Turkey stepped back from the brink of political turmoil yesterday when the ruling party narrowly escaped closure over its alleged Islamist tendencies.

After three days of deliberations, six of the eleven judges in the country’s Constitutional Court voted to ban the Justice and Development (AK) party, led by Recep Tayyip Erdogan, the Prime Minister. Seven votes were needed for a majority verdict.

Instead the court decided to cut the party’s Treasury funding for this year by half — amounting to little more than a slap on the wrist for AK, which stirred controversy by promoting Muslim headscarves.

The court’s chief judge nevertheless insisted that the fine was a warning. “I hope the party in question will evaluate the outcome very well and get the message it should get,” Hasim Kilic, the court’s chairman, said.

“We can see that there is tension in society . . . We must do all we can for sustainable conditions to be created for people to be able to live together whatever ideas or beliefs they hold,” said Mr Kilic — the only member of the court to vote to reject the case.

Officials of AK, whose roots lie in Islamist politics, hailed the verdict. “It is a victory for Turkish democracy,” Faruk Çelik, the Labour Minister, said.

“The uncertainty which Turkey was facing has been removed by this verdict,” Mr Erdogan said. “What a pity that since the case was opened in March, Turkey has faced a serious loss of time and energy,” he added.

The court’s decision ends months of uncertainty and opens the way for Turkey to pursue its international interests once more. It has recently adopted a key role in Middle East peace talks. A vote to close a party with nearly 50 per cent support in elections last year would have also harmed Turkey’s EU membership aspirations.

In Brussels officials expressed relief at the verdict. “I encourage Turkey now to resume with full energy its reforms to modernise the country,” said Olli Rehn, the European Commissioner for Enlargement.

Mr Erdogan, pledging his commitment to Turkey’s EU membership bid, said that AK would carefully study the ruling and step up efforts to heal political divisions. Optimists expected this to lead to a greater attempt at reaching out to all sections by a party accused of arrogance. The Government is now expected to consult more broadly as it seeks to reform the Constitution, which was written after a coup in 1980. It may also redouble efforts to harmonise Turkish laws and regulations with those of the EU.

The court’s admonition was not just directed at AK, but at all parties caught up in the political paralysis that has wrecked Turkey since AK’s first election victory in 2002. Analysts say that the country has been deadlocked by a struggle between the secularist old guard and Mr Erdogan’s traditionalists. The secularist elite, which has controlled Turkey since it became a modern republic 85 years ago, includes the powerful military, the judiciary and bureaucracy.

Mr Erdogan’s pro-EU, pro-free markets party has the backing of a rising social class of devout Muslims but also liberals and open-minded voters pleased with the Government’s first-term reforms.

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