Early elections in Turkey seem inevitable after 32...

Early elections in Turkey seem inevitable after 32 MPs deserted ailing Prime Minister's s Bulent Ecevit Democratic Left Party. The party had only 128 members in the 550-seat parliament. The junior coalition partner and Motherland Party leader, Mesut Yilmaz, called for a new government. Ecevit's major coalition partner, the Nationalist Action Party (MHP), is already lobbying for polls on 3 November. Polls held any later than September would almost certainly crush Turkey's hopes of passing legislation necessary to start accession talks with the European Union after the Copenhagen summit in December.
The odd left-right coalition which took power in 1999 has come to loggerheads a number of times over human rights reforms demanded by the EU, including measures to allow broadcasting and education in Kurdish, and to abolish the death penalty.
The right-wing MHP, Ecevit's hardline coalition supporters, are deeply suspicious of Europe and have opposed abolishing the death penalty until Abdullah Ocalan, the Kurdish separatist leader who is under death sentence on an island jail, is hanged.
Mesut Yilmaz, deputy prime minister and leader of the centre-right Motherland Party, has also called for early elections. Yilmaz said a November election would leave no time for the government to fulfil reforms to help the country's bid for EU membership.
"We should form a new government in order to realise EU reforms before December," Yilmaz said. "I think we owe this to next generations, if we can't make it until December, it will cost the happiness and welfare of at least one generation."