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JOBLESS TEENAGERS GOING TO AND FRO ON UZUN STREET
MuhsÝn Ozturk Trabzon
Today's Zaman, Turkey
Feb 6 2007
The center of Trabzon has two main streets. One of these streets is
called Uzun (Long) Street. This is a place where last year two people
had their throats cut over a battle for illegal drugs.
This is also a place where the shop centers of famous brands like
Lacoste are located, where in the evenings there is a huge crowd of
people walking, where jobless but proud young people wander around,
and where the best cafes are available. The bombing of McDonalds
happened just a few blocks away, the TAYAD incidents also took place
right here. Few in number, but strong in their effect, all of these
events occurred in an area of 200 meters wide and 500 meters long.
Interestingly enough, this is also a place where a young lady can
stay out late at night and spend time with her friends.
A group of undergraduate students wanted to to stage a protest march;
however, they were stopped from doing this when they met with verbal
opposition from local merchants. It looks like this natural tendency to
do this on the part of local store owners has gained the dimension of
nationalism over the recent years. Trabzon people were the top choice
some 30 years ago when the government of the time sought reliable
people to put in Turkish Cyprus or in Imbros, said Eyup Aþýk. After
Mehmet Ali Talat, the president of Turkish Cyprus, was invited to
the city, the local news media ran news items with headlines reading
"The man who betrayed Cyprus." This became a hindrance to his trip
to Trabzon. As may be known, Patriarch Bartolomeos was not allowed
to take a trip to the city. The local news media certainly plays a
crucial role in all this. A university professor here described the
local news media as acting like a judge in a court of law.
What if Trabzon were a metropolis...
Contrary to popular belief, TAYAD and other groups believed to be
extremely leftist are not influential in Trabzon at all. Those groups
consist of young people who came not from eastern Turkey but from other
cities. It was interesting to note that when a group of people chanted
"Fascists out!" on the campus of Karadeniz Technical University in
protest of recent incidents, the number of protesters was almost
equal to that of reporters. One day before Hrant Dink was laid to
rest, a group of people from Trabzon community centers gathered on a
platform set out in the square to protest the killing of Dink. There
was very little public reaction to this group of people. A joint
statement from those who put their views about violence on paper,
however, read as follows: "We are against racism and violence, and
we are not supporters of such tendencies.
Nonetheless, we are displeased with verbal expressions of protest at
Hrant Dink's assassination such as 'We're all Armenian' since we are
not at all Armenian'."
A televised discussion on a local satellite television station saw a
request from one of the speakers to have Trabzon accorded the status
of a "metropolis." Some among the speakers only smiled to show their
surprise at the idea. "On such a day..." they were heard as saying.
Famous though it may be, Trabzon is not a metropolis. Trabzon looks
like a place where 250,000 people are confined to live, confined
between the sea and mountainous areas. M. Volkan Canalioðlu, the
mayor from the main opposition Republican People's Party, pointed to
an increase in this confinement in recent years. "In recent years,
Trabzon has been experiencing a trend of reverse immigration -- people
coming into the city rather than going out. And this is increasing
the problem of unemployment," he said. Canalioðlu has the names of
3,000 unemployed people recorded in his own notebooks.
Failure to get a job is leading jobless people to illegal acts, said
the mayor, adding that when officials try to stop jobless people
involved in criminal acts, they hear the objections like "Shall we
live in hunger? Shall we resort to robbery?"
The city people have another subject to discuss. Though this is a
subject of discussion at international levels, the local people here
are curious to hear news about it. This is a topic first brought out by
the United States prior to the rejection in the Turkish Parliament of
a resolution on March 1, 2003. Future plans to build a military base
in Trabzon are closely related to the post-Cold War transformation
that the Black Sea region underwent. The Black Sea was no longer a
sea closed to its external neighbors after the Soviet Union died;
it is no longer dominated by the Soviets alone. The fact that the
Black Sea region holds world-wide appeal stems from its strategic
position where new energy routes meet. The position of the Black
Sea region as a point of transition, both east-west and north-south,
is gaining significance. Hence Trabzon...
When Turgut Ozal was in power in the early 1990s, the Turkish
government laid the initial groundwork for the formation of a
Trabzon-based Organization of Black Sea Economic Cooperation. It was
aimed at "filling in the blanks" in and around the Black Sea region.
As the United States is raising its request via NATO again to have
a military base built in Trabzon, the locals cannot help but ask why
the Black Sea region has become so important. Does the United States
seek a way to use Trabzon as a base from where it can launch a war
against Iran?
Doubtlessly, these questions will have to remain unanswered for the
moment, just as the question remains as to who was behind the two young
Trabzon people who murdered two important figures over the last year...
The pulse of Pelitli Pelitli was a small village until 1995, when its
population of 30,000 helped convert it to a small town. The initial
residential areas in Pelitli are houses that were built after Pelitli
was hit by floods.
It is a place where gray in its different tones can be seen dominating
the foreground of walls and where disjointed buildings are located here
and there. "A large proportion of the local budget is being allocated
to the houses that were built after the floods," said Omer Kayýkcý,
the local mayor. It is even obvious from a look out at the streets, at
the apartment stairs and at the jobless young people that poverty is a
big social concern here. A police car acts as regional security. None
of the government officials has ever asked him for information about
the murderer(s) of Hrant Dink, said Kayýkcý. Kayýkcý thinks of Internet
cafes as being far more dangerous than casinos because Internet cafes
can host anybody, from any age group.
The Pelitli people are asking for a solution to unemployment. The
chances for employment have not increased in the least, though over
the past decade the population reached 30,000 or so, said Abdulkadir
Býyýk. The local population comes largely from surrounding villages,
said Býyýk. "High school graduates will not work out in the field
because they left their villages in the hope of finding better
conditions, but their plans turned out to be unsuccessful." Býyýk
is not establishing a direct link between unemployment and the fact
that the murderer of Hrant Dink is someone from Pelitli; however,
he thinks it far more likely for a jobless person to be enticed into
crime. "I have six kids. I only allow them to travel to and from school
in order to prevent them from getting involved in a criminal act."
Pelitli is not rich in terms of its facilities for social activities.
The absence of such facilities has led to the creation of Internet
cafes, considered just as bad as narcotics. Býyýk thinks it probable
that further problems might arise if prompt action is not taken.
Local friends of Ogun Samast said they would not have expected him
to commit murder; however, their attitude towards the murder was not
serious. They put the reason behind the murder as a need of money.
After much talk, Bahattin, Tuncay, Ali Ýhsan and Cengiz all said words
that one is most likely to hear in similar situations: "Trabzon is
being projected as an evil place. The people of Trabzon are sending
their sons to southeastern Turkey, where they may be killed, but they
are shown no respect at all." These people know neither Hrant Dink nor
his writings. All voiced their objection to slogans that read "We are
all Hrant Dink." They portrayed a picture of Ogun Samast as someone
who would be in the forefront, who is easily provoked, and who would
try to prove himself capable, especially when he heard a statement to
the contrary. For Yasin Hayal, their picture is brighter: He is a man
who would die for his nation. Yasin Hayal has already become a legend.
The worn-out shoes of Hrant Dink were engraved in people's minds as
they appeared after he was gunned down. Havva Samast, Ogun Samast's
mother, could not help but cry when she saw Hrant Dink lying dead
on the street, covered with a sheet of newspaper. Havva Hamast even
fainted on Tuesday when Rakel Dink gave an emotional address to the
crowd waiting outside the Agos office for the funeral of Hrant Dink.
When we knocked on the door of Ogun Samast's family, a neighbor opened
the door, saying, "Please stay away from us."
Ersin Yolcu, 26, who was arrested in connection with the Hrant
Dink murder, is also living in the same district. "He was so kind
to creatures that we could not even have him kill a chicken," said
Nebahat Yolcu of his son. Mrs. Yolcu said further of his son that he
would not stay out late and would come home before 8 p.m. "If I had
known about this before, I would not have even allowed him to say
hello to Ogun Samast," said Mrs. Yolcu. After Ersin Yolcu finished
his military service, he could not find a decent job. He only found
menial jobs for very short periods of time, and he could barely make
any money. Tahsin Yucel, the father, said he had no idea why his son
got arrested. "I don't have enough money to go to Istanbul and see
him," he said. When Hrant Dink was gunned down, Ersin was home and
showed no reaction to it, said Mrs. Yolcu. "It's a pity that Hrant
Dink was killed. Neither my son nor me know him. He was arrested
on Saturday. Since then, we are really in great sorrow. None of us
except him has ever been to a police station." While Ogun and Ersin
are living in upper Pelitli, Yasin Hayal is living in lower Pelitli.
'A romantic bomber' This is a headline that appeared on a local
newspaper's front page to describe Yasin Hayal. Hayal bombed a
McDonald's building; he bombed the building of a political party; he
told the police that a bomb was planted on an airplane carrying Prime
Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoðan; and he is now seen as the mastermind
of Hrant Dink's assassination.
And he learned how to make a bomb from his search on the Internet,
and tried them along with weapons used after Trabzonspor won a
football game.
While Hayal was being tried for his connections to the bombing of
McDonald's, Erhan Tuncel, a man believed to be a superior of Hayal's,
would loiter near the courtroom, said Hayal's older brother Osman
Hayal. "While Yasin was being tried in court, Erhan would approach
the courtroom. When my mother asked him why he didn't enter, he would
immediately go away."
Yasin Hayal's parents confirmed rumors that he frequently met with
Erhan Yolcu. Now we have the following questions: Is Erhan Yolcu a
supporter of a particular group? Does Yasin Hayal know that Erhan
Yolcu has connections to an illegal group? Why did they commit this
murder? Which group is Erhan Yolcu supporting?
'There's not only one Ogun Samast' Who could have known that one of
our last talks with him would also be his last talk with us? When we
were writing this article, we heard that both the chief of police
in Trabzon and Trabzon Governor Huseyin Yavuzdemir were had been
removed from their positions. Statements from a senior official
who spent the last two-and-a-half years as the governor of Trabzon,
a city that has been in the spotlight, are quite important.
Yavuzdemir declined to accept claims that there had been a failure
on the part of the police to keep track of information about the
murderers. "It is only after a court issues a decision that people can
be tracked by the police. When a person is put under police observation
but that person makes a complaint about being kept under surveillance,
the police are at fault. A judge would ask for sound reasons to issue
a decision to put a man under surveillance. Nobody can be put under
police observation if a judge cannot be given sound reasons to do
so." Yavuzdemir linked failure to control Internet cafes to this.
It is obvious from the recent incidents that missionaries are being
used as a matter of propaganda. Yavuzdemir said that during the period
of time he was in Trabzon, he sometimes heard complaints from the
local people about missionaries; however, he did not know of any one
Muslim who had converted to Christianity. Yavuzdemir put the problem
as resulting from a lack of attention to the proper education of young
people and from a weakening in family ties. "There is not only one Ogun
Samast. There are several Ogun Samasts whose families are all split
up." Yavuzdemir also reacted to calls from the media for a military
intervention to take control of Trabzon and said that anything of this
kind would be absolutely pointless and would definitely insult the
people of Trabzon. Yavuzdemir further said that efforts to create a
bad image of Trabzon could be part of a project to allow the Kurdistan
Workers' Party (PKK) to gain influence in the region.
--Boundary_(ID_pEWIQp9wG7gbfeh9FhAlzw)--
MuhsÝn Ozturk Trabzon
Today's Zaman, Turkey
Feb 6 2007
The center of Trabzon has two main streets. One of these streets is
called Uzun (Long) Street. This is a place where last year two people
had their throats cut over a battle for illegal drugs.
This is also a place where the shop centers of famous brands like
Lacoste are located, where in the evenings there is a huge crowd of
people walking, where jobless but proud young people wander around,
and where the best cafes are available. The bombing of McDonalds
happened just a few blocks away, the TAYAD incidents also took place
right here. Few in number, but strong in their effect, all of these
events occurred in an area of 200 meters wide and 500 meters long.
Interestingly enough, this is also a place where a young lady can
stay out late at night and spend time with her friends.
A group of undergraduate students wanted to to stage a protest march;
however, they were stopped from doing this when they met with verbal
opposition from local merchants. It looks like this natural tendency to
do this on the part of local store owners has gained the dimension of
nationalism over the recent years. Trabzon people were the top choice
some 30 years ago when the government of the time sought reliable
people to put in Turkish Cyprus or in Imbros, said Eyup Aþýk. After
Mehmet Ali Talat, the president of Turkish Cyprus, was invited to
the city, the local news media ran news items with headlines reading
"The man who betrayed Cyprus." This became a hindrance to his trip
to Trabzon. As may be known, Patriarch Bartolomeos was not allowed
to take a trip to the city. The local news media certainly plays a
crucial role in all this. A university professor here described the
local news media as acting like a judge in a court of law.
What if Trabzon were a metropolis...
Contrary to popular belief, TAYAD and other groups believed to be
extremely leftist are not influential in Trabzon at all. Those groups
consist of young people who came not from eastern Turkey but from other
cities. It was interesting to note that when a group of people chanted
"Fascists out!" on the campus of Karadeniz Technical University in
protest of recent incidents, the number of protesters was almost
equal to that of reporters. One day before Hrant Dink was laid to
rest, a group of people from Trabzon community centers gathered on a
platform set out in the square to protest the killing of Dink. There
was very little public reaction to this group of people. A joint
statement from those who put their views about violence on paper,
however, read as follows: "We are against racism and violence, and
we are not supporters of such tendencies.
Nonetheless, we are displeased with verbal expressions of protest at
Hrant Dink's assassination such as 'We're all Armenian' since we are
not at all Armenian'."
A televised discussion on a local satellite television station saw a
request from one of the speakers to have Trabzon accorded the status
of a "metropolis." Some among the speakers only smiled to show their
surprise at the idea. "On such a day..." they were heard as saying.
Famous though it may be, Trabzon is not a metropolis. Trabzon looks
like a place where 250,000 people are confined to live, confined
between the sea and mountainous areas. M. Volkan Canalioðlu, the
mayor from the main opposition Republican People's Party, pointed to
an increase in this confinement in recent years. "In recent years,
Trabzon has been experiencing a trend of reverse immigration -- people
coming into the city rather than going out. And this is increasing
the problem of unemployment," he said. Canalioðlu has the names of
3,000 unemployed people recorded in his own notebooks.
Failure to get a job is leading jobless people to illegal acts, said
the mayor, adding that when officials try to stop jobless people
involved in criminal acts, they hear the objections like "Shall we
live in hunger? Shall we resort to robbery?"
The city people have another subject to discuss. Though this is a
subject of discussion at international levels, the local people here
are curious to hear news about it. This is a topic first brought out by
the United States prior to the rejection in the Turkish Parliament of
a resolution on March 1, 2003. Future plans to build a military base
in Trabzon are closely related to the post-Cold War transformation
that the Black Sea region underwent. The Black Sea was no longer a
sea closed to its external neighbors after the Soviet Union died;
it is no longer dominated by the Soviets alone. The fact that the
Black Sea region holds world-wide appeal stems from its strategic
position where new energy routes meet. The position of the Black
Sea region as a point of transition, both east-west and north-south,
is gaining significance. Hence Trabzon...
When Turgut Ozal was in power in the early 1990s, the Turkish
government laid the initial groundwork for the formation of a
Trabzon-based Organization of Black Sea Economic Cooperation. It was
aimed at "filling in the blanks" in and around the Black Sea region.
As the United States is raising its request via NATO again to have
a military base built in Trabzon, the locals cannot help but ask why
the Black Sea region has become so important. Does the United States
seek a way to use Trabzon as a base from where it can launch a war
against Iran?
Doubtlessly, these questions will have to remain unanswered for the
moment, just as the question remains as to who was behind the two young
Trabzon people who murdered two important figures over the last year...
The pulse of Pelitli Pelitli was a small village until 1995, when its
population of 30,000 helped convert it to a small town. The initial
residential areas in Pelitli are houses that were built after Pelitli
was hit by floods.
It is a place where gray in its different tones can be seen dominating
the foreground of walls and where disjointed buildings are located here
and there. "A large proportion of the local budget is being allocated
to the houses that were built after the floods," said Omer Kayýkcý,
the local mayor. It is even obvious from a look out at the streets, at
the apartment stairs and at the jobless young people that poverty is a
big social concern here. A police car acts as regional security. None
of the government officials has ever asked him for information about
the murderer(s) of Hrant Dink, said Kayýkcý. Kayýkcý thinks of Internet
cafes as being far more dangerous than casinos because Internet cafes
can host anybody, from any age group.
The Pelitli people are asking for a solution to unemployment. The
chances for employment have not increased in the least, though over
the past decade the population reached 30,000 or so, said Abdulkadir
Býyýk. The local population comes largely from surrounding villages,
said Býyýk. "High school graduates will not work out in the field
because they left their villages in the hope of finding better
conditions, but their plans turned out to be unsuccessful." Býyýk
is not establishing a direct link between unemployment and the fact
that the murderer of Hrant Dink is someone from Pelitli; however,
he thinks it far more likely for a jobless person to be enticed into
crime. "I have six kids. I only allow them to travel to and from school
in order to prevent them from getting involved in a criminal act."
Pelitli is not rich in terms of its facilities for social activities.
The absence of such facilities has led to the creation of Internet
cafes, considered just as bad as narcotics. Býyýk thinks it probable
that further problems might arise if prompt action is not taken.
Local friends of Ogun Samast said they would not have expected him
to commit murder; however, their attitude towards the murder was not
serious. They put the reason behind the murder as a need of money.
After much talk, Bahattin, Tuncay, Ali Ýhsan and Cengiz all said words
that one is most likely to hear in similar situations: "Trabzon is
being projected as an evil place. The people of Trabzon are sending
their sons to southeastern Turkey, where they may be killed, but they
are shown no respect at all." These people know neither Hrant Dink nor
his writings. All voiced their objection to slogans that read "We are
all Hrant Dink." They portrayed a picture of Ogun Samast as someone
who would be in the forefront, who is easily provoked, and who would
try to prove himself capable, especially when he heard a statement to
the contrary. For Yasin Hayal, their picture is brighter: He is a man
who would die for his nation. Yasin Hayal has already become a legend.
The worn-out shoes of Hrant Dink were engraved in people's minds as
they appeared after he was gunned down. Havva Samast, Ogun Samast's
mother, could not help but cry when she saw Hrant Dink lying dead
on the street, covered with a sheet of newspaper. Havva Hamast even
fainted on Tuesday when Rakel Dink gave an emotional address to the
crowd waiting outside the Agos office for the funeral of Hrant Dink.
When we knocked on the door of Ogun Samast's family, a neighbor opened
the door, saying, "Please stay away from us."
Ersin Yolcu, 26, who was arrested in connection with the Hrant
Dink murder, is also living in the same district. "He was so kind
to creatures that we could not even have him kill a chicken," said
Nebahat Yolcu of his son. Mrs. Yolcu said further of his son that he
would not stay out late and would come home before 8 p.m. "If I had
known about this before, I would not have even allowed him to say
hello to Ogun Samast," said Mrs. Yolcu. After Ersin Yolcu finished
his military service, he could not find a decent job. He only found
menial jobs for very short periods of time, and he could barely make
any money. Tahsin Yucel, the father, said he had no idea why his son
got arrested. "I don't have enough money to go to Istanbul and see
him," he said. When Hrant Dink was gunned down, Ersin was home and
showed no reaction to it, said Mrs. Yolcu. "It's a pity that Hrant
Dink was killed. Neither my son nor me know him. He was arrested
on Saturday. Since then, we are really in great sorrow. None of us
except him has ever been to a police station." While Ogun and Ersin
are living in upper Pelitli, Yasin Hayal is living in lower Pelitli.
'A romantic bomber' This is a headline that appeared on a local
newspaper's front page to describe Yasin Hayal. Hayal bombed a
McDonald's building; he bombed the building of a political party; he
told the police that a bomb was planted on an airplane carrying Prime
Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoðan; and he is now seen as the mastermind
of Hrant Dink's assassination.
And he learned how to make a bomb from his search on the Internet,
and tried them along with weapons used after Trabzonspor won a
football game.
While Hayal was being tried for his connections to the bombing of
McDonald's, Erhan Tuncel, a man believed to be a superior of Hayal's,
would loiter near the courtroom, said Hayal's older brother Osman
Hayal. "While Yasin was being tried in court, Erhan would approach
the courtroom. When my mother asked him why he didn't enter, he would
immediately go away."
Yasin Hayal's parents confirmed rumors that he frequently met with
Erhan Yolcu. Now we have the following questions: Is Erhan Yolcu a
supporter of a particular group? Does Yasin Hayal know that Erhan
Yolcu has connections to an illegal group? Why did they commit this
murder? Which group is Erhan Yolcu supporting?
'There's not only one Ogun Samast' Who could have known that one of
our last talks with him would also be his last talk with us? When we
were writing this article, we heard that both the chief of police
in Trabzon and Trabzon Governor Huseyin Yavuzdemir were had been
removed from their positions. Statements from a senior official
who spent the last two-and-a-half years as the governor of Trabzon,
a city that has been in the spotlight, are quite important.
Yavuzdemir declined to accept claims that there had been a failure
on the part of the police to keep track of information about the
murderers. "It is only after a court issues a decision that people can
be tracked by the police. When a person is put under police observation
but that person makes a complaint about being kept under surveillance,
the police are at fault. A judge would ask for sound reasons to issue
a decision to put a man under surveillance. Nobody can be put under
police observation if a judge cannot be given sound reasons to do
so." Yavuzdemir linked failure to control Internet cafes to this.
It is obvious from the recent incidents that missionaries are being
used as a matter of propaganda. Yavuzdemir said that during the period
of time he was in Trabzon, he sometimes heard complaints from the
local people about missionaries; however, he did not know of any one
Muslim who had converted to Christianity. Yavuzdemir put the problem
as resulting from a lack of attention to the proper education of young
people and from a weakening in family ties. "There is not only one Ogun
Samast. There are several Ogun Samasts whose families are all split
up." Yavuzdemir also reacted to calls from the media for a military
intervention to take control of Trabzon and said that anything of this
kind would be absolutely pointless and would definitely insult the
people of Trabzon. Yavuzdemir further said that efforts to create a
bad image of Trabzon could be part of a project to allow the Kurdistan
Workers' Party (PKK) to gain influence in the region.
--Boundary_(ID_pEWIQp9wG7gbfeh9FhAlzw)--