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Tansu Penbe Çiller (Turkish pronunciation: [ˈtansu tʃiˈlːæɾ]; b. May 24, 1946, Istanbul) is a Turkish economist and politician. She was Turkey's first and only female Prime Minister.

Early career[link]

She is the daughter of a Turkish governor of Bilecik province during the 1950s. She graduated from the School of Economics at Robert College after finishing the American College for Girls in Istanbul. She received her M.S. from the University of New Hampshire and Ph.D. from the University of Connecticut. She later completed her postdoctoral studies at Yale University. Çiller taught economics at Franklin and Marshall College in Lancaster, Pennsylvania. In 1978, she became a lecturer at Boğaziçi University in Istanbul and in 1983 she was appointed as professor by the same institution. She also worked in the now-defunct Istanbul Bank as president of the company.

Politics[link]

After teaching at several universities as a professor, Çiller entered politics in November 1990, joining the conservative True Path Party (DYP). She was first elected to the parliament in 1991 as deputy of Istanbul and served as Minister of State in charge of economics in the coalition government of Süleyman Demirel. On June 13, 1993, she became the party's leader and later in the same year, the Prime Minister of a coalition government. She served as prime minister from 1993 to 1996. After the withdrawal of the Republican People's Party (CHP) from the coalition in 1995 she attempted to form a minority government, which failed. After that she agreed to form another cabinet with the CHP and went for general elections.

Çiller also served as Turkey's Foreign Affairs Minister and the vice prime minister between 1996 and 1997.

The EU-Turkey Customs Union agreement was signed in 1995 and came into effect in 1996 during Çiller's government. Çiller was also prime minister during the Imia/Kardak crisis with neighbouring Greece in 1996.

Tansu Çiller is a member of the Council of Women World Leaders, an international network of current and former women presidents and prime ministers whose mission is to mobilize the highest-level women leaders globally for collective action on issues of critical importance to women and equitable development.

As Prime Minister, Çiller declared that if Greece tried to separate Albania, it would have the Turkish Army in Athens 24 hours later.^[1][2]

After her November 2002 election defeat, she retired from political life.

Fight against PKK and controversy[link]

One of Çiller's major achievements was to transform the Turkish Army from an organization using vintage equipment from the US Army into a modern fighting force capable of defeating the PKK, using hit-and-run tactics. She also convinced the U.S. government to list the PKK as a Foreign Terrorist Organization, which was later followed by the acceptance of the same by the European Union.

Çiller declared on 4 October 1993: "We know the list of businessmen and artists subjected to racketeering by the PKK and we shall be bringing their members to account." Beginning on 14 January 1994, almost a hundred people were kidnapped by commandos wearing uniforms and travelling in police vehicles and then killed somewhere along the road from Ankara to Istanbul. Abdullah Catli, a leader of the ultra-nationalist Grey Wolves and an organized crime figure, demanded money from people who were on "Çiller’s list", promising to get their names removed. One of his victims, Behçet Canturk, was to pay ten million dollars, to which Casino King Omer Luftu Topal added a further seventeen million. However, after receiving the money, he then went on to have them kidnapped and killed, and sometimes tortured beforehand.^[3]

After the Susurluk scandal, she praised Catli who was killed during the Susurluk car crash, saying that: "Those who fire bullets or suffer their wounds in the name of this country, this nation, and this state will always be respectfully remembered by us."^[4][5]

She was also investigated by the Turkish Parliament on serious corruption charges following her period in government. Along with another former Prime Minister, Mesut Yılmaz, she was later cleared of all the charges mainly due to technicalities such as the statute of limitations and the political immunity of parliamentarians. At the end of 1998, the corruption files about Yılmaz and Çiller were covered up at the commissions of the Parliament in a common action staged by DYP, ANAP and DSP MPs.^[6]

Personal life[link]

Tansu Çiller is married to Özer Uçuran Çiller and they have two sons, Mert and Berk.

See also[link]

• Roger Tamraz

References[link]

1. ^ "PANGALOS/GR-TURK.RELATIONS". hri.org. http://www.hri.org/news/greek/ant1en/1997/97-06-04.ant1en.html. 
2. ^ ""TURKEY WILL NOT STAY SPECTATOR TOWARDS EFFORTS TO DIVIDE ALBANIA" - declares Tansu Çiller". hri.org. http://www.hri.org/news/balkans/ata/1997/97-03-21.ata.html#11. 
3. ^ Nezan, Kendal (5 July 1998). "Turkey's pivotal role in the international drug trade". Le Monde diplomatique. http://mondediplo.com/1998/07/05turkey. 
4. ^ Lucy Komisar, Turkey's terrorists: a CIA legacy lives on, The Progressive, April 1997.
5. ^ 1998 Report from the Human Rights Foundation of Turkey, chapter II, "SUSURLUK SCANDAL: Counter-guerilla Affairs", p.39-86 (see note p.39)
6. ^ 1998 Report from the Human Rights Foundation of Turkey, p.11

External links[link]

• Biyografi.net - Biography of Tansu Çiller
• Who is Who - Biographies : Prof. Dr. Tansu Çiller
• Appendix A : Turkey and Former Prime Minister Tansu Çiller in State Department Seeks ‘Viable’ Iranian Candidates, by Sibel Edmonds

v t e Foreign Ministers of Turkey Bekir Sami Kunduh Ahmet Muhtar Mollaoğlu Yusuf Kemal Tengirşenk İsmet İnönü Şükrü Kaya Tevfik Rüştü Aras Şükrü Saracoğlu Numan Menemencioğlu Hasan Saka Necmettin Sadak Mehmet Fuat Köprülü Adnan Menderes Fatin Rüştü Zorlu Ethem Menderes Selim Sarper Feridun Cemal Erkin Hasan Esat Işık İhsan Sabri Çağlayangil Osman Olcay Haluk Bayülken Turan Güneş Metin Esenbel Gündüz Ökçün Hayrettin Erkmen Ertuğrul Ekrem Ceyhun İlter Türkmen Vahit Melih Halefoğlu Mesut Yılmaz Ali Bozer Ahmet Kurtcebe Alptemoçin Safa Giray Hikmet Çetin Mümtaz Soysal Murat Karayalçın Erdal İnönü Coşkun Kırca Deniz Baykal Emre Gönensay Tansu Çiller İsmail Cem Şükrü Sina Gürel Yaşar Yakış Abdullah Gül Ali Babacan Ahmet Davutoğlu

Sırrı Süreyya Önder is a Turkish fim director, actor, screen writer, columnist, and an MP elected in the Turkish general election, 2011.^[1][2]

References[link]

This article needs additional citations for verification. Please help improve this article by adding citations to reliable sources. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed. (March 2011)

Necmettin Erbakan
Prime Minister of Turkey
In office June 28, 1996 – June 30, 1997
President	Süleyman Demirel
Vice PM	Tansu Çiller
Preceded by	Mesut Yılmaz
Succeeded by	Mesut Yılmaz
Personal details
Born	(1926-10-29)29 October 1926 Sinop, Turkey
Died	27 February 2011(2011-02-27) (aged 84) Ankara, Turkey
Political party	National Order Party (1970–71) National Salvation Party (1972–1981) Welfare Party (1987–1998) Felicity Party (2003–2011)
Spouse(s)	Nermin Erbakan (m. 1967–2005, her death)
Children	Zeynep, Elif, Fatih
Alma mater	Istanbul Technical University, RWTH Aachen University
Religion	Sunni Islam

Necmettin Erbakan (29 October 1926 – 27 February 2011) was a Turkish engineer, academic, politician (eventually political party leader), who was the Prime Minister of Turkey from 1996 until 1997. He was Turkey's first Islamist Prime Minister. In 1997 he was pressured by the military to step down as prime minister and later banned from politics by the constitutional court.^[1][2]

Early life and education[link]

Erbakan was born in Sinop, at the coast of Black Sea in northern Turkey.^[3] His father was Mehmet Sabri, a judge from the prestigious Kozanoğlu clan (Oghuz Turks, Afshar tribe) of Cilicia and his mother Kamer was a native of Sinop and second wife of Mehmet Sabri.^[4]

After the high school education in Istanbul High School, he graduated from the Mechanical Engineering Faculty at the Istanbul Technical University in 1948 with a GPA of 4.00/4.00, and received a PhD degree from the RWTH Aachen University, Germany.^[3] After returning to Turkey, Erbakan became lecturer at the İTÜ and was appointed professor in 1965 at the same university.^[3] After working some time in leading position in the industry, he switched over to politics, and was elected deputy of Konya in 1969.^[3]

As well as his political career, Erbakan had his success in mechanical engineering and has invented several devices^{[clarification needed]}.

Political activities[link]

Erbakan's ideology is set forth in a manifesto, entitled Millî Görüş (National View), which he published in 1969.^[3] The Islamist organisation of the same name, which he founded and of which he was the leader,^[5] upholds nowadays that the word "national" is to be understood in the sense of monotheistic ecumenism.^[6][7]

One the leading names in Turkish politics for decades, Erbakan was the leader of a series of Islamist political parties that he founded or inspired. These parties rose to prominence only to be banned by Turkey's secular authorities. In the 1970s, Erbakan was chairman of the National Salvation Party which, at its peak, served in coalition with the Republican People's Party of Prime Minister Bülent Ecevit during the Cyprus crisis of 1974.^[3]

In the wake of the 1980 military coup, Erbakan and his party were banned from politics.^[3] He reemerged following a referendum to lift the ban in 1987 and became the leader of Refah Partisi (Welfare Party).^[3] His party benefited in the 1990s from the acrimony between the leaders of Turkey's two most prominent conservative parties, Mesut Yılmaz and Tansu Çiller. He led his party to a surprise success in the general elections of 1995.

Prime Ministership[link]

He became Prime Minister in 1996 in coalition with Çiller's Doğru Yol Partisi (Correct Path Party). As prime minister, he attempted to further Turkey's relations with the Arab nations.^[3] In addition to trying to follow an economic welfare program, which was supposedly intended to increase welfare among Turkish citizens, the government tried to implement multi-dimensional political approach to relations with the neighboring countries.

Erbakan's image was damaged by his famous speech making fun of the nightly demonstrations against the Susurluk scandal. Even though his government had no responsibility for the scandal^{[citation needed]}, he was nevertheless widely^{[weasel words]}blamed at the time for his indifference. The Turkish military gradually increased the harshness^{[clarification needed]} and frequency of its public warnings to Erbakan's government, eventually prompting Erbakan to step down 1997^{[citation needed]}.

At the time there was a formal deal between Prime Minister Erbakan, and the leader of Doğru Yol, Tansu Ciller, for a "period based premiership"^{[citation needed]}. According to this, Erbakan was to act as the Prime Minister for a certain period (a fixed amount of time, which was not publicized), then he would step down in favour of Tansu Ciller. However, Ciller's party was the third in the parliament, and when Erbakan stepped down, President Süleyman Demirel asked Mesut Yılmaz, leader of the second-biggest party, to form a new government. Since this whole act was after the infamous 28 February 1997 National Security Council meeting orchestrated by the military^{[citation needed]}(who was against the Erbakan government), this has been claimed as a "postmodern coup" by some^[8][who?].

Post-PM[link]

Erbakan's ruling Welfare Party was subsequently banned by the courts, who judged that the party had an agenda to promote Islamic fundamentalism in the state, and Erbakan was barred once again from active politics.^[9]

Despite often being under political ban, Erbakan nonetheless acted as a mentor and informal advisor to former Refah members who founded the Virtue Party in 1997. The Virtue Party was found unconstitutional in 2001 and banned; by that time Erbakan's ban on political activities had ended and he founded the Felicity Party, of which he was the leader in 2003–2004 and again from 2010^[10] till his death.

Death[link]

Grave of Necmettin Erbakan and his family at Merkezefendi Cemetery in Istanbul

Erbakan died on 27 February 2011 at 11:40 local time of heart failure at Güven Hospital in Çankaya, Ankara.^[11]

His body was transferred to Istanbul, and following the religious funeral service at the Fatih Mosque, the attending crowd accompanied his coffin the about 4 km (2.5 mi) way to the Merkezefendi Cemetery, where he was laid to rest beside his wife Nermin. He did not wish a state funeral, however his funeral was attended by highest state and government officials.^[12]

Views[link]

His foreign policy had two main pillars: Close cooperation and unity among Muslim countries and struggle against Zionism. He created "D-8" or The Developing Eight, to achieve a strong economic and political unity among Muslim countries. It has eight members including Turkey, Iran, Malaysia, Indonesia, Egypt, Bangladesh, Pakistan and Nigeria. These countries constitute around 14% of the world's population, with a total of more than 800 million people.^[13][14][15]

References[link]

External links[link]

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Necmettin Erbakan

• Biography of Necmeddin ERBAKAN
• Official Website of Prime Minister of the Republic of Turkey (Turkish)
• Felicity Party website (Turkish)
• Erbakan Died (Turkish)