Türkiye

The photo of a woman in a red dress—her dark hair aswirl as police blast her full in the face with pepper spray—has become an international symbol of Turkey's recent protests.

While Erdogan has agreed to meet today with the protest leaders, many expect the demonstrations to escalate after police entered Gezi Park Tuesday, flinging gas canisters and shooting rubber bullets at demonstrators, despite the Istanbul governor's

The local elections in March 2014 will have a vital bearing on the future of Turkish politics. The presence of women in the parliament, although still totally inadequate, went up to 14.5 % in the last elections. However, the status of women in local administrations is truly dismal. Of 2,950 mayors, only 26 are women. Moreover, among village heads, only 65 out of 34,275 are women. This is not even 2%. I had hoped that this situation would be on the agenda of the opposition Republican People’s Party (CHP) and the Nationalist Movement Party (MHP)

Leyla Zana: Married at 14 to Mehdi Zana, a political Kurd some 20 years her senior who became mayor of Diyarbakir and spent 16 years in jail after the 1980 military coup, she found herself the single mother of two children. Learning Turkish with them as they were schooled, she also found her political voice — and went on to become, in 1991, the first Kurdish woman elected to the Turkish Parliament.

Women activists in Turkey launched a new campaign aimed at increasing the number of women elected to parliament. The campaign depicts the patriarchal society in Turkey by featuring well-known women wearing false moustaches.
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Turkish women are on the street protesting as never before as the fight to preserve Turkey's secular status gives them a louder political voice that could translate into parliamentary seats in this summer's elections.
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On July 2nd, ESI Analyst and TPQ Editor Nigar Göksel chaired a roundtable meeting organized by the ARI Movement in Istanbul's Bilgi University on women in Turkey with former U.S. Secretary of State Madeleine Albright as guest speaker.

Women's groups in Turkey have condemned a new draft constitution, saying it sets the country back years in terms of gender equality. The document describes women as a vulnerable group needing protection.
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