Turkey nears 100 years as a republic

Next year will be the one hundredth anniversary of the founding of the Turkish Republic when Mustafa Kemal Ataturk was elected as the country's first president. He was also the man perhaps most instrumental in defeating the Anzac and Allied forces at Gallipoli in 1915. He led the Turkish counter attacks which swept New Zealand troops off Chunuk Bair, the dominant range of hills on the peninsula which came to define defeat or victory. Later as President he transformed Turkey into a secular country. New civil and legal codes were adopted along European lines. The wearing of the traditional Fez headwear was outlawed and the Turkish alphabet was changed into Latin script. But what sort of country is Turkey today under the government of President Erdogan? Ece Temelkuran is a Turkish writer who's written books about her homeland like The Insane and the Melancholy.