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Posted on 01/15/2003 5:03:28 PM PST by knighthawk
ANKARA - Turkey's powerful and staunchly secular army has dismissed one of its officers for opposing ties with Israel.
Hurriyet, the country's largest daily newspaper, revealed that the officer was recently dismissed from the Turkish Armed Forces in a decision by the 15 top generals and admirals.
According to Hurriyet editor-in-chief Ertugrul Ozkok, the officer, who was working aboard one of the Turkish Naval Forces frigates, rejected an official assignment to set sail for Israel.
"When the officer was asked why he did not want to go to Israel, he said: 'I am Muslim, Israel has been oppressing Muslims. That's why I will not go to that country,'" wrote Ozkok in his column.
Ozkok asked, "how can an army keep such an officer?"
The Turkish army's highest body, the Supreme Military Council, which includes the Chief of General Staff and 14 other generals and admirals, decided at the end of last month to dismiss seven military personnel for involvement in Islamist activities that directly affected their routine military duties. Some of them were accused of abandoning their jobs during prayer times.
Prime Minister Abdullah Gul expressed reservations about those seven dismissals, saying those expelled should have chance to go to court to defend their actions. Normally, officers have no right to challenge such decisions.
Gul's reservations led to a serious crisis between the Turkey's military and government. Top commander Gen. Hilmi Ozkok harshly criticized the government, accusing the country's prime minister of encouraging "anti-secularist activities." This was the military's first public attack on a new government it views with suspicion for its Islamist roots. "The place and means of voicing opposition on this matter should not have been the council itself," Ozkok said during a reception in Ankara.
Since its election, Gul's party, the AKP, has been at pains to present itself since as a strictly democratic pro- Western administration.
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