Turkey parliament speaker says country needs religious constitution

PanARMENIAN.Net - Overwhelmingly Muslim Turkey needs a religious constitution and the precept of secularism should be dropped from the country's new charter, parliament's speaker said, marking a potential rupture with the modern republic's founding principles, Reuters reports.

Critics fear a new charter could concentrate too much power in the hands of President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, who wants an executive presidency to replace the current parliamentary system. The government has pledged that European standards on human rights will form the basis of the new text.

"For one thing, the new constitution should not have secularism," parliament speaker Ismail Kahraman said in a speech late on Monday, April 25, according to videos published by Turkish media.

"It needs to discuss religion ... It should not be irreligious, this new constitution, it should be a religious constitution," said Kahraman, according to Reuters.

Kemal Kilicdaroglu, head of the main opposition and secularist Republican People's Party (CHP), tweeted: "Secularism is the primary principle of social peace ... Secularism is there to ensure that everyone has religious freedom, Ismail Kahraman!"

Kahraman said the current charter was already religious because it declared Islamic holidays as public holidays, even if fails to cite "Allah" once.