ANKARA (Reuters) – Turkish authorities charged on Saturday 13 ultra-nationalists, including retired army officers, with involvement in plans for a violent uprising against the government, Turkish media said. The court decision followed the arrests of dozens of people this week in a police investigation into a far-right group known as Ergenekon. Turkish media say the group was plotting a series of bomb attacks and assassinations. Retired Brigadier General Veli Kucuk, retired Major Zekeriya Ozturk and lawyer Kemal Kerencsiz were among those facing charges of inciting people to armed revolt.

ISTANBUL (AFP) – Turkish PM Recep Tayyip Erdogan said Saturday he wants a ban on the Islamic headscarf in universities abolished “as soon as possible” despite harsh objections from secularists, Anatolia news reported. Erdogan rejected accusations that the Justice and Development Party (AKP) was seeking to erode secular traditions. “How can you say that people who wear the headscarf are not secular? We have a society in which those who cover up and those who do not both defend the democratic and secular state,” he told a gathering of the AKP in Istanbul.

Bulgaria will not recognize Kosovo independence immediately, President Georgi Parvanov said yesterday, calling on the EU to adopt a common position on the subject. “Bulgaria will not be among the countries to immediately recognize Kosovo,” Parvanov told a press conference. “We want the EU to adopt a common position on the Balkans. We need a solution that guarantees stability in the region, including good relations between neighbors,” he added. (AFP)

President Stipe Mesic said on Saturday, the eve of International Holocaust Remembrance Day, that Croatia must face up to its World War II history if it wants to fully integrate into Europe. “We remember the Holocaust not only because this heinous crime should never be forgotten in order to prevent its repetition, but also as it was happening also here on Croatia’s territory and since Croatians also took part in it,” Mesic said in a statement. During World War II Croatia was ruled by the Nazi-allied Ustasha regime, which killed hundreds of thousands of Serbs, Jews, Roma and anti-fascist Croatians in concentration camps. (AFP)

Bulgarian President Georgi Parvanov proposed yesterday to hold a referendum on changes to the electoral system aimed at diminishing voter apathy. If approved by Parliament, the proposed referendum would be the country’s first since the fall of communism in 1989. “Bulgaria is the only country in the EU that has not held a referendum during its democratic period,” Parvanov told a press conference in Sofia. (AFP)