The name refers to Istanbul’s Gezi Park, situated near Taksim Square, the epicentre of the uprising that at the end of May saw a group of environmentalists start protests against the destruction of the city’s last green area in order to build a large shopping mall as well as an Ottoman barracks and a mosque. The uprising that broke out all over the country because of harsh repression inflicted by the police resulted in six deaths, about 4,000 wounded and 1,000 arrests.

The same ideals that led tens of thousands of people to take to the streets are the founding principles of this new party, as set out on the party’s Facebook page, which aims to make the Turkish constitution “more democratic” and to obtain greater freedom, human rights, independence and justice. Founded by a group of musicians and artists, led by the famous rock singer Reşit Cem Köksal, the Gezi Party, the GZP, presents itself as a movement without a leader, organised using social networks, with a leadership that acts as spokesperson for the demands coming from a large part of the population. On October 1 the founders presented a petition to the Interior Ministry in order to officially register the party, and it was approved on October 9. Its members now aim to be elected to parliament.

The creation of the GZP proves that in spite of the apparent calm that has returned to Taksim Square and the democratic reform package approved by the government, dissent continues to exist in Turkish society. In a country marked by profound conflicts, between secularism and Islamism, between prosperity and inequality and between progress and repression, where respect for human rights has yet to be achieved, the opposition movement’s work is not done.

In September new protests began opposing the construction of a road crossing the campus of the Middle Eastern Technical University (ODTU) in Ankara. The project, involving the destruction of about 3,000 trees in the campus, one of the capital’s largest green areas, sparked protests organised by students and activists, once again repressed by the police using tear gas and water cannons. Twenty-two-year-old Ahmet Atakan was killed during an event organised in the southern province of Hatay on September 10 to express support for the ODTU students. A number of witnesses reported that he was hit on the head by a tear gas canister shot by the police, while the police say he fell off a building. On the night of October 18, when the campus was almost empty on the last day of the religious Feast of Sacrifice, and negotiations were still continuing between the municipality and university leaders opposing the project, teams of workmen with police escorts started to cut down trees. Activists who ran to stop them were violently prevented from accessing the area.

Once again the ideology of development at any cost embraced by Erdoğan, based on liberalisation and privatisation, clashes with the wish to preserve the social fabric and to participate more actively in the decision-making process from which most of the people continue to feel excluded. The government does not appear to be listening to requests for greater civil rights and increased social and political participation. The much-expected reform package presented by Erdoğan on September 30, which, according to the prime minister, was aimed at starting “a new and decisive phase in the democratisation process”, has done little to ease the social tension and sense of mistrust that is widespread in the country. Although more open to ethnic minorities and increasing the severity of sentences for racial, sexual and religious crimes, the reform package does not resolve the problems that have affected Turkish political and social life in recent years. Most Turks consider it an attempt by Erdoğan to clean up his image in view of the coming electoral schedule with local elections in March 2014, presidential elections in August and a general election in 2015.

Measures include the abolition of the ban on wearing the veil in public places and the oath sworn in schools every morning that says, “I am Turkish, I am truthful and diligent.” Furthermore, the ban on the three Kurdish letters q, w and x which do not exist in the Turkish alphabet has been abolished, and a debate has been planned to decide whether to lower the benchmark for parties entering parliament from the current 10 per cent to 5 per cent. In spite of this progress, there are many who feel betrayed by the “democratisation package.” First among them the Kurds, who make up about 20 per cent of Turkey’s population and have for a long time been deprived of their political and cultural rights. The reform introduces the teaching of the Kurdish language in private schools, but not in state schools, and there are no provisions in favour of the decentralisation of government in order to hand more power over to regional and local authorities.

Disappointed by the government’s weakness, the leaders of the Kurdish Workers Party (PKK) have threatened to suspend the ceasefire ordered in March within the framework of peace talks between their leader Abdullah Ocalan, in prison since 1999, and the Turkish authorities, thereby ending to the conflict for Kurdish autonomy in which over 40,000 people have died over the past three decades. The context has become even more explosive due to the war in Syria, with the Kurds accusing Ankara of supporting the Islamic rebels fighting against them in the north of the neighbouring country. Hence Turkey risks missing an opportunity to resolve the Kurdish issue, which has had a negative effect on the country’s international image, slowing economic growth as well as its European Union candidature.

The Alawites, the largest Turkish minority, feel even more penalised by the reform package since they hoped to be officially acknowledged hoping for permission to have their assembly halls, the cemevi, to be acknowledged as places of worship. Orthodox Greeks instead have been denied the right to reopen the Halki seminar on the island of Heybeliada, near Istanbul, closed forty years ago with a law placing all military and religious training centres under state control.

What irritated the majority of Turks and international observers most, was the repeal of anti-terrorism laws introduced in 1991 to oppose the Kurdish uprising and which have been used indiscriminately against all criticism. Official data made known by the Justice Ministry in October revealed that in the past four years over 20,000 people were sentenced on the basis of these laws, of which 8,000 in the past year alone. The most important Kurdish Party, the Party of Peace and Democracy (BDP), believes that 6,000 of its members are detained in Turkish prisons, among them 33 mayors. In recent years, anti-terrorism laws have been used against left-wing opponents, journalists, students and activists. There are 49 journalists in prison just for having done their job, a figure that puts Turkey in top place for having the highest number of detained journalists in 2012, in the rankings drafted by the Committee to Protect Journalist. The absence of an independent media, little freedom of expression and assembly, and the excessive use of force by the police are all critical elements underlined in the European Commission’s annual report on progress in Turkey, a report that exhorts the country to align its laws and behaviour to international standards in order to revitalise negotiations for membership which started in 2005 and have been stalemated for three years. Prime Minister Erdoğan could still ensure his government becomes more democratic when on November 5 in Brussels a new round of talks on Turkey’s EU candidature begins.

Translated by Francesca Simmons