ousted from the party in 1962. He was re-elected to the party's ruling committee taking second highest votes, thus joining the party again. He served as the Turkish representative at the Council of Europe between 1961 and 1970, and was elected as deputy secretary general in 1961. In 1969, he was appointed as a member of the UN International Law Commission in The Hague, Netherlands. In Turkey, after a spree of political violence, and the coup by memorandum, the army forced the resignation of prime minister Süleyman Demirel on 12 March 1971. Nihat Erim, while still at the university, was advised to withdraw from his post in the Republican People's Party (CHP) by the National Security Council, which was then heavily influenced by the military. Prime Minister He was appointed a neutral and technocratic prime minister on 26 March 1971 to form a "national unity" coalition government (see 33rd government of Turkey), the first of a series of weak governments until the elections in 1973. During his tenure he ruled out the existence of another nationality living in Turkey and the Kurdish population in the country was oppressed. One of the actions in regards of the Kurdish question during Erim's prime ministry was the closing down of the Workers Party of Turkey (, TİP) for its recognition of the Kurds as a distinct ethnicity. Erim was forced to resign when 11 technocratic ministers of his cabinet resigned as a body on 3 December 1971. However, he was appointed once more by the President Cevdet Sunay, and he formed his second cabinet on 11 December 1971. He resigned on 17 April 1972 on health grounds, when his decision to promulgate decree laws was not backed by the parliament. His resignation was approved on 22 May 1972, and Ferit Melen, representative of the Van Province and minister of national defense in his cabinet, was appointed as the new prime minister and formed his own cabinet. During his premiership, a significant contribution he made to Turkish politics was to form a ministry of culture (today in the form of the Ministry of Culture and Tourism), which was until then a mere department within the ministry of education. He appointed Talat Halman, journalist-writer, as the minister to this newly formed post. His government's prohibition of opium poppy harvesting in June 1971 under US pressure fired controversy. A change in the constitution brought together a