Turkey

Europe’s security body has released a strongly-worded statement voicing concern over the targeting of prominent Turkish journalist Amberin Zaman by presidential hopeful Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan.

Women should not laugh out loud in public, Deputy Prime Minister Bülent Arınç has said while complaining about “moral corruption” in Turkey. 

Speaking during an Eid el-Fitr meeting on July 28, Arınç described his ideal of the chaste man or woman, saying they should both have a sense of shame and honor.

As the deadline for the finalization of Turkey's local election electoral lists draws closer, an association of women's groups has launched a campaign to entice political party leaders to nominate more women as candidates in 2014 elections.

On Sept. 11, a story broke about a female student taken into custody at one of the most prestigious universities of Turkey, Middle East Technical University (METU). Ezgi Ozen and her friends were protesting a government road project that may destroy 3,000 trees on the METU campus and nearby neighborhoods. Another protester was able to shoot a video of Ozen being handcuffed and escorted to police vehicles. The video shows an officer yelling, “If she resists, her arm will be broken.” Unarmed and relatively small, could Ozen really have “resisted” the police?

2023 will mark the 100th anniversary of the Turkish Republic. The symbolism of this date has led to 2023 being set as the “deadline” for many financial, political, and social targets. However, any growth needs to be social for it to be sustainable.

The fundamental question is how to prevent, prosecute, and eliminate violence against women. As long as violence against women is widespread and accepted, there can be no genuine mention of gender equality.

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)