ISTANBUL, Turkey - Turkey's newest political party, seeking to topple the government of ailing Prime Minister Bulent Ecevit, will work to overcome divisions between religious and secular forces that have embittered the country's politics in the past, its founder said.
Ismail Cem, who resigned last week from his post as Ecevit's foreign minister, told the daily Sabah newspaper that the party's organization would take shape this week, after a meeting Monday with 46 lawmakers who quit Ecevit's party to join the new movement.
Cem said the party would be tolerant of Turkish women who wear the Islamic-style headscarf. In strictly secular Turkey, the headscarf is barred for university students and public sector workers, and the ban has created intense political controversy.
"I have never had a problem with people wearing headscarves. Why should I have?" Cem said. "We are not concerned with headscarves, but with modern attitudes."
The division between Islam and secularism has often inflamed Turkish politics, notably when the fiercely secular army forced a pro-Islamic government out of office in 1997.
Cem said Kemal Dervis, the economy minister expected to be a key member of the breakaway party, might not attend the new party's meeting this week.
Dervis offered his resignation last week, but was persuaded to stay on by President Ahmet Necdet Sezer to avoid damage to Turkey's fragile economy. He has backed the new party, enraging nationalists who are the largest group remaining in the struggling coalition government.
"If any member of the Cabinet is involved with new movements outside the government, he must make a personal choice," nationalist leader Devlet Bahceli told daily Hurriyet. "You can't do both; it's unseemly and I consider it unethical."
Nationalists are expected to step up pressure for Dervis' departure in the coming days. Financial markets, which plunged last week amid reports that Dervis had quit, will monitor the future of a minister who is the chief architect of an economic recovery plan backed by billions of dollars in International Monetary Fund loans.
Defections from Ecevit's party have reduced the government's majority in the 550-seat parliament to just 12, and the squabbling three-party coalition faces a fight for survival.
Two of its partners are calling for early elections in the autumn. The government may not even survive until then. Ecevit has admitted that more resignations could bring the coalition down, while the center-right Motherland Party has hinted it could pull out.
The party, which supports reforms to help Turkey join the European Union, was expected to meet Monday to discuss the government's future. The nationalist party strongly opposes the reforms and has promised to block them while it remains in power.