:
               [From the Washington Post, Nov. 28, 1994]

                       Turkey's Confident Leader

                          (By Lally Weymouth)

       In a country where a radical Islamist party is growing in 
     strength, and increasingly women are seen on the streets of 
     major cities wearing the chador, the prime minister is a 
     decidedly modern woman who has surprised the experts with her 
     staying power. From the day 48-year-old Tansu Ciller came to 
     power little over a year ago, analysts have been predicting 
     the fall of her coalition. So far, however, she has managed 
     to prove them wrong.
       It remains true, however, that virtually every move Ciller 
     makes is controversial. Some Turks criticize her as a 
     disorganized novice; she's an academic-turned-prime minister. 
     Others say she has failed to deal with Turkey's economic 
     crisis; inflation this year is running at 116 percent, and 
     the growth rate is negative.
       Yet the prime minister appears cool and unflappable as she 
     stops out of a helicopter in Istanbul and enters her palace 
     to talk about Turkey's problems.
       For one thing, Turdey's relationship with Washington has 
     deteriorated in the post-cold war era. Meanwhile, Ciller has 
     many soldiers deployed fighting terrorists in the southeast 
     of Turkey. On the domestic front, she's engaged in an effort 
     to reschedule a by-election for some national assembly seats, 
     a vote originally scheduled for early December. Experts have 
     been predicting that Ciller's party wouldn't fare well in 
     these elections, since the majority of seats at stake are 
     located in southeast Turkey, where the fundamentalist 
     ``Welfare Party'' is strong.
       Ciller, however, says confidently, ``We are the majority 
     party in the parliament *  *  * and I think we'll increase 
     that majority. We're going to do much better than ANAP [the 
     other right-of-center party.] I'm secular and democratic and 
     progressive and this is what people want.
       The central threat to Ciller's party and to all mainstream 
     Turkish parties is the radical Islamist ``Welfare Party.'' 
     The prime minister nevertheless plays down the fundamentalist 
     threat, claiming that the fundamentalists have only 15 or 16 
     percent of the vote. Indeed, she argues that their core vote 
     is even smaller than that; she believes that Welfare attracts 
     a considerable number of protest voters who are reacting to 
     Turkey's economic problems.
       Shouldn't her party (the True Path) merge with the other 
     right-of-center party (the Motherland Party)--to offer voters 
     a united front against the fundamentalists? Ciller, who has 
     acquired a populist touch, strikes out at the Motherland 
     Party, calling it elitist, ``the product of the military 
     coup. They had contacts [only] with the upper class,'' says 
     Ciller, claiming that her True Path Party ``represents the 
     peasants and small businessmen, the artisans and free 
     trades--the private sector.'' In the next elections, she 
     predicts, Turkish voters will opt for one party, and ``very 
     likely it's going to be me and my party they will choose.''
       As Ciller sees it, she's faced with two major problems: an 
     economic crisis and a terror threat. In the economic realm, 
     she's trying to privatize the state sector: ``I'm for a free 
     market economy * * * but we've had problems in the economy 
     because the government sector was so big. The government is 
     in finance, in banking, in manufacture--everywhere.''
       As for terrorism, when Ciller became prime minister, the 
     Syrian-sponsored PKK terrorists controlled large areas of 
     southeast Turkey. Although she and other Turkish officials 
     have not noticed any dropoff in Syrian support for the terror 
     group, Ciller says she has used her army to regain control 
     over much of the southeast. The prime minister says 
     confidently that factories and schools are open again after 
     having been closed for six years. ``Life is going back to 
     normal * * * and I did it in one year,'' she said. ``We still 
     have problems, but it's a big step in the right direction.''
       Her government has been criticized for the harsh methods 
     used by the army in fighting the PKK, but Ciller claims she 
     had no choice: ``The fight was not against people living in 
     the southeast [but] against the PKK who were killing the 
     Kurdish and Turkish people without discrimination.''
       Turning to foreign affairs, Ciller notes that Turkey was a 
     faithful U.S. ally during the Cold War, and cooperated with 
     the United States and its allies in prosecuting the gulf war, 
     shutting down an oil pipeline from Iraq that had produced 
     large revenues for Turkey, thus causing economic hardship.
       Recently, when Saddam marched toward Kuwait, Ciller said 
     she told President Clinton that ``we back the U.S. 100 
     percent and that I would provide any help the president would 
     ask.''
       Yet she hesitates when it comes to the question of renewing 
     ``Operation Provide Comfort''--the program started by the 
     United States and the international community to aid the 
     Kurds in northern Iraq. ``My people have hesitations about 
     Provide Comfort because they feel it might help separate 
     northern Iraq from the rest of the country,'' she said. ``We 
     feel the territorial integrity of Iraq should be 
     maintained.''
       Ciller has endeavored to warn Washington about Russia's 
     aggressive posture. ``We know what is going on there * * * 
     and we cannot close our eyes to the fact * * * that there are 
     forces within Russia who want to go back to the old empire, 
     to the old ways * * *. Aggression should be stopped--be it in 
     Bosnia, in Azerbaijan or Kuwait.''
       Tansu Ciller is looking to the future. She plans to guide 
     Turkey into the Customs Union of the European Union. Then, 
     she wants Turkey to play some role in the Middle East peace 
     process. Moreover, she wants to aid the Turkic Republics of 
     the former Soviet Union emerge into independence.
       But, says the prime minister, ``we need help.'' She does; 
     she also deserves it.
     

                          ____________________