The Presidency of the Assembly has made the Democratic Party (DP) Parliamentary Group meeting minutes accessible to researchers in electronic environment.
The 260-volume "DP Parliamentary Group Negotiation Minutes", which is included in the rare books collection of the Turkish Grand National Assembly Library and Archive Services Presidency, as microfilm, has been transferred to the digital environment.
The summaries and records of the minutes recorded with a typewriter were also made available for research by word scanning.
The minutes of the Parliamentary Group meetings held by the DP starting from 1950, when it came to power, until the 1960 military coup, are of special importance as they are the only Parliamentary Group meeting minutes of a party throughout the history of the Republic.
DP GROUP MEETING MINUTES AS AN ARCHIVE DOCUMENT
The minutes are unique archival documents for those who examine the political structure and democracy processes of the period. The course of opposition-government relations in terms of the history of multi-party democracy can be observed in the minutes, in which the complaints of DP deputies, their different attitudes and differences of opinion within the party are examined. Although political and economic issues come to the fore in the debated issues, the political structure of the period, the effects of the president and prime minister on the party, and the bilateral relations can be investigated from the minutes.
FIRST ASSESSMENTS OF THE KOREAN WAR
Group meeting minutes, which included the first evaluations of DP Chairman and Prime Minister Adnan Menderes, ministers and DP deputies on the Korean War, which started due to the invasion of South Korea by North Korea on June 25, 1950, were also made available. In the first group meeting held after the Turkish Grand National Assembly took the decision to send soldiers to Korea on June 30, 1950, the minutes reflecting that then Foreign Minister Fuat Köprülü informing the party group about the Korean War are among the documents made available. The minutes of the meeting, in which Menderes read the government program at the first parliamentary group meeting held on 28 May 1950 after the DP came to power, and addressed the party group for the last time before the 27 May 1960 coup, were also shared. It was stated that making these minutes, which shed light on one of the most important processes of the Republican period, to the access of researchers will be a source for researches regarding this period.