How likely is secular democracy in the Middle East?

Ambassador Feridun Sinirlioğlu, a former Undersecretary at the Foreign Ministry who is Turkey's new "point man" at the U.N., believes the Middle East has to move toward a secular and democratic future.

"We also see that this multicultural region needs a secular and democratic future on the basis of freedom of religion and belief," Sinirlioğlu said in an interview with Hürriyet's Cansu Çamlıbel, just prior to flying off to New York to assume his post as Turkey's Permanent Representative to the U.N.

"The Arab Spring, which started in 2011, also began with the same demand. People were demanding democracy. Democracy and secularism were both on the agenda," he added.

Despite current problems and seemingly insurmountable difficulties in this regard, Sinirlioğlu remains an optimist. According to him, "the Middle East will eventually get a secular democracy established as a reflection of the people's consent and will," even though "this process may take time."

Diplomats are pessimists by profession but optimists in public. Still, we must give Sinirlioğlu some benefit of the doubt. It is not impossible that a secular democratic future awaits the Middle East. Whether it is probable, though, as long as the current hold of religion on all aspects of life in the region continues is another question. 

Given the mess that followed the Arab Spring as the established order in region - and the potentially emerging order, as in the case of the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt - worked to undermine democracy, let alone a secular democracy, the prospects in the Middle East for attaining what Sinirlioğlu suggests seem dimmer than ever.

It is true, as Sinirlioglu said, that the Arab Spring started off with a demand for democracy. But whether...