Identifier
Created
Classification
Origin
07ISTANBUL406
2007-05-15 12:36:00
CONFIDENTIAL
Consulate Istanbul
Cable title:  

ISTANBUL: A TALE OF THREE OUTLOOKS

Tags:  PGOV PREL TU 
pdf how-to read a cable
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PP RUEHDBU RUEHFL RUEHKW RUEHLA RUEHROV RUEHSR
DE RUEHIT #0406/01 1351236
ZNY CCCCC ZZH
P 151236Z MAY 07
FM AMCONSUL ISTANBUL
TO RUEHC/SECSTATE WASHDC PRIORITY 7021
INFO RUEHZL/EUROPEAN POLITICAL COLLECTIVE PRIORITY
C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 02 ISTANBUL 000406 

SIPDIS

SIPDIS

DEPARTMENT FOR EUR/SE

E.O. 12958: DECL: 04/18/2017
TAGS: PGOV PREL TU
SUBJECT: ISTANBUL: A TALE OF THREE OUTLOOKS

REF: 06 ISTANBUL 192

Classified By: Consul General Deborah K. Jones for reasons 1.4 (b) and
(d.)

C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 02 ISTANBUL 000406

SIPDIS

SIPDIS

DEPARTMENT FOR EUR/SE

E.O. 12958: DECL: 04/18/2017
TAGS: PGOV PREL TU
SUBJECT: ISTANBUL: A TALE OF THREE OUTLOOKS

REF: 06 ISTANBUL 192

Classified By: Consul General Deborah K. Jones for reasons 1.4 (b) and
(d.)


1. (C) Summary. In separate meetings, an entrepreneur and
founding member of the Justice and Development Party (AKP),a
representative of Turkish tradesmen and craftsmen, and a
Kemalist academic each commented on today's politics; the
first resentful of secularist prejudice, the second aggrieved
by current economic policy but nevertheless supporting Prime
Minister Erdogan and the third concerned that AKP control of
the parliament and presidency was undemocratic and a danger
to the state. End summary.

THE ANATOLIAN MUSLIM - "THEY" DON'T REPRESENT "US"
-------------- --------------


2. (C) Nureddin Nebati, 42, is a purveyor of fine children's
clothes for those appearing in Istanbul's society pages. We
met Nebati between buying trips to Rome and Paris. He is
also a member of the board of MUSIAD (religiously-associated
Independent Industrialists and Businessmen's Association),as
well as the AKP Istanbul board. Nebati is clear about what
he disdains in Turkey's secularist elite: he recounted a
meeting in Rome in FM Gul's presence when Turkey's Ambassador
told the Italian hosts that Turkey has three shortcomings:
poverty, village mentality, and Islam. This frequently
voiced sentiment regarding Islam shocks and angers AKP
members. "This side of the Turkish state does not represent
us. They are wrong to say such things," Nebati stated.
Nebati stressed that being Muslim and Turkish does not mean
support for Sharia law, he said. It means respect and honor
for the Muslim faith as traditionally practiced in Turkey.
(Note. He refers to a moderate, Sufi-inspired Sunni Islam
common in Turkey. End note.) From his perspective,
"everyone" in Turkey would be America's friend if the U.S.
supported a woman's right to wear a headscarf in official
settings.

TRADESMEN AND CRAFTSMEN: ECONOMY COULD BE BETTER BUT...
-------------- --------------


3. (C) Suat Yalkin, head of the Union of Turkish Tradesmen
and Craftsmen, is the 72-year old representative of small
shop owners and craftsmen. Strongly pro-American, he

recalled with emotion U.S. efforts during the Cold War to
support Turkey's independence against Soviet-era pressure.
The spokesman for hundreds of thousands of small businessmen
made clear that AKP economic reform policies are hurting
those he represents. Yalkin went into detail to describe
protectionist measures accorded small business in the EU,
noting that even though Turkey had to compete on price and
quality, a huge disparity favoring European small businesses
exists in the cost and outright availability of government
loans, for example. Though the 1982 Constitution mandates
incentives for small business, Yalkin claimed there were none
comparable to those the Europeans enjoy. And when an
American-style supermarket opens, Yalkin says an average of
54 neighborhood corner stores close due to price competition.
He pitched a European-model fix: taxation of supermarkets
at a higher rate and redistribution of that revenue to local
markets, for instance.


4. (C) Confidently predicting small businessmen would oppose
AKP, Yalkin professed not to understand why polls
consistently show AKP winning a plurality in general
elections. He allowed that tradesmen do not typically
declare their opposition to AKP openly. Furthermore, he felt
personally that given Turkey's overwhelmingly Muslim
demographic, it was useless to get into who was better
qualified to represent Muslims. There is no point in
creating tension over secularity, he said. "All of us are
nationalists...the fight is against poverty."


5. (C) Yalkin closed the meeting by confiding that Erdogan,
when mayor of Istanbul, had asked for Yalkin's support for
the rest of his political career. Though at the time Yalkin
felt Erdogan needed refinement, his record of accomplishment
for the city convinced him to give Erdogan his word. He
wouldn't lend his support to a "Refah-type extremist," Yalkin
said, but he would stick to his pledge to Erdogan.

COMPROMISE CHOICE FOR PRESIDENT?
--------------


6. (C) When Sabah newspaper recently reported Motherland
Party (ANAVATAN) leader Erkan Mumcu had the perfect
compromise candidate for president and that she was blond and
from Istanbul, we were surprised to learn it was ardent
secularist, Professor Deniz Aribogan. So was Aribogan. In

ISTANBUL 00000406 002 OF 002


the days before FM Gul's candidacy was announced, Aribogan
told us AKP could name Turkey's next president but the
"tipping point" would come if one party controlled all powers
of the state following national parliamentary elections. It
would be "undemocratic" if AKP both selected the next
president and formed the next government without a coalition
partner. Noting her own "fear" of the military, she said the
"70 percent or so" of voters alienated from the AKP may
demand some response from the military. The Nationalist
Movement Party (MHP) was entirely capable of turning out
large and boisterous protests that could intimidate a
government, she said.


7. (C) Aribogan took an enlightened approach to the question
of headscarves in public saying it really did not matter -
even for the president's wife - as long as it was neither a
political statement nor a means of attacking the opposing
side but solely a matter of personal religious expression.
Turks do not want institutionalization of a "militant Islam"
which Aribogan defined as direction of the state according to
Koranic principles. Reflecting a sense of geopolitics
popular with Turks, Aribogan said the U.S. should act to
place Turkey in a powerful position in the Middle East.
Aribogan said someone like Tayyip Erdogan could only become
Prime Minister "in a country like Turkey" because of U.S.
intervention, citing Erdogan's December 2002 White House
meeting with President Bush during Abullah Gul's interregnum
as prime minister as evidence of this "intervention."


8. (C) Comment. Aribogan's comments track sentiments often
repeated by Turkey's secular elite, and Nebati's complaints
are typical of our AKP interlocutors. Secularist contacts
often use "undemocratic" when "unrepresentative" might be a
more accurate term. In their reverence for Kemalism, this
elite maintains that the threat of a recidivist polity
heading toward something other than strict separation of
church (or mosque) and state is a grave danger. They see
secularism, not necessarily democracy, as the means of
protecting Turkey from becoming a theocratic state modeled on
today's Iran. At the May 11 Brookings Institute/Sabanci
University event, former Turkish Ambassador to the United
States Faruk Logoglu spoke in this vein when he vigorously
contested the Economist magazine's recommendation that Turkey
opt for democracy rather than secularism. End comment.
JONES