Demirel, Süleyman

Demirel, Süleyman (1924- ), ninth President of Turkey (1993- ), Prime Minister of Turkey (1965-1971, 1975-1977, 1979-1980, 1991-1993). Born in Islamköy and an engineer by training, he joined the Justice Party in 1961 and three years later emerged as its leader. When the party won the 1965 elections, he became Prime Minister. Demirel followed a moderate pro-Western policy and won re-election in 1969, but growing political violence in the country led the army to demand his resignation in 1971. After a series of governments failed, Demirel returned to office in 1975. He lost the 1977 elections but regained power in 1979. With Turkey's unemployment at 20 per cent, however, Demirel was unable to stop the political terrorism that continued to plague the country, and in 1980 a military government replaced him. He was banned from politics for ten years under the 1982 constitution, but became Prime Minister in November 1991 as head of the True Path Party. Demirel became Turkey's president in May 1993 when parliament chose him to replace Turgut Özal, who had died while in office.

He opposed the plan, put forward by Tansu Çiller and others, for a customs union with the European Union. After the collapse of Çiller's government, Demirel asked Necmettin Erbakan, leader of the Islamicist Welfare Party, to form a government in January 1996; after some months of rule by an anti-Islamicist coalition, Erbakan eventually formed a coalition with Çiller in July. In May 1996 Demirel narrowly escaped assassination by a mentally unbalanced Islamic militant in a shopping centre in Izmit. In January 1997 he held talks with the Turkish Cypriot leader, Rauf Denktash, to affirm Turkey's readiness to assist its satellite regime in northern Cyprus militarily against Greece. In February 1997 he convened a meeting of Turkey's National Security Council, attended by Çiller and the Chief of the General Staff, increasing pressure on Prime Minister Erbakan's government over his Islamicist policies. In June 1997 he accepted Erbakan's resignation, but instead of allowing Çiller to replace Erbakan as Prime Minister, he asked the conservative Motherland Party to form a new secularist administration. After the collapse of Yilmaz's government in November 1998, he invited Bülent Ecevit to form a government.