Turkey is now stuck on an endless debate on the consequences of numerous, critical judicial processes. The bad part of the story is that it has been left adrift halfway through a journey, whose destination would be an institutionalized democracy and a past thoroughly dealt with.
The unfortunate case with Turkey is, unlike what took place in, say, Germany after the fall of the Berlin Wall, or South Africa, its political and bureaucratic actors have been severely in disagreement over the need for change, despite the fact that society in general has remained in favor of it. While one segment of the political players has been trying to hit the gas, the other side has never given up pulling the hand brake. This, to say the least, complicates things.
Success in any transition depends upon the notion of justice. Therefore, the need for care and attention must be focused on making Turkey’s “stone age” judiciary fair and speedy. At the moment, it mainly produces dissatisfaction and serves all those nostalgic for the “good old days of the past, shaped by impunity and privileges” in applying various methods.
The latest debate, which has been whipped up in the media, centers on the question, “In which court should a former chief of General Staff be tried?” There has been a parallel outcry over the chairman of the main opposition, against whom a legal inquiry has been launched by an attorney. The legal grounds on which these cases are based are so filled with ambiguities, and thus so open to misinterpretation, that they serve on silver plates material for the circles who keep hitting the brakes.
The launched processes baffle. The infamous Şemdinli case (concerning military intelligence figures accused of bombing a Kurdish bookstore in 2005) ended up with only two low-ranking, non-commissioned officers plus an informer being sentenced to 39 years in prison, while the question of who in the army ordered the act of terror has remained unanswered. This outcome also causes concern about the Uludere case, with 35 unarmed Kurds killed at the border. In another debate, the main question is whether or not only two generals will be put on trial, or some hundred key officers who were responsible and operational in the September 1980 coup.
If you are unfamiliar with the key element of shrewdness that was dominant in politics here, you get lost (as many foreigners do) in the jungle of endless words about legal procedures. It is the best way to mislead the naive away from the big picture and even instrumentalize them for undemocratic purposes. The debate about whether or not it was a “crime of duty” in Başbuğ’s case, for example, is an attempt to invalidate, at the end of the day, all the trials which many hope will shed light on the clandestine plots against the elected Parliament in the past.
“We all have to understand,” wrote Sedat Laçiner in the Star daily yesterday, “that these trials are not the crusades of a handful attorneys or judges.... Turkey is confronting its dirty, very dirty, past. It is confronting coup-making, not certain people. If we place the burden of these cases on the shoulders of a few lawyers and judges, and not help them, they will never get finished. Surely they make mistakes, too. Because it is not people or groups, but an entire rotten, petrified mentality. They are confronted by ‘Old Turkey’ and its vicious actors. If this goes on like it does, it will be a pity for those judicial figures as well as ‘New Turkey’ itself.”
So, the overall pressure against the government should be continued to be applied, but with this wisdom and with a broad insight into the true nature of the national debate on the judiciary’s needs. The latest step announced by Sadullah Ergin, the Minister of Justice, on the “third reform package,” which aims to wrap up pending legal cases within a year, is a good one. Indeed, all the critical trials, such as Ergenekon, Sledgehammer, etc., must end by the end of this year. Detentions should no longer be standard procedure nor an alternative punishment. The indictments must be lucid, and the evidence must be properly shared with the defense. There is enough material to follow in the Hammarberg report.
But, as the Kurdish Communities Union (KCK) case and various trials involving journalists and academics show, the fine line between an “act of violent crime” and a “peaceful act of politics and opinion” must be drawn in law. The way forward is not a tightening of security in undue ways but to give freedom breathing room. It has to happen on many fronts, otherwise the ground on which the journey takes place will break.
