The proposed amendments to the report titled “Report on the Functioning of Democratic Institutions in Turkey” have been accepted by a large majority vote in the PACE and the monitoring procedure has been reinstated for Turkey.
The proposed amendments to the report titled “Report on the Functioning of Democratic Institutions in Turkey” have been accepted by a large majority vote in the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE) and the monitoring procedure has been reinstated for Turkey.
In the vote regarding the general report after the proposed amendments were voted for in the PACE General Assembly, the report was accepted with 45 against and 113 for votes. With this, the monitoring procedure that had been halted in 2004 has been reinstated for Turkey.
ALL OF AKP’S PREPOSTEROUS PROPOSALS WERE REJECTED
Almost all proposals put forth by AKP parliamentarians that aimed solely to dilute the report’s contents were rejected with a majority while the preposterous claims in the proposals stood out.
AKP’s Markar Esayan’s proposals that the PKK had an economic force of 2 billion dollars in Europe, that Turkey shouldered the “whole weight of Europe’s refugee load alone” and that threats against Turkey were made possible “via statutory decrees”. Only a handful votes were in favor of AKP’s proposals outside of the Turkey and Azerbaijan committees.
HDP’s proposal to include to the report the European Congress of Local and Regional Governments’ previous findings on local administrations was also rejected.
AKP’s proposal that blames the mayors for the trustee appointments and mayors’ arrests and demands this be added to the report was rejected with a large majority. AKP’s proposal to change the statements claiming there is no judicial independence in Turkey be changed was also among those rejected with a large majority.
AKP’s preposterous proposal that stated “In Turkey, every opposition viewpoint can be expressed in the most free way, journalists in particular can voice their opinions without any pressure” was among those that stood out. The proposal was rejected with a majority of 34 to 135.
Similarly, the proposal to remove PACE’s statements on violations of judicial independence was among the rejected ones, with 27 to 130 votes against.
AKP’s proposal to change the PACE report’s proposal to reinstate the monitoring procedure for Turkey was rejected with a large majority.
