Demonstrators take part in a protest at the mausoleum of Mustafa Kemal Ataturk, founder of modern and secular Turkey, in Ankara yesterday. Thousands of anti-government protesters marched in the capital, calling on Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan to resign.

ANKARA (Reuters) – Thousands of anti-government protesters marched in Turkey’s capital yesterday, calling on Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan to resign for what they say are violations of the country’s secular principles. About 20,000 people waving red-and-white Turkish flags and carrying banners reading “Secular Turkey will stay secular” walked from the central square of Tandogan to the mausoleum of Mustafa Kemal Ataturk, founder of the modern Turkish Republic.

Demonstrators were also protesting the government’s handling of the economy as unemployment reaches a record high amid the global economic downturn. Some denounced the so-called Ergenekon probe into a suspected nationalist group accused of conspiring to topple Erdogan’s government.

Erdogan’s opponents have said he wants to make Turkey more overtly Islamic through incremental steps, like failed attempts to end a ban on the Islamic-style headscarf at universities. The ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) narrowly escaped a ban last year on charges it was undermining Turkey’s secular constitution. “May the hand that touches the judiciary break,” some banners said at the march. The European Union has said Turkey must reform its national charter to guarantee human rights like freedom of religion and expression if it is to make progress in its membership bid.

The Ankara march was organized by the secularist Ataturk Thought Association, which has been implicated in the Ergenekon investigation.

ALEPPO (AFP) – Turkish President Abdullah Gul said yesterday that efforts by some European countries to block Ankara’s entry into the 27-member European Union were “unacceptable.” “There has been a unanimous decision [by the Europeans] to start negotiations with Turkey” on its accession to the European Union, Gul told reporters on the sidelines of an official trip to neighboring Syria.

“Any discussion on this is tantamount to violating the decisions taken by the EU and would mean that the decision to start negotiations with Turkey were not sincere, that the heads of state took a decision that did not reflect their intentions,” Gul said.

“It would be unacceptable,” Gul said, referring to France and Germany.

French President Nicolas Sarkozy and German Chancellor Angela Merkel have both recently reiterated their opposition to Turkey’s EU membership and suggested a special status for the Muslim-majority but secular country.

Sarkozy has also said that Ankara did not have the “vocation” needed to join the European bloc and that Europe must have “frontiers.” Turkey began membership talks in 2005, but has so far opened negotiations on only 10 of the 35 policy areas that candidates must complete.