Turkish Top Court Receives AKP Closure Case Report

top prosecutor wants the pro-reform, pro-business AK Party,closed on charges of seeking to introduce Islamic law in Turkey.

A rapporteur to Turkey's top court filed his recommendation on Wednesday on a case to close the governing party on charges of seeking to introduce Islamic rule, bringing a verdict a step closer.

The rapporteur's report -- which was not immediately made public -- is not binding but has to be presented to the Constitutional Court judges before the case can proceed.

"We are going to meet with our colleagues and have the necessary discussions and after that we are going to put it on the calendar (for hearing the case)," court chairman Hasim Kilic told reporters after receiving the report.

Turkey's financial markets have been unsettled by the case which has triggered months of political uncertainty and raised the prospect of an early parliamentary election if the AK Party is closed.

A top prosecutor wants the pro-reform, pro-business AK Party, which has roots in political Islam, closed on charges of seeking to introduce Islamic law in Turkey. The prosecutor also wants leading party members, including Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan, banned from party politics for five years.

A verdict is expected by early August.

The court is not obliged to follow the rapporteur's recommendation and has not done so in recent key rulings.

The AK Party has rejected the charges that it is seeking to impose Islamic rule on the predominantly Muslim but officially secular country. It points to its office in record as proof.

The court case is the latest salvo in a decades-old battle between a secularist elite, which has traditionally controlled Turkey's key institutions, and religious-oriented political parties, today in the shape of the popular AK Party.

Political analysts say the likelihood of the AK Party being closed down has increased since the same court last month overturned a constitutional amendment to allow students to wear the Islamic headscarf at university. The garment plays a central role in the prosecutor's case against the party.

Turkey has long been divided along ideological and religious lines, stemming back to the foundation of modern Turkey on the ashes of the Ottoman Empire in 1923. The republic's founder Mustafa Kemal Ataturk removed religion from public life and redirected Turkey towards the West.

Turkey's old guard see it as its duty to defend Ataturk's principle of secularism and now accuse the AK Party of seeking to relax the strict rules governing religion.

Critics say the case is a political move to use the judiciary, packed with secularist judges, to remove a democratically elected party from power. Turkey has banned more than 20 political parties for Islamist or Kurdish separatist activities, but never a party as popular as the AK Party.