TURKEY - May 2 - Turkey's PM Calls For Early Elections.

PM Recep Tayyip Erdogan of Turkey asks Parliament to approve early national elections, and his party begins to press for several constitutional changes that will bring it advantages in the campaign. Elections had been scheduled for Nov. 4, but are being moved up after Turkey's highest court May 1 annulled a parliamentary vote for president, effectively blocking the candidacy of FM Abdullah Gul, a close ally of Erdogan's with a background in Islamic politics. The ruling placed Erdogan's party, known by its Turkish initials, AK, in a standoff with the secular establishment in Turkey. Erdogan suggested holding the election June 24. But Turkey's electoral board, which sets the date and oversees elections, countered later May 2 with a proposal for a vote July 22, and the Parliament's constitutional committee agreed to that. The decision now passes to the general assembly, which was expected to approve the July date, probably on May 3. "We have established that we can hold elections on July 22", at the earliest, said the electoral board chairman, Muammer Aydin, according to the state-run Anatolia press agency. Erdogan's party also proposed two constitutional amendments that it wanted to push through Parliament before elections. The first would let candidates as young as 25 qualify to be on the ballot. The party's supporters are overwhelmingly young and its candidates tend to be younger as well. And on May 2 night, the constitutional committee backed the proposal. A second initiative from Erdogan's party would allow the president, the highest secular office in Turkey, to be chosen by popular vote, taking the decision out of the hands of Parliament. "Our wish is to place two ballot boxes before the people", Erdogan said. Some of the opposition parties are strongly against the initiatives, but some are in favor, and Erdogan would need only a handful of votes outside his party to pass them. Turkey has held eight early national elections since adopting a multiparty system in 1946. The day before, in a speech before party members May 1 night, Erdogan struck back at the court ruling, calling its decision "a bullet for democracy". Erdogan said that he would prevail in the ballot box and his confidence did not flag by May 2, as he seemed to speak directly to the Republican People's Party, the secularist opposition party that had filed the case to block Gul's candidacy. "Now you're going to see who's going to run away and who's going to remain in the arena", he said. In a largely procedural move, the Parliament also set a schedule for a continuation of the presidential vote. The AK party knows that there is virtually no chance that Gul could be confirmed, but the law requires that a constitutional process like the election of the president must continue once it has begun. "Our ideas, our lifestyles may be different, but we are one nation and one country", Erdogan said. "Nobody can overshadow this". The EU warns the Turkish military to stay out of the political crisis, The AP said. The EU enlargement commissioner, Olli Rehn, said that Turkey must abide by the rule of law.