Former Turkish prime minister Bulent Ecevit, the man who sent Turkish troops into northern Cyrprus in 1974, quit the leadership of his Democratic Left Party on Sunday, ending a 50-year political career.
Ecevit, 79, who sent the troops in after a Greek coup on the Mediterranean island, also headed the previous coalition government that won European Union candidacy for Turkey in 1999.
In a farewell address to party members, Ecevit urged the government to stick to the secularist reforms of modern Turkey's founder Mustafa Kemal Ataturk.
"We in Turkey should first consolidate the secularism of Ataturk before working to open the doors to the EU," he said.
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