Venetian Criteria
Venetian Criteria
Venetian Criteria is set of rules adopted by European Union member countries under European Human Rights Contract regarding ban of political parties. It is hard to find detailed applications of Venetian Criteria since the issues are arisen in certain countries in European Union only such as Spain, Bulgaria and very frequently in Turkey. According to Venetian Criteria, a political party may only be closed down if they provoke racism, terrorism, foreigner animosity, violence and violence calls. I do not have detail information on Venetian Criteria in case of closure of Refah Partisi (RP) whether it was available at that time or not. But approval of closure of Refah Partisi by European Human Rights Court was a shocking event few years ago since none of the rules Venetian Criteria was violated in that case. Many people believe in Turkey that European Union has a biased behavior in case of Islamic Issues.
Now Turkey is facing another struggle on the way to real democracy. AKP is trying to find a way against closure case of AKP.
Law experts of the ruling Justice & Development (AK) Party have been working on a constitutional amendment to impede the closure case filed against the party. AK Party is expected to offer Nationalist Movement Party (MHP) that they should implement “Venetian Criteria” of the European Union in regard to closure of a political party. According to the judicial practice known as Venetian Criteria, only the parties advocating violence and racism may be closed down.
The AK Party will propose the Venetian Criteria in response to the MHP’s suggestion to punish individual members instead of closing down the party. According to the Venetian Criteria model, only parties that advocate violence and racism may be shut down.
The AK Party will respond to MHP’s proposal to not close down parties but to instead punish individual party members, with the ‘Venetian Criteria’. This model stipulates only banning parties involved in racism and violence.
The AK Party’s legist members are continuing their efforts to amend the constitutional law in order to prevent a ban on the AK Party. The AK Party will respond to MHP’s proposal not to close down parties but to instead punish individual party members, with the ‘Venetian Criteria’. These criteria had formed a basis for banning extreme nationalist party leader Jörg Haider in Austria. Group vice chairmen Sadullah Ergin, Bekir Bozdağ, TBMM (Turkish Grand National Assembly) Constitutional Board chairman, Burhan Kuzu, chairman of Justice Committee, Ahmet İyimaya and the first secretary Cemil Çiçek are expected to hold a meeting with MHP (Nationalist Movement Party) within this week. The jurist members of the party will start a discussion on the 68th and 69th articles of the constitutional law.
TBMM (Turkish Grand National Assembly) Constitutional Board chairman, Burhan Kuzu, referred to the EU criteria and stated: “The European Union utilizes the Venetian Criteria. The first sanction of the criteria was implemented in Austria. Extreme nationalist Haider, who was ruling the country at that time, was banned according to these criteria. The criteria states that parties, which are involved in racist and violent actions should be shut down as a final option.”
Prof. Dr. Burhan Kuzu is mistaken here due to disinformation campaign in media. He is mistaken because none of the parties in Europe either Alliance for the Future of Austria (Jörk Haider’s former party) or Vlaams Blok in Belgium was closed under any of criteria. Also none of the party members banned from politics for 5 years like in Turkey. This case was raised by Hadi Uluengin here and a blog post in Turkish titled as Venedik Kriterleri.
No back steps in Venetian criteria
AK Party is very insistent: “the constitutional law package will pass in order not to close the party; we may hold a referendum.”
These words were uttered by Merdan Aslan, the former deputy of the Labor Party. Aslan said: “we have spoken to the chief of the supreme court of appeals and members of the constitutional court. They do not make concessions on the issue of the republic. You need to form mass support and public support. They are really sure about that.”
AKP: “No back steps”
AK Party is very insistent: “the constitutional law package will pass in order not to close the party; we may hold a referendum.”
Non-governmental organizations call everyone to take one step back; but AK Party is determined not to take any back steps about the issue of constitutional law amendment. AK Party will submit the mini package of the constitutional change to the national assembly by the next week. The party aims to end the issue of closing down parties with the Venetian criteria. According to the Venetian criteria adopted by European Human Rights Contract, a political party may only be closed down if they provoke racism, terrorism, foreigner animosity, violence and violence calls.
Collection and translation from various articles from Turkish newspapers
