1.
33rd Republican People's Party Ordinary Convention
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The 33rd Republican Peoples Party Ordinary Convention was held on 22 and 23 May 2010 in order to elect a new leader following the resignation of Deniz Baykal after a sex-tape scandal. The only candidate was former CHP parliamentary group leader Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu, while Kılıçdaroğlu received the support of 77 out of the 81 provincial chairpersons, Baykal received the endorsement of the remaining four. A total of 1,250 delegates were registered for election, members elected to the Party Council are as follows, with the number of votes they received shown in brackets. Members elected to the Party Council through the Science, Culture and Executive Quota are as follows, a candidate for the leadership needed the signatures of 20% of the registered delegates to officially run for election. Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu, parliamentary leader and CHP Member of Parliament since 2002. Deniz Baykal, three-time leader of the CHP and former government minister, stood down as a candidate before the election
2.
Republican People's Party (Turkey)
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The Republican Peoples Party is a Kemalist and social-democratic political party in Turkey. It is the oldest political party of the Republic of Turkey and is currently the opposition in the Grand National Assembly. The Republican Peoples Party describes itself as a modern social-democratic party, also, the party is cited as the founding party of modern Turkey. The political party was established during the Congress of Sivas in 1919 as a union of resistance groups against the invasion of Anatolia, the union represented Turkish people as a unified front during the Turkish War of Independence. On 9 September 1923, the Peoples Party officially declared itself as an organization and on October 29,1923. On 10 November 1924, the Peoples Party renamed itself to Republican Peoples Party as Turkey moved into a one-party period, during the one-party period, the CHP became the major political organisation of a one-party state. Both of which, however, were banned within a few months of their establishment by the state for veering too closely to Islamism and this experience was followed by the founding of the National Development Party by Nuri Demirağ in 1945. The current structure of the party was established within the transition to the multi-party period, after World War II, the leader of the CHP İsmet İnönü introduced democratic elections to Turkish society. Due to widespread dissatisfaction with the CHP in the four years after its victory in the first multi-party general election, celâl Bayar then replaced İnönü as President. During the interim multi-party periods in between the military coups of 1960,1971, and 1980, CHP is regarded as being social-democratic, state nationalistic and secular/laicist. The partys logo consists of the Six Arrows, which represent the principles of Kemalism, republicanism, nationalism, statism, populism, laïcité. The CHP, along all other political parties of the time, was closed down for a brief period by the military coup of 1980. An inheritor party which still participates in Turkish democratic life was established in 1984 by the name of the Democratic Left Party, created by the leader of CHP. CHP was finally re-established with its name on 9 September 1992. Nevertheless, the relationship between CHP and some trade unions, business chambers and most non-governmental organisations alienated many voters. The distance between the party administration and many leftist grassroots, especially left oriented Kurdish voters, contributed to the shift away from the political left. CHP urged the Socialist International to accept Republican Turkish Party of the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus as an observer member, at the 2007 general election CHP ran in alliance with Democratic Left Party. CHP suffered a defeat, getting 7,300,234 votes
3.
Istanbul
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Istanbul, historically known as Constantinople and Byzantium, is the most populous city in Turkey and the countrys economic, cultural, and historic center. Istanbul is a city in Eurasia, straddling the Bosphorus strait between the Sea of Marmara and the Black Sea. Its commercial and historical center lies on the European side and about a third of its population lives on the Asian side, the city is the administrative center of the Istanbul Metropolitan Municipality, both hosting a population of around 14.7 million residents. Istanbul is one of the worlds most populous cities and ranks as the worlds 7th-largest city proper, founded under the name of Byzantion on the Sarayburnu promontory around 660 BCE, the city developed to become one of the most significant in history. After its reestablishment as Constantinople in 330 CE, it served as a capital for almost 16 centuries, during the Roman and Byzantine, the Latin. Overlooked for the new capital Ankara during the period, the city has since regained much of its prominence. The population of the city has increased tenfold since the 1950s, as migrants from across Anatolia have moved in, arts, music, film, and cultural festivals were established at the end of the 20th century and continue to be hosted by the city today. Infrastructure improvements have produced a complex transportation network, considered a global city, Istanbul has one of the fastest-growing metropolitan economies in the world. It hosts the headquarters of many Turkish companies and media outlets and accounts for more than a quarter of the gross domestic product. Hoping to capitalize on its revitalization and rapid expansion, Istanbul has bid for the Summer Olympics five times in twenty years, the first known name of the city is Byzantium, the name given to it at its foundation by Megarean colonists around 660 BCE. The name is thought to be derived from a personal name, ancient Greek tradition refers to a legendary king of that name as the leader of the Greek colonists. Modern scholars have hypothesized that the name of Byzas was of local Thracian or Illyrian origin. He also attempted to promote the name Nova Roma and its Greek version Νέα Ῥώμη Nea Romē, the use of Constantinople to refer to the city during the Ottoman period is now considered politically incorrect, even if not historically inaccurate, by Turks. By the 19th century, the city had acquired other names used by foreigners or Turks. Europeans used Constantinople to refer to the whole of the city, pera was used to describe the area between the Golden Horn and the Bosphorus, but Turks also used the name Beyoğlu. The name İstanbul is commonly held to derive from the Medieval Greek phrase εἰς τὴν Πόλιν and this reflected its status as the only major city in the vicinity. The importance of Constantinople in the Ottoman world was reflected by its Ottoman name Der Saadet meaning the gate to Prosperity in Ottoman. An alternative view is that the name evolved directly from the name Constantinople, with the first, a Turkish folk etymology traces the name to Islam bol plenty of Islam because the city was called Islambol or Islambul as the capital of the Islamic Ottoman Empire
4.
Kars
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Kars is a city in northeast Turkey and the capital of Kars Province. With a population of 73,836, it is the largest city on the Turkish side of the border with Armenia. For a brief period of time, it served as the capital of the medieval Bagratid Kingdom of Armenia. Its significance increased in the 19th century, when Kars was contested between the Ottoman and Russian empires, with the latter gaining control of the city as a result of the 1877-78 war, during the Turkish–Armenian War in late 1920, Turkish revolutionaries captured Kars for the last time. As Chorzene, the town appears in Roman historiography as part of ancient Armenia, the Turkish etymology offered by M. Fahrettin Kırzıoğlu, has been dismissed as unsustainable by scholars. Little is known of the history of Kars beyond the fact that it had its own dynasty of Armenian rulers and was the capital of a region known as Vanand. Medieval Armenian historians referred to the city by a variety of names, including Karuts Kaghak, Karuts Berd, Amrotsn Karuts, at some point in the ninth century it became part of the territory of the Armenian Bagratunis. Kars was the capital of Bagratid Kingdom of Armenia between 928 and 961, during this period the towns cathedral, later known as the Church of the Holy Apostles, was built. In 963, shortly after the Bagratuni seat was transferred to Ani, Kars became the capital of an independent kingdom. In 1064, just after the capture of Ani by Alp Arslan, in 1065 Gagik-Abas ceded his kingdom to the Byzantine Empire, but soon after Kars was taken by the Seljuk Turks. The Kars emirate was a vassal of the Saltukids in Erzurum, thus, it was only in 1206 that Zakare of the Zakarids-Mkhargrzeli succeeded in capturing Kars, joining it to their fiefdom of Ani. In 1387 the city surrendered to Timur and its fortifications were damaged, anatolian beyliks followed for some time after that, until it firstly fell into the hands of the Kara Koyunlu and subsequent Ak Koyunlu. After the Ak Koyunlu, as it went naturally for almost all their former territories, following the Peace of Amasya of 1555 that followed through the Ottoman-Safavid War of 1533-1555, the city was declared neutral, and its existing fortress was destroyed. In 1585, during the Ottoman-Safavid War of 1579-1590, the Ottomans took the city alongside Tabriz, on June 8,1604, during the next bout of hostilities between the two archrivals, the Ottoman-Safavid War of 1603-1618, Safavid ruler Abbas I retook the city from the Ottomans. The fortifications of the city were rebuilt by the Ottoman Sultan Murad III and were enough to withstand a siege by Nader Shah of Persia. It became the head of a sanjak in the Ottoman Erzurum Vilayet, in Augsust 1745, a huge Ottoman army was routed at Kars by Nader Shah during the Ottoman-Persian War of 1743-1746. As a result, the Turks fled westwards, raiding their own lands as they went, in 1807 Kars successfully resisted an attack by the Russian Empire. After another Russian siege in 1828 the city was surrendered by the Ottomans on June 23,1828 to the Russian general Count Ivan Paskevich,11,000 men becoming prisoners of war
5.
Turkish language
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Outside of Turkey, significant smaller groups of speakers exist in Germany, Bulgaria, Macedonia, Northern Cyprus, Greece, the Caucasus, and other parts of Europe and Central Asia. Cyprus has requested that the European Union add Turkish as an official EU language, in 1928, as one of Atatürks Reforms in the early years of the Republic of Turkey, the Ottoman Turkish alphabet was replaced with a Latin alphabet. The distinctive characteristics of Turkish are vowel harmony and extensive agglutination, the basic word order of Turkish is subject–object–verb. Turkish has no classes or grammatical gender. Turkish has a strong T–V distinction and usage of honorifics, Turkish uses second-person pronouns that distinguish varying levels of politeness, social distance, age, courtesy or familiarity toward the addressee. The plural second-person pronoun and verb forms are used referring to a person out of respect. Turkic languages belong to the Altaic language group, the Turkic family comprises some 30 living languages spoken across Eastern Europe, Central Asia, and Siberia. Turkish is a member of the Oghuz group of languages, a subgroup of the Turkic language family, there is a high degree of mutual intelligibility between Turkish and the other Oghuz Turkic languages, including Azerbaijani, Turkmen, Qashqai, Gagauz, and Balkan Gagauz Turkish. The earliest known Old Turkic inscriptions are the three monumental Orkhon inscriptions found in modern Mongolia, erected in honour of the prince Kul Tigin and his brother Emperor Bilge Khagan, these date back to the second Turk Kaghanate. The Seljuqs of the Oghuz Turks, in particular, brought their language, following the adoption of Islam c. Turkish literature during the Ottoman period, particularly Divan poetry, was influenced by Persian, including the adoption of poetic meters. One of the tasks of the newly established association was to initiate a reform to replace loanwords of Arabic. By banning the usage of imported words in the press, the association succeeded in removing several hundred words from the language. While most of the words introduced to the language by the TDK were newly derived from Turkic roots, owing to this sudden change in the language, older and younger people in Turkey started to differ in their vocabularies. While the generations born before the 1940s tend to use the terms of Arabic or Persian origin. The past few decades have seen the work of the TDK to coin new Turkish words to express new concepts and technologies as they enter the language. Many of these new words, particularly information technology terms, have received widespread acceptance, however, the TDK is occasionally criticized for coining words which sound contrived and artificial. Some earlier changes—such as bölem to replace fırka, political party—also failed to meet with popular approval, some words restored from Old Turkic have taken on specialized meanings, for example betik is now used to mean script in computer science
6.
Turkey
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Turkey, officially the Republic of Turkey, is a transcontinental country in Eurasia, mainly in Anatolia in Western Asia, with a smaller portion on the Balkan peninsula in Southeast Europe. Turkey is a democratic, secular, unitary, parliamentary republic with a cultural heritage. The country is encircled by seas on three sides, the Aegean Sea is to the west, the Black Sea to the north, and the Mediterranean Sea to the south. The Bosphorus, the Sea of Marmara, and the Dardanelles, Ankara is the capital while Istanbul is the countrys largest city and main cultural and commercial centre. Approximately 70-80% of the countrys citizens identify themselves as ethnic Turks, other ethnic groups include legally recognised and unrecognised minorities. Kurds are the largest ethnic minority group, making up approximately 20% of the population, the area of Turkey has been inhabited since the Paleolithic by various ancient Anatolian civilisations, as well as Assyrians, Greeks, Thracians, Phrygians, Urartians and Armenians. After Alexander the Greats conquest, the area was Hellenized, a process continued under the Roman Empire. The Seljuk Sultanate of Rûm ruled Anatolia until the Mongol invasion in 1243, the empire reached the peak of its power in the 16th century, especially during the reign of Suleiman the Magnificent. During the war, the Ottoman government committed genocides against its Armenian, Assyrian, following the war, the conglomeration of territories and peoples that formerly comprised the Ottoman Empire was partitioned into several new states. Turkey is a member of the UN, an early member of NATO. Turkeys growing economy and diplomatic initiatives have led to its recognition as a regional power while her location has given it geopolitical, the name of Turkey is based on the ethnonym Türk. The first recorded use of the term Türk or Türük as an autonym is contained in the Old Turkic inscriptions of the Göktürks of Central Asia, the English name Turkey first appeared in the late 14th century and is derived from Medieval Latin Turchia. Similarly, the medieval Khazar Empire, a Turkic state on the shores of the Black. The medieval Arabs referred to the Mamluk Sultanate as al-Dawla al-Turkiyya, the Ottoman Empire was sometimes referred to as Turkey or the Turkish Empire among its European contemporaries. The Anatolian peninsula, comprising most of modern Turkey, is one of the oldest permanently settled regions in the world, various ancient Anatolian populations have lived in Anatolia, from at least the Neolithic period until the Hellenistic period. Many of these peoples spoke the Anatolian languages, a branch of the larger Indo-European language family, in fact, given the antiquity of the Indo-European Hittite and Luwian languages, some scholars have proposed Anatolia as the hypothetical centre from which the Indo-European languages radiated. The European part of Turkey, called Eastern Thrace, has also been inhabited since at least forty years ago. It is the largest and best-preserved Neolithic site found to date, the settlement of Troy started in the Neolithic Age and continued into the Iron Age
7.
Political party
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A political party is a group of people who come together to contest elections and hold power in the government. The party agrees on some proposed policies and programmes, with a view to promoting the good or furthering their supporters interests. While there is some international commonality in the way political parties are recognized, and in how they operate, there are many differences. Many political parties have a core, but some do not. In many democracies, political parties are elected by the electorate to run a government, many countries, such as Germany and India, have several significant political parties, and some nations have one-party systems, such as China and Cuba. The United States is in practice a two-party system, but with smaller parties also participating. Its two most important parties are the Democratic Party and the Republican Party, the first political factions, cohering around a basic, if fluid, set of principles, emerged from the Exclusion Crisis and Glorious Revolution in late 17th century England. The leader of the Whigs was Robert Walpole, who maintained control of the government in the period 1721–1742, as the century wore on, the factions slowly began to adopt more coherent political tendencies as the interests of their power bases began to diverge. The Whig partys initial base of support from the aristocratic families widened to include the emerging industrial interests. A major influence on the Whigs were the political ideas of John Locke. They acted as a united, though unavailing, opposition to Whig corruption and they finally regained power with the accession of George III in 1760 under Lord Bute. Out of this chaos, the first distinctive parties emerged, the first such party was the Rockingham Whigs under the leadership of Charles Watson-Wentworth and the intellectual guidance of the political philosopher Edmund Burke. A coalition including the Rockingham Whigs, led by the Earl of Shelburne, took power in 1782, the new government, led by the radical politician Charles James Fox in coalition with Lord North, was soon brought down and replaced by William Pitt the Younger in 1783. It was now that a genuine two-party system began to emerge, by the time of this split the Whig party was increasingly influenced by the ideas of Adam Smith, founder of classical liberalism. As Wilson and Reill note, Adam Smiths theory melded nicely with the political stance of the Whig Party. The modern Conservative Party was created out of the Pittite Tories of the early 19th century, in the late 1820s disputes over political reform broke up this grouping. A government led by the Duke of Wellington collapsed amidst dire election results, following this disaster Robert Peel set about assembling a new coalition of forces. However, a consensus reached on these issues ended party politics in 1816 for a decade, Party politics revived in 1829 with the split of the Democratic-Republican Party into the Jacksonian Democrats led by Andrew Jackson, and the Whig Party, led by Henry Clay
8.
Turkish presidential election, 2014
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Presidential elections were held on 10 August 2014 in order to elect the 12th President of Turkey. Incumbent Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan was elected outright with a majority of the vote in the first round. The election took place under reforms resulting from the 2007 constitutional referendum, over 55 million people were eligible to vote, both within Turkey and abroad. Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, leader of the AKP, first elected Prime Minister in 2002, the co-leader of the Peoples Democratic Party Selahattin Demirtaş, who received the backing of 8 left-wing parties, came third with 9. 76%. Recep Tayyip Erdoğan took over as President from Abdullah Gül on 28 August, while Ahmet Davutoğlu, the historic 12-year low turnout of 74. As Gül took office on 28 August 2007, the first possible day could be 29 June, also, the Prime Minister of Turkey could be nominated for the presidency without having to resign from his post. Three candidates were nominated to participate in the election, a more detailed list of parties that endorsed them can be found in the List of parties by presidential candidates section. To run for election, a candidate needs to be nominated by at least 20 Members of Parliament in the Grand National Assembly, three candidates obtained sufficient endorsements from parliament in order to register with the Supreme Electoral Council. The Electoral Council forbids any potential candidate from nominating themselves, since this would give advantage to prospective candidates who were sitting Members of Parliament. The AKP began collecting signatures for a candidate from all 311 eligible MPs out of their 312-seat total. Due to the debate on whether the CHPs candidate Ekmeleddin İhsanoğlu adhered to secular, six CHP MPs protested their leaders choice of candidate by attempting to nominate Emine Ülker Tarhan instead, though she herself stated that she would not stand as a candidate. Out of the 14 independent MPs, three supported İhsanoğlu while two supported Demirtaş, with the remaining 9 boycotting the process altogether. Only 536 seats out of the 550 are occupied, with many vacant MPs having resigned or serving prison sentences due to their roles in the PKK, or the Sledgehammer, Turkish and international media speculated that Recep Tayyip Erdoğan would almost certainly be the AKPs candidate for the Presidency. This was proven correct on 1 July when Erdoğans candidacy was announced, Abdullah Gül, the outgoing President of Turkey elected in 2007 caused media speculation regarding a potential candidacy in January 2014. He announced that he would not stand on 29 June 2014, a full list of possible AKP candidates which at one point showed intentions of running for election is as follows. Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, leader of the AKP and Prime Minister of Turkey, Abdullah Gül, Prime Minister of Turkey, President of Turkey. Bülent Arınç, Deputy Prime Minister of Turkey and Speaker of Parliament, the two main opposition parties, the Republican Peoples Party and the Nationalist Movement Party had both expressed interest in fielding a joint candidate after the March 2014 local elections. In an unofficial vote of CHP MPs, Eskişehir mayor Yılmaz Büyükerşen was seen as a potential forerunner, a list of potential candidates which had expressed interest in running, or had been recommended as a candidate of the CHP or its parliamentary sister party DSP is as follows
9.
Turkish general election, June 2015
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The Turkish general election of June 2015 took place on 7 June 2015 in all 85 electoral districts of Turkey to elect 550 members to the Grand National Assembly. This was the 24th general election in the history of the Turkish Republic, the result was the first hung parliament since the 1999 general election. Unsuccessful attempts to form a coalition government resulted in a general election being called for November 2015. The Justice and Development Party, which had governed Turkey since 2002, lost its parliamentary majority, the main opposition Republican Peoples Party also fared worse than their 2011 result, and won 132 seats with 25. 0% of the vote. The Nationalist Movement Party had been projected to win over many disaffected voters from the AKP and its share of the vote increased, and the party won 80 seats with 16. 3% of the vote. The party fared better than expectations, it won 13. 1% of the vote and took 80 seats, campaigning before the election focused mainly on a faltering economy, the political conflict between the government and the Gülen Movement, and Turkeys involvement in the Syrian Civil War. The vote was seen by some as a referendum on President Recep Tayyip Erdoğans call for an executive presidency, Electoral fraud claims and political violence caused controversy in the run-up to the election. Several candidates and party offices were subject to politically motivated attacks, the governing Justice and Development Party sought a fourth consecutive term in government. Its leader, Ahmet Davutoğlu, who had taken over from Recep Tayyip Erdoğan in August 2014, the Republican Peoples Party aimed to surpass the 30% boundary and to form a government, potentially with the help of smaller parties or in its own right. The CHPs leader Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu had publicly stated that his party would target 35% of the vote, popular support for the Nationalist Movement Party had surged during the 2014 local elections, and it aimed to participate in a coalition government. However, several politicians from the CHP and MHP resigned in protest against their unrealistic electoral prospects, the most prominent break-away party was the Anatolia Party formed by former CHP MP Emine Ülker Tarhan in November 2014. This election is the last election - presidential, local and general - scheduled in Turkey until 2019, speculation as to what the AKP government will do during four years of electorally unchecked power should they win generated both favourable predictions and concerns. The AKP also support a system, which would give greater powers to President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan. This would allow the AKPs new leader to seek a mandate in their own right rather than serving the remainder of Erdoğans term before seeking re-election. Although Erdoğan did win outright with 51. 79% of the vote, despite this, speculation in December 2014 as to whether the election would be brought forward in order not to clash with summer examinations remained. In the end, no initiative was taken and Supreme Electoral Council of Turkey went on with the date 7 June. Some schools changed the times of examinations in order to not clash with polling day, the AKP were widely expected to target at least 330 seats in parliament in order to pursue constitutional reforms. In the 2014 local elections, the AKP won 42. 87% of the vote, the opposition Republican Peoples Party would have won 130–145 seats, the Nationalist Movement Party would have won 75–85 and Kurdish nationalist independent candidates would win between 30–45 seats
10.
Deniz Baykal
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Deniz Baykal is a Turkish politician from the Republican Peoples Party who served as Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Foreign Affairs from 1995 to 1996. Having served in government positions, Baykal led the CHP from 1992 to February 1995, from September 1995 to 1999. Between 2002 and 2010, he served as the Leader of the Opposition by virtue of leading the second largest party in Parliament. With the CHP shut down during the 1980 Turkish coup détat, Baykal was one of the leading members of the re-established CHP, which was founded again in 1992. He served as the leader until 1995, when the CHP and SHP merged during a convention. He was re-elected leader in September 1995, after which Baykal contested the 1995 general election and he served concurrently as Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Foreign Affairs between 1995 and 1996. Leading the CHP into a defeat in the 1999 general election. Regardless, he was re-elected as leader in 2000 and led the party to a success in the 2002 general election. He resigned as leader in 2010 after the release of a video of Baykals private relationship with another CHP MP, as the oldest MP in Parliament following the June 2015 general election, Baykal briefly served as the interim Speaker of the Grand National Assembly. He became interim parliamentary Speaker for a time on 17 November 2015 by virtue of being the oldest MP after the November 2015 general election. He was succeeded by the AKP MP İsmail Kahraman, who was elected Speaker on 22 November 2015, Baykal was born to Hüseyin Hilmi and Feride in Antalya. He was educated at the University of Ankara Faculty of Law and he later studied at the University of California, Berkeley and Columbia University as a Rockefeller scholar. Following this, he has completed his Ph. D. by 1963 at the University of Ankara Faculty of Political Science and he became an Associate Professor at the same faculty, where he lectured until 1973. Baykal first become involved in politics during the 1950s, having taken part in student movements opposing the Democratic Party government of Adnan Menderes, in the 1973 general election, he was elected as a CHP Member of Parliament for Antalya. At the time of his election, he was the youngest MP in Parliament, in the short-lived coalition government of Bülent Ecevit that had been formed with the Islamist National Salvation Party led by Necmettin Erbakan, Baykal become the Minister of Finance. His tenure would last under a year, with the partnership between the secular-orientated CHP and the Islamist-orientated MSP collapsing in November 1974. Baykal become the Minister of Energy and Natural Resources in the cabinet of Bülent Ecevit. The government had a vote of confidence in Parliament due to a loose coalition with independent MPs, the Democratic Party
11.
Yalova
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Yalova is a city located in northwestern Turkey, near the eastern coast of the Sea of Marmara. Yalova has a city population of 100,863, while the population of the Yalova Province is 118,998. as of 2011. In general, it is assumed that the name Yalova comes from Yalıova Yalı which means house at the coast while ova means plain in Turkish, the first settlement in the region dates back to the Prehistoric Period, in around 3000 BC. The Hittites ruled the region in the 21st century BC, followed by the Phrygians in the 13th century BC, the region was conquered by the Romans in 74 BC. After the fall of the Roman Empire, the city was part of the Byzantine Empire, in the Byzantine period the town remained of some importance due to its geographic location, and emperors frequently used it as a disembarkation point from Constantinople. Thus Emperor Heraclius landed here in 622, at the beginning of his counter-offensive against the Persians, and Romanos IV Diogenes did the same in 1071, on his way to the Battle of Manzikert. In the 9th century, the town was also the site of one of the beacons that transmitted news from the frontier with the Abbasid Caliphate, and included an imperial hostel for travellers. In the late 10th century, however, Leo of Synada described Pylae as little more than a village, the town and the surrounding district were raided by the Seljuk Turks after Manzikert, but soon recovered. In 1147, Greek refugees from Phrygia were settled there, in 1199 charter of privileges to Venetian merchants, it is attested along with neighbouring Pythia Therma as a separate fiscal district, and was a separate province by the time of the Fourth Crusade. Following the fall of Constantinople to the Crusaders, Pylae formed part of the Empire of Nicaea, Pylae remained in Byzantine hands until ca. 1302, when Turkish attacks grew in intensity, forcing much of the population to abandon it, shortly after, Yalova was incorporated into the territory of the Ottoman Empire. It was part of Sanjak of Kocaeli and was known as successively Yalakabad and it was occupied by Greek troops on 5 September 1920 during Turkish War of Independence. During the occupiation, Massacres in Yalova peninsula occurred, Turkish troops, who waited beyond Sakarya River, used this opportunity and attacked loosened Greek ones. Adapazarı was liberated on 26 June 1921, İzmit on 28 June 1921 and it was initially county centre in Karamürsel district of Kocaeli Province. It became a centre in Istanbul Province in 1930 after joining 2 villages from Orhangazi before becoming a province centre in 1995. Mustafa Kemal Atatürk occasionally lived in Yalova in his final years, in one of his speeches he famously said, Yalova is my city. Yalova has a number of tourist attractions, such as the Yalova Atatürk Mansion used by Mustafa Kemal Atatürk, there are also numerous new cultural centres, such as the Raif Dinçkök Cultural Centre and Cem Kültür House. The city is famous for its hot springs in Termal district, which gets its name from the Greek word θερμαί, another attraction is the Karaca Arboretum on the way to Termal
12.
Turkish general election, 2011
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Turkeys 17th general election was held on 12 June 2011 to elect 550 new members of Grand National Assembly. In accordance to the result of the referendum held in 2007. This represented an increase of 3. 2% since the 2007 general election, the Republican Peoples Party also saw an increase in its popular vote share, receiving 26. 0% and 135 MPs. The Nationalist Movement Party won 13. 0% and 53 MPs, the election was the first to be contested by the CHPs new leader Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu, who replaced Deniz Baykal as leader in 2010. The election was marred by violence originating mainly from the Kurdistan Workers Party, which is recognised as a terrorist organisation by Turkey, the European Union, emboldened by the 2010 constitutional referendum, AKP leaders said they would create a new constitution after the 2011 elections. On March 3,2011, Parliament approved a ruling party proposal to set June 12 as the date for the general elections, the proposal was submitted by the ruling Justice and Development Party on February 21 and was approved unanimously in the Parliaments General Assembly. In its proposal, the AKP pointed to the appropriateness of June 12 as the election date considering the June dates for the placement test for high schools, seeking high voter turnout, the heat during the summer was also considered during the choice of date. In accordance with a law approved by Parliament last year that changes to Turkeys election laws, Turkish voters encountered some new rules. The changes sought to bring Turkish election campaign regulations up to European standards, the age for parliamentary eligibility was reduced from 30 to 25. Wooden ballot boxes were replaced by new ballot boxes made out of plastic that were transparent, shatterproof. Voting booths were upgraded to a stronger, safer, and more portable model, voting envelopes were made larger and had different colors for each matter that was being voted upon. Campaigning was now allowed until two hours after sunset, under the previous law, campaigning after sundown was forbidden. Citizens were able to vote without official identification as long as they could provide their identity number, anyone who prevented someone from casting their vote would receive three to five years in prison. Turkish voters living abroad will have to wait for election to be able to cast their votes in the countries in which they are residing due to the inability to institute electronic voting. Turkish voters abroad thus needed to cast their votes at customs gates, the number of MPs by province was redistributed according to the most recent population data. The number of deputies in Parliament for Istanbul was increased by 15, ankaras two regions yielded 15 and 16 deputies. Istanbul, made up of three regions, elected 30,27 and 28 deputies, İzmir, with two regions, elected 13 deputies each from both regions. Some of them decided to participate in the elections as independent, on April 19,2011, the Supreme Election Board announced that ÖDP and YP could not join the June 12 general elections as they could not hand out their necessary documents on time
13.
Turkish general election, 1991
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General elections were held in Turkey on 20 October 1991, to elect members to the 19th Grand National Assembly. It was the first by the ruling Motherland Party to be contested without its leader, Turgut Özal. The result was a swing against Özals former party in favour of its fierce centre-right rival, the vote saw two additional parties cross the 10 percent barrier to enter parliament. Necmettin Erbakan and his Welfare Party saw a party of religious background returned for the first time in 14 years, Welfare had a greatly increased share of the vote and took several key provinces, including Istanbul in 1994 local elections. Bülent Ecevits Democratic Left Party also scraped through to win seven seats
14.
Council of State (Turkey)
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The Council of State is the highest administrative court in the Republic of Turkey and is based in Ankara. Its role and tasks are prescribed by the Constitution of Turkey within the articles on the supreme courts and it shall also be the first and last instance for dealing with specific cases prescribed by law. Currently within the Turkish Council of State there are 15 Divisions,14 of them are judicial divisions, in each division, there are at least 5 members including the Head of the Division. Judgments are delivered by an absolute majority, the Plenary Assembly of the Council of State consists of 156 members. The president of the council is Zerrin Güngör, Turkish Council of State shooting Official Web site
15.
Milliyet
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Milliyet is a major Turkish daily newspaper published in Istanbul, Turkey. Milliyet came to publishing life at the Nuri Akça press in Babıali and its owner was Ali Naci Karacan. After his death in 1955 the paper was published by his son, for a number of years the person who made his mark on the paper as the editor in chief was Abdi İpekçi. İpekçi managed to raise the standards of the Turkish press by introducing his journalistic criteria, on 1 February 1979, İpekçi was murdered by Mehmet Ali Ağca, who would later attempt to assassinate the Pope John Paul II. Milliyet is published in broadsheet format, in 2001 Milliyet had a circulation of 337,000 copies. According to comScore, Milliyets website is the fifth most visited website in Europe. In 1979 the founding Karacan family sold the paper to Aydın Doğan, erdoğan Demirören, who owned 25% of the paper, later also sold his stake to Doğan. In October 1998 the paper was sold to Korkmaz Yiğit. The paper was purchased by a joint venture of the Demirören Group and Karacan Group in May 2011, since 1994, Milliyet has abandoned its stable, upmarket journalism established by Abdi İpekçi for a middle-market editorial line akin to that of Hürriyet. Milliyet has been criticised for having self-censored a column that was critical of the Prime Ministers reaction to a press leak, the column was frozen out for two weeks and then blanket-refused for publication. In 2013, Milliyet fired two columnists Hasan Cemal and Can Dündar, who had taken critical stances against the AKP government, on September 2009, Milliyet opened its digital archive becoming the first Turkish newspaper to do so. List of newspapers in Turkey Official website Milliyet news Milliyets digital archive Salih Sarıkaya, Turkish Journalist Can Dündar fired for writing columns that might disturb the prime minister from Milliyet Newspaper in Turkey
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