"The West's Support of Turkish Islamists
Posted GMT 6-11-2007 23:51:15
Ataturk's reforms in Turkey (1923 -- 1938) created a modern and survivable nation out of the remnants of the crumbling Ottoman Empire. Part of these reforms was to eliminate the influence of religion in public life, that is called 'laicism', outlawing the Sharia, and emancipating the women. He told the youth to preserve that system, otherwise they could go the way of the Ottoman empire. Seventy years after him an Islamist party came to power in Turkey, that precisely wants to roll back the reforms of Ataturk. Modern Turks are horrified. They do not want to go backward, but most of all they do not want to see their country crumble like the Ottoman Empire."
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