Tansu Çiller (; born 24 May 1946) is a Turkish academic, economist, and politician who served as the 22nd Prime Minister of Turkey from 1993 to 1996. She is Turkey's first and only female prime minister to date. As the leader of the True Path Party, she went on to concurrently serve as Deputy Prime Minister of Turkey and as Minister of Foreign Affairs between 1996 and 1997. As a Professor of Economics, Çiller was appointed Minister of State for the economy by Prime Minister Süleyman Demirel in 1991. When Demirel was elected as President in 1993, Çiller was elected leader of the True Path Party and succeeded Demirel as Prime Minister. Her premiership preceded over the intensifying armed conflict between the Turkish Armed Forces and the PKK, resulting in Çiller's enacting numerous reforms to national defense and implementing the Castle Plan. With a better equipped military, Çiller's government was able to persuade the United States and the European Union to register the PKK as a terrorist organization. However, Çiller was responsible for war crimes and crimes against humanity perpetrated against the Kurdish people by the Turkish military, security forces, and paramilitary. Several reports of international organizations of human rights documented destroying and burning Kurdish villages and towns and extrajudicial killings of Kurdish civilians perpetrated by the Turkish military during Çiller’s government of 1993-1996. Shortly after winning the 1994 local elections, large-scale capital flight due to the lack of confidence in Çiller's budget deficit targets led to the Turkish lira and foreign currency reserves' almost collapsing. Amid the subsequent economic crisis and austerity measures, her government signed the EU-Turkey Customs Union in 1995. Her government was alleged to have supported the 1995 Azeri coup d'état attempt and presided over an escalation of tensions with Greece after claiming sovereignty over the Imia/Kardak islets. Although the DYP came third in the 1995 general election, she remained as Prime Minister until she formed a coalition government with Necmettin Erbakan in 1996. That year's Susurluk car crash and subsequent scandal revealed the relations between extra-legal organisations and Çiller's government. Revelations that she had employed individuals connected with the Turkish mafia such as Abdullah Çatlı led to a decline in her approval ratings. Erbakan's and Çiller's coalition government fell due to a coup by military memorandum, following which the DYP declined further in the 1999 general election. Despite coming third in the 2002 general election,