{"id":7002,"date":"2026-02-09T21:10:10","date_gmt":"2026-02-09T21:10:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/7002\/"},"modified":"2026-02-09T21:10:10","modified_gmt":"2026-02-09T21:10:10","slug":"undoing-turkeys-founding-vision-is-treason-far-right-ally-says-in-veiled-warning-to-erdogan","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/7002\/","title":{"rendered":"Undoing Turkey\u2019s founding vision is \u2018treason,\u2019 far-right ally says in veiled warning to Erdo\u011fan"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Far-right Nationalist Movement Party (MHP) leader Devlet Bah\u00e7eli warned Monday that attempts to alter Turkey\u2019s founding principles or its unitary state structure amount to \u201ctreason,\u201d in remarks that analysts read as a message aimed at his ally, President Recep Tayyip Erdo\u011fan, as his ruling party weighs steps tied to a peace with Kurdish militants and a possible new constitution, Turkish Minute<\/a> reported.<\/p>\n

Speaking at an event in Ankara marking the 57th anniversary of the MHP, Bah\u00e7eli said opening \u201cthe founding principles and structure of the Republic\u201d to debate and attempting to \u201cdestroy them based on ethnic differences\u201d would undermine the state\u2019s existence. \u201cThis is also called treason,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Bah\u00e7eli, whose MHP is Erdo\u011fan\u2019s ruling Justice and Development Party\u2019s (AKP) main parliamentary ally and a part of pro-Erdo\u011fan electoral alliance called People\u2019s Alliance, framed Ankara as a symbol of Turkey\u2019s unitary structure, pointing to the founding year of the republic in 1923.<\/p>\n

Even though he did not name Erdo\u011fan or the AKP, Bah\u00e7eli\u2019s language echoed Turkey\u2019s long-running political red lines around the first articles of the constitution, which define the state as secular, unitary and name Ankara as the capital, provisions widely treated in Turkish politics as off-limits for change.<\/p>\n

In the same speech Bah\u00e7eli tried to draw a distinction between ethnic nationalism and citizenship-based civic nationalism, arguing that \u201cany form of racist nationalism based on blood ties and ancestry\u201d is contrary to Turkish nationalism. He said the Turkish nation would carry its \u201cvictorious past\u201d into the future \u201cwith the Turk and the Kurd,\u201d presenting that unity as a duty to be fulfilled \u201ceven at the cost of our lives.\u201d<\/p>\n

Bah\u00e7eli also used the anniversary address to attack political figures who have left his party or shifted alliances, calling them \u201cpolitical converts\u201d and deriding what he described as opportunism among self-described nationalists.<\/p>\n

The remarks came as Turkey\u2019s ruling camp tries to maintain their nationalist base while exploring steps that could lower tensions with Kurdish political actors and address a conflict that has killed tens of thousands since the 1980s.<\/p>\n

The Kurdistan Workers\u2019 Party (PKK), which is designated a terrorist organization by Turkey and its Western allies, has waged an insurgency since 1984. A previous peace initiative collapsed in 2015. In early 2025 the PKK declared a ceasefire after a call by its imprisoned leader, Abdullah \u00d6calan, for the group to lay down arms and disband, steps that would have major implications for domestic politics and for Kurdish armed groups in neighboring Syria and Iraq.<\/p>\n

At the same time Erdo\u011fan has repeatedly signaled interest over the years in replacing Turkey\u2019s 1982 constitution, a document drafted after a military coup. The politics of any rewrite are sensitive because Turkish nationalists have long opposed constitutional amendments that could alter how citizenship, language and the unitary state are defined, areas closely tied to Kurdish demands for greater cultural and political recognition.<\/p>\n

Some commentators have argued that winning support from the pro-Kurdish Peoples\u2019 Equality and Democracy Party (DEM Party) could become relevant in any constitutional push that requires votes beyond the AKP-MHP bloc, even as the DEM Party operates under sustained legal and political pressure.<\/p>\n

Erdo\u011fan, who has governed Turkey for more than two decades, sent Bah\u00e7eli an arrangement of 57 roses shaped as the Turkish flag to mark the party\u2019s anniversary. Bah\u00e7eli publicly thanked Erdo\u011fan for the gesture during the program at a venue in Ankara.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Far-right Nationalist Movement Party (MHP) leader Devlet Bah\u00e7eli warned Monday that attempts to alter Turkey\u2019s founding principles or…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":7003,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[83],"tags":[5952,5953,5954,5955,5956,2911,314,131,132,155],"class_list":{"0":"post-7002","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-stockholm","8":"tag-devlet-bahceli","9":"tag-kurdish-issue","10":"tag-kurdistan-workers-party-pkk","11":"tag-nationalist-movement-party-mhp","12":"tag-peace-initiative","13":"tag-peoples-equality-and-democracy-party-dem-party","14":"tag-president-recep-tayyip-erdogan","15":"tag-stockholm","16":"tag-sweden","17":"tag-turkey"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7002","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7002"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7002\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/7003"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7002"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7002"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7002"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}