Ece Temelkuran, Turkish Author HARDtalk

Welcome to HARDtalk. I'm Stephen Sackur.

Two months ago, Turkey's elected government managed to survive

Not necessarily - not if you regard freedom of expression

and an independent judiciary as prerequisites of

Thousands of judges, journalists, civil servants have been locked up

My guest today is Ece Temelkuran, a prominent writer and journalist

who knows how difficult it can be to speak out in Erdogan's Turkey.

Thank you for having me. Let's start with what is happening in Turkey

today and has been happening for the last couple of months. As everything

that happened since that attended crew, as taken you by surprise or

not width the coup, it did. But the things that happened afterwards, not

really -- attempted that matter. Because everybody is talking about

if this was a staged act or not, or if it was a real coup attempt. Your

view? I think it was a real coup attempt. When things don't go the

way we think they go, the one who benefit from the incident is the one

who creates the incident. That rule does not really apply every time in

middle eastern countries. People thought since the president is

benefiting from the situation, he might have staged this act, which

was not the case, I think. His political career has been built on

this turning crashes into opportunities. It was not surprising

that he would try to restrict them himself even more after the coup,

which is legitimate in many people's eyes at the moment. -- crisis. You

use that interesting phrase, turning a crisis into an opportunity. Sorry

to interrupt. I do it all the time. I am just trying to set some rules

in the hope you don't do it. His political career started at a

certain point when he was in prison, and when he was out of the prison,

he was a very strong leader already. From that time going on throughout

his career, he did a similar thing and turned crises into

opportunities, which is brilliant. You made a point several times of

repeating a pump, in 1997, after a very complex moment in Turkish

political history -- poem. Another attempted coup of a sort. President

Erdogan addressed a crowd while under pressure, and he said the

minarets our bayonets, the domes our helmets, the mosque is our barracks,

the divine army await our faith. Because you regard that as such a

seminal moment, is a true therefore to say the you believe President

Erdogan's career has been something where from the beginning he has been

a man on a mission and a mission which involves authoritarianism in

the name of Islam? I have been a critic of this government from the

very beginning. I am not one of those who love this government in

the beginning and all of a sudden understood there were frittering

inclinations in this regime. -- authoritarian. I would say it was

significant and obvious, it was apparent from the beginning. When

you know Turkish history, it was supposed to be so. This government

was supposed to be authoritarian. We have to go back to the 1980 coup,

which all of the leftists and progressive people created millions

of exiles and imprisonments, torture cases and so on. You were left with

very strong conservative society, their much a conservative society

and a strong right-wing politics. I would say when you look throughout

time, this government was, this Turkey, has been the outcome of the

1980 coup. They are different brands of authoritarianism introduces true.

Every brand. -- in Turkish history. Here are a few figures. 130 media

organisations shut down since the coup. 45 newspapers, 29 publishing

houses, radio stations, 16 television stations, magazines,

three news agencies, they have all been in one way or another

interfered with or intervene with or shut down by the Turkish government.

The liberal secular side of Turkish politics is saying this is worse,

the repression is worse then we saw with the military dictatorships. Do

you say that? It is tragic that we have these two options only, either

military dictatorship or this kind of operation. -- oppression. I don't

want to make a comparison. Why not? Because it is not the only option,

these are not the only options. They are the two strands of your history

so it is easy to make a comparison. I wonder if you don't want to

because... Is like no, it is not. There are many dichotomies repeated

the mainstream media. It is either military people or conservative

right-wing religious authoritarian regime. That is not a right way of

looking at things. It assumes that military is secular and therefore

against the religious movement. It is not like that. In the 1980 coup,

it was the first time the military approved the brigade free religious

lessons in Turkey. Actually, the military authority approved and

supported actively the religious movements and the other two ago when

-- Fethullah Gulen, which is supposedly responsible for this

coup. Right now, Turks are being encouraged by the government to make

a binary choice. President Erdogan is essentially using the language of

George W Bush after 9- 11. You are either with us or against us. He is

representing the state, democracy and the survival of a great Turkey.

He says those against whom are enemies of the state and traitors.

Whose side are you on? I am trying to BB story teller and not to take

sides, I want to tell the whole story, the entire story. Once you

take one side, you don't hear the other side, and more importantly,

the other side does not hear you. There is no room, in order to

respect. It is an extremely polarised society -- in all due

respect. All sites have been hating each other, and that hurts turns to

disgust. People don't want to see the other cohabit with the other.

That is a very dangerous thing. You rather neatly dodged my whose side

are you on question. I will come back to it. You have a history with

present anyone. In 2012, you were a prominent correspondent with the

Haberturk newspaper and wrote vitriolic columns ticking on

President Erdogan directly. -- taking on. You addressing directly

and say, so you give the orders, my commander, but I am not listening to

you any more. We are the rest of this country. We will not listen to

your orders any more. In President Erdogan's mine, that probably sounds

like in a sense you are pre-empting the coup, questioning... You are

putting ideas in people's minds. It was years ago. Secondly, it was not

about President Erdogan, it was about the massacre that happened on

the border that accidentally killed a dozen kids. You say we are the

rest of the country. Because of that article, and a 32nd telephone

call... You were fired, tracked down. You have continued writing and

you have a prominent voice in and out of Turkey. But it is

extraordinarily difficult to navigate right now. Absolutely. One

thing I feel like pointing out something, this is the new fashion

in media now. Being against us. It started after the uprising. Before

that uprising, all of these people who are now criticising's, most of

the intellectuals and journalists, they were praising this Turkish

model. After the uprising, it it is all over the place. They are acting

as if President Erdogan is the mother of all evil. He moved from

being the Democrat, moderate Islamist, to be authoritarian. You

would be surprised but I think it is unfair to him. There was something

wrong with the model, not the man. Nobody takes the time to think about

what was wrong with that model. You are saying it was naive and wrong to

ever think there was this thing called moderate Islam. Is that what

you are saying? It is not that which I am saying. It is this fantasy of

perfect marriage within democracy and moderate Islam, it was lacking

vision. In a sense, I want to get personal. We have talked about the

difficulty of navigating as a writer and journalist in today's post coup

Turkey, and God knows it is difficult. Have you had to dial back

on what you write? Are you constantly aware with every word

that leaves your computer that you could be running a very personal

risk? This has been my story for the last 20 years, which, you know, is

my entire writing life. There are hundreds of journalists locked up

right now, many new friends and colleagues of yours. But surely

meant you can't say what you want to say any more. This is not new

fertility to start with, but it is true that it has become more

worrying at the moment -- new for Turkey. Yes, I do feel concerned. To

give the British understatement. LAUGHTER

You are still based in Istanbul. Yes, I am. I have another place in

Zagreb, I bought it a few years ago because it is not only the

oppression and Turkey being threatening, the turbulent times

paralyse you. You are intellectually paralysed in such a turbulent

country. Sometimes I need some peace of mind, so I go to Zagreb to write.

You have written movingly about sometimes the way you feel about

Turkey, the homeland. One phrase I remember about you feeling almost

like a relationship with a lover, a lover that is you so badly and so

deeply, and I just wonder if you believe that the relationship

between you and your homeland, is that amount of hurt is there, can be

repaired? This as being going on since the establishment of this

country. Since the state. The state is never being compassionate towards

people like me. Towards people who tell the real and entire story of

the country. I mentioned almost all of them in the book. The very

important ones at least. The greatest poet in Turkish literature,

and another great poet in Turkish Language. All of these names either

have been imprisoned, tortured, exiled, you know, whatever you want.

So this state has been quite massless against those children that

loved him most -- mercilessly stop is that because you are out of tune

and out of step with most Turks? Therefore it is easy to isolate you

and to try to pin you down and in a sense, to silence you?

No country loves their children if they are children is constantly

talking about the negativity is of the country. It is not about Turkey,

it goes for many countries and many societies. I am a writer. It isn't

easy to like a writer who writes about political stuff. And you talk

about subjects that Turkey as a state, not just any government, but

at the state has declared to be off limits, like the army and genocide.

You have taken it on in a way most writers refuse to because they know

it could lead to their being locked up. You've also taken on the human

rights situation in the Kurdish areas of Turkey, repeatedly. I think

you would probably call yourself a feminist in a way that upset some

Turks. Yes. The human rights defender. I am not really a

defender, I am trying to move to the storytelling part. I am trying to be

more on the storytelling part. In all these cases you mentioned,

Armenian issues, the Kurdish question and so on and so forth, all

of them I want to tell the entire story. In the Armenian case, for

instance, I thought the term genocide stopped the conversation

between Turkish and Armenian people, so I try to find another way to tell

the story without mentioning that word and to tell the pain of

Armenian people to Turkish people and vice-versa. For Kurdish people I

tried to bring those people as human beings for the people in the western

Turkey to see the story. Because I am this naive person who thinks that

once you know the story you can understand the person. Against that

you betray a Turkish society which in some way seems to be determined,

not just because of government instruction, but collectively

determined to forget to be silent. -- you portray. You talk about the

Dubai-isation, where as long as people have access to shopping

centres and converts they can sort or forget all of the polarisations

and divisions within their country. Is that the weight you feel about

Turkey today? Turkey is, the cliched definition, that Turkey is the place

between Asia and Europe. So once you are on a bridge you feel like

passing through it, not really staying on it. So I always thought

that Turkey has been hurrying up, rushing history, let's say, to cross

the bridge. The ideology in the beginning was to cross the bridge to

the western side, where is in this new Turkey the idea was to cross to

the other side, to eastern side. You strike me as a deeply westernised

Turk. Is that how you see yourself? I am pretty much middle eastern in

my emotional world, but if we talk about realities I am kind of Weston,

I think. I want to bring it back to politics, you would be delighted to

know. I want to bring it back to Erdogan and your critique of him,

which you would suggest makes his talk of democracy illegitimate, and

yet the truth is that according to all of the evidence in Turkey today

he is more popular and his government is more popular today

than it has ever been. More than two thirds of Turks appear to willingly,

voluntarily, support President Erdogan. How does that fit in your

picture? First of all, I told you before and I repeat it again, this

book is not about Mr Erdogan and I am not personally criticising Mr

Erdogan. I am talking about the system, the ideas, the ideologies

and so forth. Let's put that aside. Democracy is a funny thing. Once you

define it as just... As the ballot boxes, then you can get anything you

want. But then it is not only ballot boxes, it's unions, foundations,

civil society and so on and so forth. Would you draw a parallel

between Mr Erdogan today and Vladimir Putin, in Russia? I think

there's a trend the world and you are going to go through that as

well, I think, in Britain. There is a trend of order -- orderism. Having

Putin, in France they are having right-wing parties, in Austria as

well, so this is a trend. And I think it represents the crisis of

democracy for the entire world and that's why Turkey is important.

That's why Europe has to pay more attention to Turkey, because if the

Turkish democracy gets damaged, I think that might have a domino

effect in Europe and you will see the right-wing parties in Europe

will rise with the same discourse, the same arguments, that have been

used in Turkey. You seem quite disillusioned with the way Western

powers have looked at Turkey in recent years and you seem to believe

they have consistently misunderstood what is happening. Not really. I

think they chose to believe in this project, the Turkish model, because

it fit the requirements of the world. What do you mean, the

moderate idea, that Erdogan could be the effective bridge between Western

ideology and the Arab world? Yes, especially after the fears of 9/11.

By the way, I am feeling like the guinea pig of a failed experiment, a

massive scale experiment, and most people feel the same way. In Egypt,

people who went to Tahrir Square, almost the same thing. What, a sense

of betrayal? Not betrayal, you are asking about the west and my

disillusionment. I think they refuse to talk to secular parts of society

and politics and they were still enthusiastic for a decade, so

enthusiastic about this project. So they fell for the narrative of the

secularism of these countries, the elites, they are oppressive and they

are pressing the real people of Turkey, or the real people of the

country and so on. I think all these people, all these intellectuals and

writers, they should show the same enthusiasm now when they connect,

communicate, with the secular part of the society. We view, you mean.

What happens to you now? With you. You say from time to time you feel

intellectually paralysed and you have to get out. Do you think you

will end up living... Given that situation... No, God forbid, I don't

want that. It is not an easy thing to talk about. I look at other

journalists and writers and frankly courageous people, as you've said,

who are committed to truth telling and write -- right now in Turkey

that's dangerous exercise. I am not a courageous person. I am a perfect

coward. Callard? -- cow would? The things you have written? I am a

serious coward. Usually this programme doesn't work like that.

You say you are courageous and I say you are not. No, this is how I deal

with life. A fierce. I am not a courageous person. Whenever you

bring up imprisonment and so on I go to -- like this. But I don't want to

be defined by courage because that is a lot of weight on one's shoulder

and then introduces you to this person who is courageous. And there

is a funny thing about being in a position, especially in Turkey

nowadays, even though you are oppositional. Whenever the political

power becomes more primitive you are coming more primitive accordingly

and you are turning into this person who says, no! Which doesn't require

much intellectual capacity. That's why I am trying to write the whole

story, that's why I am telling that Turkey's story is far bigger than

the current government and current issues. It is interesting you say

this. My last question is this, we do you feel you will move away from

the sort of daily diet of commentary and columns and journalism and more

towards your fiction, maybe more allegorical stuff, where the tension

with the state and the government is less of a daily pressure? Yes.

Because journalism, or articles, daily articles, are more mediocre,

in a way. Compared to literature. When you write literature you write

these big books, so all these people who want to hate you have to take

their time and spend energy and they do do that, so they don't see the

politics actually buried in them a mark that basically buried in those

books. That's a great way of putting it. Ece Temelkuran, thank you very

much for being on HARDtalk Thank you.

Tuesday the 13th of September will be a day to remember,

not just because of extreme heat but a day of contrast.