TURKEY: MHP DEMANDS RETURN OF DEATH PENALTY

the Nationalist Movement Party (MHP) in Turkey is increasing its efforts to bring back the death penalty, with two of its deputies preparing a bill to reintroduce capital punishment, which was abolished when the MHP was part of a coalition government. MHP deputies Mehmet Serdaroğlu and Behiç Çelik, who drafted the bill, have suggested that increased acts of terrorism have created a need for the death penalty, which was abolished on Aug. 2, 2002. Speaking to Today’s Zaman, Çelik said his party is against the death penalty but that the punishment was abolished at a time when incidents of terror had significantly decreased. “We need to have the death penalty in the case of terrorism, war and widespread violence because the death penalty has a deterrent effect. The states of the European Union have abolished the death penalty because they do not face acts of terror like Turkey does,” he said.