Ertuğrul Özkök (born 8 April 1947) is a Turkish journalist and a daily columnist. Between 1990 and 2010, he was the editor-in-chief for ''

Hürriyet ''Hürriyet'' (, ''Liberty'') is one of the major Turkish newspapers, founded in 1948. , it had the highest circulation of any newspaper in Turkey at around 319,000. ''Hürriyet'' has a mainstream, liberal and conservative outlook. ''Hürriyet ...

'', a daily newspaper published in Turkish in

Turkey Turkey ( tr, Türkiye ), officially the Republic of Türkiye ( tr, Türkiye Cumhuriyeti, links=no ), is a transcontinental country located mainly on the Anatolian Peninsula in Western Asia, with a small portion on the Balkan Peninsula in ...

and some European countries. Özkök is known for advocating modernization of Turkey, globalization, women's rights and Turkey's European Union accession. He is also known for his strong relationships with Turkey's and

Europe Europe is a large peninsula conventionally considered a continent in its own right because of its great physical size and the weight of its history and traditions. Europe is also considered a subcontinent of Eurasia and it is located entirel ...

's top politicians, journalists and business people.

Early life

Özkök was born in

İzmir İzmir ( , ; ), also spelled Izmir, is a metropolitan city in the western extremity of Anatolia, capital of the province of the same name. It is the third most populous city in Turkey, after Istanbul and Ankara and the second largest urban aggl ...

a few years after his parents had to migrate to Istanbul. Both his father, who had made a name as a prominent printer of İzmir, and his mother are from

Kardzhali Kardzhali ( bg, Кърджали , ''Kărdžali''; tr, Kırcaali; gr, Κάρτζαλι, ''Kártzali''), sometimes spelt Kardžali or Kurdzhali, is a town in the Eastern Rhodopes in Bulgaria, centre of Kardzhali Municipality and Kardzhali Pro ...

Bulgaria Bulgaria (; bg, България, Bǎlgariya), officially the Republic of Bulgaria,, ) is a country in Southeast Europe. It is situated on the eastern flank of the Balkans, and is bordered by Romania to the north, Serbia and North Macedo ...

. He graduated from İzmir

Namık Kemal Lisesi Namik or Namık is a masculine given name. Notable people with the name include: * Namig Abdullayev (born 1971), Azerbaijani wrestler * Namik Dokle (born 1946), Albanian politician * Namık Gedik (1911–1960), Turkish physician and politician ...

and did his university studies in

Paris Paris () is the Capital city, capital and List of communes in France with over 20,000 inhabitants, most populous city of France, with an estimated population of 2,165,423 residents in 2019 in an area of more than 105 km² (41 sq mi), ma ...

France France (), officially the French Republic ( ), is a country primarily located in Western Europe. It also comprises of overseas regions and territories in the Americas and the Atlantic, Pacific and Indian Oceans. Its metropolitan area ...

Political views and public perception

In September 2010 Özkök said that "I believe in God but I am not religious." (Turkish: Ben Allah’a inanan bir insanım, ama dindar değilim.) He also identifies himself as a White Turk, a sociological group he has been describing. He was against the wearing of the

Islamic headscarf In modern usage, hijab ( ar, حجاب, translit=ḥijāb, ) generally refers to headcoverings worn by Muslim women. Many Muslims believe it is obligatory for every female Muslim who has reached the age of puberty to wear a head covering. While ...

Merve Kavakçı Merve is a feminine Turkish given name of Arabic origin. It has two meanings: # Pebble # One of the two sacred hills in Mecca, Saudi Arabia between which Muslims travel back and forth seven times as part of the ritual pilgrimages. Merve is mentioned ...

in the

Parliament of Turkey The Grand National Assembly of Turkey ( tr, ), usually referred to simply as the TBMM or Parliament ( tr, or ''Parlamento''), is the unicameral Turkish legislature. It is the sole body given the legislative prerogatives by the Turkish Consti ...

, stating in a 1999 article titled ''Ecevit o gece neleri kurtardı'' (What Ecevit Saved that Night), " Ecevit is like that head of parliament who stood against the soldiers who overran the Parliament of Spain. He stood up in front of an ideology that overran Parliament. History will write what was prevented in Turkey by that speech that night, and what a historical importance Ecevit's scolding speech there carried. The lessons Ms. Merve received from those little students at school, when she went to pick her kids, are the first signs of the process of letting her know her limits."

Notes

External links

Archive of Ertuğrul Özkök articles in Hürriyet
1947 births Living people Writers from İzmir Turkish journalists Turkish columnists Hürriyet people Turkish people of Bulgarian descent {{Turkey-journalist-stub