US embassy cable - 05ADANA225

UNCLAS SECTION 01 OF 02 ADANA 000225 
 
SIPDIS 
 
E.O. 12958: N/A 
TAGS: PREL, PINS, PGOV, PHUM, TU, ADANA, Press Summaries 
SUBJECT: SOUTHEAST TURKEY PRESS SUMMARY FOR DECEMBER 2, 2005 
 
This is the Southeastern Turkey press summary for December 02, 
2005.  Please note that Turkish press reports often contain 
errors or exaggerations; AmConsulate Adana does not vouch for 
the accuracy of the reports summarized here. 
 
POLITICAL, SECURITY, HUMAN RIGHTS 
 
NTV ONLINE (http://www.ntv.com.tr/news/352125.asp       ) / 
HURRIYET / ZAMAN / YENI SAFAK / RADIKAL / SABAH / CUMHURIYET: 
Ministry of Interior has recently switched the positions of 
Hakkari's Yuksekova District Subgovernor and Mus's Bulanik 
District Subgovernor.  Yuksekova Subgovernor Yucel Akgul is now 
working as the Subgovernor of Bulanik district.  Ministry had 
already switched the position of Hakkari's Semdinli District 
Subgovernor with Karabuk's Ovacik District Subgovernor. 
 
NTV ONLINE (http://www.ntv.com.tr/news/352155.asp):     A mine 
blast in Van's Caldiran district killed one person and wounded 
another. 
 
RADIKAL / NTV ONLINE (http://www.ntv.com.tr/news/352059.asp): 
A report of Diyarbakir Chapter of Egitim-Sen (Teacher's Union) 
drew attention to the problems concerning education in the 
province.  According to the report, there are 341,295 illiterate 
people in Diyarbakir and the city has a shortage of 1,045 
teachers.  Thirty-eight percent of the students enrolled at 
Diyarbakir schools are reportedly girls.  Every year, on 
average, 46,000 new students is registered at schools. 
 
NTV ONLINE (http://www.ntv.com.tr/news/352101.asp) / ZAMAN / 
CUMHURIYET:     Massoud Barzani, National Leader of the Kurdistan 
Democratic Party, stating that the December 15 national 
elections would be a significant turning point for Kurds and 
Kurdistan, further claimed that Kirkuk will be attached to the 
Kurdish administration in 2007.  The Turkish Ministry of Foreign 
Affairs offered a strong reaction to Barzani's remarks. 
Meanwhile, an Israeli newspaper separately claimed that retired 
officers of the Israeli Army were going to northern Iraq over 
Turkey under the disguise of agricultural specialists and 
engineers, and were training the Kurdish peshmergas in a secret 
area called Z-zone in Iraq. 
 
CNNTURK ONLINE 
(http://www.cnnturk.com/DUNYA/haber_detay.asp ?PID=319&HID=1 
&haberID=143122) / RADIKAL:     Kurdish groups, which embarked upon 
efforts to find oil in northern Iraq 16 kilometers away from 
Turkey's Silopi district, reportedly disturbed Shiites and 
Sunnis in the Baghdad administration.  According to the 
Kurdistan Democratic Party, companies from Turkey, Britain, 
Portugal and the U.S. will carry out exploration for oil. 
 
 
HURRIYET:       Vedat Gulsen, attorney of the officers arrested for 
their involvement in the Semdinli Case, said that they were 
unable to find witnesses who would give statements on his 
clients' behalf only because people in Semdinli avoid 
confrontation because of the alleged pressure and threats 
exerted on them to give statements against the state.  Gulsen 
said he and his clients would petition the court on Monday to 
lift the decision to arrest his clients. 
 
CUMHURIYET / SABAH / ZAMAN / YENI SAFAK:        According to Zaman 
daily, the number of patients contracting diarrhea reached 7,700 
in Malatya.  Three thousand and three hundred students in 25 
primary schools were affected from symptoms such as diarrhea, 
vomiting, fever and nausea.  Malatya State Hospital Doctor 
reportedly announced that there was an ongoing decrease each day 
in the number of patients affected from diarrhea.  Malatya Mayor 
Cemal Akin announced that November 28-dated tests on water 
revealed that the problem already has been eliminated.  Sabah 
daily reported Provincial Health Director of Malatya as saying 
that they had been warning the municipality about insufficient 
chlorine application on the city water since April.   The 
director's two children are reportedly sick from diarrhea, as 
well.  Authorities reportedly warned that a typhoid epidemic 
might strike Malatya province. 
 
ZAMAN:  During the public unrests that followed the Semdinli 
bombing, the houses rented by the police officers in the city 
center were reportedly attacked by demonstrators.  PM Erdogan, 
upon learning these developments after his visit to Semdinli, 
decided to launch housing projects for police officers in 
Hakkari in more secure areas of the city. 
 
RADIKAL / CUMHURIYET / OZGUR GUNDEM:    A delegation of 
intelligentsia formed by the efforts of the Turkey Peace 
Initiative will go to Semdinli today to extend support to the 
bombed Umut Bookstore, to express condolences and to strengthen 
solidarity. (Note: The name Umut means 'hope' in Turkish. End 
Note.)  The delegation will bring hundreds of books to the 
store. 
 
  RADIKAL:      Minister of Justice, Cemil Cicek, urged everbody and 
every institution to be sensitive about the investigation 
process of the Semdinli case. "Our role, when a demand to open 
an investigation against a public officer is placed, is to 
permit opening of that investigation.  When judiciary places a 
demand, if there is something we could do, it is most natural 
for us to respond to it." 
 
CUMHURIYET:     The Diyarbakir Governor's Office did not allow the 
Kayapinar Municipality to name the municipality's newly built 
parks with Kurdish names or names whose meanings refer to 
specific contexts important for Kurds.  For example the proposed 
name "33 Bullets" refers to the bullets found in the body of 
Ugur Kaymaz after he was killed on November 2004 by the security 
forces.  The municipality has applied to the Supreme Court to 
annul the Governor's ban. 
 
OZGUR GUNDEM:   Esat Canan, Hakkari deputy from CHP 
(Republican People's Party), said that military circles might 
have prevented CHP from appointing Canan to the Parliamentary 
Investigation Commission for the Semdinli Case (see press 
summary 12/01). 
 
OZGUR GUNDEM:   The daily claimed that cost assessment studies 
have not been done to date despite the fact that the Minister of 
Internal Affairs and former Hakkari Governor promised to cover 
the costs of the damage done by the November 1 bombing in 
Semdinli.  The tradesmen affected from the bombing said that 
200,000 new Turkish liras (approx. 148,000 USD) the government 
allocated to the Subgovernor's Office would not be enough to 
cover the costs of the 67 utterly damaged buildings. 
 
OZGUR GUNDEM:   Following the finding that the type of the 
bombs found in the car of the officers Ali Kaya and Ozcan 
Ildeniz, who were arrested for their involvement in the Semdinli 
Case, matched the bomb used in the bookstore blast, Ali Kaya 
reportedly said in his statement that the car remained under the 
control of alleged PKK followers for nine hours.  People could 
have replaced the regular type of bombs officers owned with the 
ones used in the bombing incident, said Ali Kaya. 
 
OZGUR GUNDEM:   Following the dismissal of four workers from 
their jobs in Adana's Cukurova University Hospital allegedly on 
grounds that they engaged themselves in unionist activities, 400 
workers enrolled in a health union to protest the dismissals. 
 
HURRIYET ONLINE 
(http://www.hurriyet.com.tr/gundem/3590636.as p?m=1&gid=69):     527 
young activists, who publicized themselves as human shields and 
who staged many protests in many (unspecified) places asking for 
a peaceful solution for the Kurdish problem and for the end of 
military operations in the southeastern region of Turkey, 
reportedly went to the Qandil Mountains in northern Iraq and 
enrolled in the ranks of the PKK terrorist organization.  The 
spokesperson of the "so-called" human shields said that, since 
their demands for the end of violence and oppression found no 
response, they decided to take up arms instead of trying to stop 
the war by going to the operation areas as human shields. 
 
HURRIYET:       Four village guards, who attacked the public 
residences and security directorate of Sirnak's Silopi district 
in 1995 with their state registered arms, have been convicted 
and sentenced to life in prison. 
REID