EU says move to ban ruling Turkish party 'undemocratic'[fr][de] 

"In a normal European democracy, political issues are debated in the parliament and decided through the ballot box, not in the court rooms," Rehn commented following Turkey’s chief prosecutor’s decision to ask the Constitutional Court to ban Prime Minister Recep Tayip Erdogan's AKP, accusing it of anti-secular activities.

"The executive shouldn’t meddle into the court’s work, while the legal system shouldn’t meddle into democratic politics," Rehn added. 

Heavy criticism also came from the German government, which said the proposal would undermine Turkey's efforts to join the EU. Germany's foreign minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier however said he was confident that the Court would ultimately reject the request to outlaw the party. 

The EU's Slovenian Presidency urged Turkey’s leaders not to let the issue distract attention from the reforms necessary for moving membership talks forward. 

The banning request comes just weeks after the pro-secular opposition party introduced a file contesting the validity of constitutional amendments, made by the Parliament in February, to allow women to wear Islamic headscarves at universities. 

Turkey’s chief prosecutor Abdurraham Yalcinkaya said, on 14 March, that he had enough evidence to prove that the AKP had violated the country’s secular constitution, which forbids any religious influence on the operation of the state. 

The AKP has Islamic roots, but its leader Erdogan insists that the party’s political views have changed. He further argues that the headscarf ban unfairly prevents large numbers of girls from attending higher education in a nation where about two thirds of women wear the scarf. 

"The action taken is not aimed at the Justice and Development Party but the will of the nation," he stressed. 

According to a government official, Erdogan’s government is currently discussing with officials from the AKP a legal strategy in case the Court accepts the prosecutor’s request. One possibility is that the government change the law to make banning political parties more difficult and strip prosecutors of some powers, Turkish newspapers reported. 

The Constitutional Court said it had begun assessing the request yesterday (17 March) and will decide within 10 days whether to hear the case. 

Since the 1970s, the top Court has already ordered the closing down of four other Islamic-oriented parties on similar grounds. 

The prosecutor also wants Erdogan himself and 70 other persons, including President Abdullah Gul, banned from politics for five years.