New charter won't harm Turkish secularism-minister

ANKARA, Sep 7 (Reuters) Government plans to overhaul Turkey's constitution will bolster, not threaten, the country's secular system of government, Justice Minister Mehmet Ali Sahin said.

Turkey's secular elite, which includes army generals, top judges and the main opposition party, suspect the ruling Islamist-rooted AK Party of wanting to undermine the separation of state and religion, a claim the party strongly denies.

''Nobody should block the country's path using the politics of fear... Secularism will be strengthened (by the planned changes),'' Sahin told private broadcaster NTV in an interview yesterday.

The AK Party, which won re-election in July polls with 47 percent of the vote, says the present constitution, dating back to a period of army rule after a 1980 coup, hampers Turkey's reform drive aimed at taking it into the European Union.

But secularists fear the changes could include a lifting of the ban on Muslim headscarves in universities and public offices and more rights for the large ethnic Kurdish minority, moves they say will undermine secularism and national unity.

Sahin said the AK Party had not yet prepared a draft text but said officials and academic experts would discuss planned changes next week. The process of preparing a new constitution is expected to take many months.

Sahin did not comment on what the new text might contain but he reaffirmed the government's plans to trim the powers of the president. He confirmed that voters would be asked to endorse this change in a referendum scheduled for October 21.

Under the current constitution, the president can veto laws once and appoints key officials. The AK Party, often at odds with former president Ahmet Necdet Sezer, a staunch secularist, says these powers undermine Turkey's parliamentary system.

Abdullah Gul, who served as foreign minister and deputy prime minister in the previous AK Party government, was elected head of state by parliament last month.

REUTERS VD HS0850