GURSEL CALM AHEAD OF VERDICT

EuroNews
May 22 2009
France

He is not the first writer to live far from his homeland, but Nedim
Gursel, one of Turkey’s greatest authors, likes to think of himself
as a bridge, not only between two nations, but between the west and
the east.

He fled his country during the military coup of 1980, and is now
a naturalised Frenchman living in Paris where he heads research at
the CNRS, and holds conferences on Europe. His latest was at Paris’s
Science-Politics grande ecole.

Nowadays he is a frequent visitor to his homeland, but he still faces a
blasphemy trial for his novel "Allah’s daughters", published in Turkey
last year. The state prosecutor has already called for his aquittal,
but there remains a one to two-year prison term at stake. euronews
caught up with Nedim Gursel in Paris.

euronews: "Europeans ask themselves if Turkey really is a secular
nation that deserves integration in the European Union. How would
you answer them?"

Nedim Gursel: "You know, I’m a fervent partisan for my country’s
integration in the EU. But now with this trial I wonder, all the
same. Is Turkey drifting towards a more authoritarian regime? That
wouldn’t be compatible with Turkey’s desire to be European.

I just hope that my trial is a hiccup on the way, but I think Europe
is right to ask questions, because today Turkey is perhaps not ready
to join."

euronews: "Isn’t the EU, or rather, aren’t Europeans to blame? When
you talk with Turkish people they often describe the contempt they
have to deal with; they see the EU as a ‘christian club’."

NG: "Yes, the Turks hate this rejection. It hurts their national
pride. I’m against nationalism, but Turkey has been knocking on the
EU’s door for a long time now, and someone is always finding some
excuse to deliver a speech against Turkish membership. As Mrs Merkel
and Mr Sarkozy are doing at the moment.

Turkey is a muslim country. But if it shared Europe’s values it
would be an enriching experience for Europe. This is a difficult
thing for Europeans to recognise, they won’t admit it, but Turkey’s
candidature forces Europe to live up to its image: Does Europe affirm
its own identity by rejecting the Turkish one? Or does it reconcile
the two? A reconciliation is needed."

euronews: "There is still progress to report. Freedom of expression
has advanced in recent years, the poet Narim Hikmet’s nationality
was restored, and last year the infamous article 301 which punished
the crime of denigrating the Turkish nation was reformed. But there
are organisations and individuals who claim these changes are merely
cosmetic. Do you agree?"

NG: "It’s good that you mention Nazim Hikmet, one of Turkey’s greatest
poets. The state committed a terrible crime by jailing him for 16
years, then exiling him, and he died in Moscow in 1963.

So our prime minister recently announced his rehabilitation, and
added that Turkey was no longer a country that persecuted its writers.

I was obviously one of the first to cheer, but this trial is a glaring
denial of that speech…So it’s been said the changes are cosmetic,
small, but maybe that’s all for the good because the democratisation
of Turkey still has far to go, and without Europe on the horizon it
will get nowhere."

euronews: "You are one of the signatories to the Letter of Apology
to the Armenians published by a group of Turkish intellectuals. Some
have criticised the letter for not using the word ‘genocide’."

NG: "Turkey really needs to face up to its past. I think it was
a good thing to sign this letter, because it breaks taboos. Ah,
taboos! Like religion, the Armenian problem is a taboo in Turks’
collective memory. It’s the same for the Kurds. Only 10 years ago we
couldn’t even talk about it, couldn’t even use the word Kurd. Now
the President Abdullah Gul says the Kurdish question is the most
important one facing our country. So there has been a clear evolution."

euronews: "Do you consider yourself in exile?"

NG:"It’s a voluntary exile. I’m not in exile in fact, I go to Turkey
very often to nourish my imagination, to feed on Turkey’s Ottoman
heritage. I write historical novels and I love Istanbul, but there
was a time, just after the military coup on September the 12th 1980
when I couldn’t return to my country for 3 years. Then I really was in
exile. That’s why I wrote "The last tram", where I express my feelings
as a Turkish writer in exile, his wanderings, his attachment to his
country, his city.

Now I don’t feel like an exile at all. I’m a little in Paris, a
little in Istanbul and I always say metaphorically that I’m like the
Bosphorous bridge, that doesn’t just join two banks, Europe and Asia,
but also joins men and cultures, and I think that’s the writer’s role,
because literature is universal and brings people together."

From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress