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  • Turkey’s Kurdish question demands brave new moves

    Turkey’s Kurdish question demands brave new moves

    Turkey’s Kurdish question demands brave new moves

    By Kaya Genç November 17, 2011, 6:21 pm

    ISTANBUL, Turkey: Who could have imagined that one day pedestrians in Istanbul’s most artistic and liberal neighborhood of Cihangir would stumble upon a massive wall of graffiti that reads, simply and terrifyingly, “Exterminate all Kurds”? That day came earlier this month.

    Something has happened in Turkey that has made racism, once again, an everyday occurrence. Yet there are concrete steps that can be taken to halt a seemingly endless cycle of hatred.

    Turkey’s 30-year conflict with Kurdish separatists has created an ideal habitat for racism. Ethnically different from the majority of Turks, many Kurds have supported a political movement that has aimed, among other things, to legalize the use of the Kurdish language and expand Kurdish rights in the public sphere. Kurds have also felt discriminated against in terms of where they could live and the schools they could enroll in. One radical group, the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK), adopted a secessionist agenda and has used violence against Turkish security forces, as well as civilians, sparking sporadic clashes between the PKK and the Turkish government over the last three decades.

    Over the years, a number of attempts have been made to defuse the conflict. For instance, in 2002 Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan lifted the state of emergency in the Kurdish-populated areas in eastern Turkey and in 2009 his government began what he called the “Kurdish opening”, a multi-pronged approach to resolving tensions between the Turkish government and the country’s Kurdish population.

    Turkey’s state television soon began broadcasts in Kurdish, and economic and political relations with the Kurdistan Regional Government in Iraq provided a more peaceful and democratic atmosphere that was publicly supported by both Turkish and Kurdish intellectuals.

    During the last two years, however, things began to go alarmingly wrong, resulting in public disputes between Turkish and Kurdish politicians. Some of Erdoğan’s political maneuvers were labeled fascist by Kurdish politicians, while Kurds were accused of pursuing an uncompromising agenda. Both sides then reached, once again, for their weapons.

    It is high time that both sides search for democratic and non-violent solutions.

    A great responsibility lies with Erdoğan’s government. His party should press strongly for dialogue and reform that will provide political solutions to the inequalities Kurds have been subjected to for so long. We don’t yet have comprehensive anti-discrimination legislation, and so Turkey should ratify all international agreements aimed at ending racial discrimination.

    Furthermore, the government and civil society must reassess Article 301 of the Turkish Penal Code, which forbids insulting Turkish identity, Turkey or its government institutions, makes it extremely difficult to have an open discussion on matters related to national identity. It is still in place and used arbitrarily, and is a threat to anyone who belongs to a political or ethnic minority.

    The responsibility to find democratic and peaceful solutions also lies with Turkish Kurds. Political violence in the form of suicide attacks and assaults to military bases have proved to be extremely injurious for Kurdish rights. Putting an end to aggressive attacks towards Turkey’s security forces can contribute to solving the current impasse. Kurdish politicians have enormous influence over their people. They have earned their people’s trust and respect and they will need to take the lead in any political solution.

    After all, the question “What do Kurds want?” is not very difficult to answer. Turkey’s election limit, which excludes parties that have less than ten percent of all votes from the parliament, makes it difficult for comparatively smaller parties — such as the Peace and Democracy Party which represents Kurdish interests — to participate in the political arena. This cut off point should be done away with to allow democratically elected political representation from minority political movements.

    Revising the definition of “Turkishness” in the constitution — making it a general concept rather than one related to a specific race or ethnic group — will also go a long way toward building goodwill.

    In addition, Kurds are asking the government to improve prison conditions for Kurdish political prisoners, including PKK leader Abdullah Öcalan. Even though conditions for inmates have improved dramatically over the last decade, the prison environment for political inmates still remains a concern for many.

    It is not force but an ambitious new political agenda that will bring resolution to Turkey’s greatest conflict of the last century. For Erdoğan and his Kurdish counterparts, these steps will cost little, allowing Turkey to win a long-deserved peace, hopefully wiping out once and for all the horrifying graffiti of the past.

    Kaya Genç is an Istanbul-based novelist and scholar specialising in late Victorian literature. Visit his blog, Musée des Beaux Arts, at kayagenc.blogspot.com. This article was written for the Common Ground News Service (CGNews).

    via Turkey’s Kurdish question demands brave new moves.

  • Turkey’s Kurdish conundrum

    Turkey’s Kurdish conundrum

    Posted By Mohammed Ayoob Wednesday, November 9, 2011 – 4:52 PM Share

    129629447 thisturkey

    Any time spent in Turkey and one cannot help but be taken in by the country’s economic dynamism and political vibrancy that is unique in the region it inhabits. With a 9 percent growth rate in its GDP in 2010, Turkey has become the fastest growing economy in the OECD and is projected to remain so until 2017. Its commitment to democratic governance was demonstrated in the elections earlier this year that kept the ruling AKP in power with almost 50 percent of the votes. That the Turkish democratic process has become irreversible was confirmed soon thereafter by the fact that the resignation of Turkey’s top four generals in an effort to unnerve and destabilize the civilian government hardly created a stir in the country. Even a couple of years ago such a deliberately contrived crisis could have provided the military brass with an excuse for staging a coup.

    In the context of this upbeat picture, which has turned Turkey into a model for Arab democrats next door, the festering Kurdish issue has gained greater saliency both because of increased acts of terrorism by the PKK and, more importantly, because it strikes a highly discordant note in an otherwise bright scenario. The recent escalation of terrorist activity by the PKK can in part be attributed to its declining political appeal among Turkey’s Kurdish citizens who now enjoy cultural and linguistic rights that had been denied to them by the hyper-nationalist Kemalist elite in the first 80 years of the Republic’s existence. The PKK leadership feels that it is in danger of becoming politically irrelevant and has, therefore, escalated terrorist activity to prove that no solution to the Kurdish problem is possible without its participation.

    Turkey’s economic buoyancy has also ensured that large segments of the Kurdish population both in the predominantly Kurdish areas in the east and southeast, as well as in the huge Kurdish diaspora in western and central Turkey (Istanbul is the largest Kurdish city with a reported Kurdish population of 2 million), now have a major stake in the well-being of the Republic. Finally, the rise in PKK’s terrorist activities can be attributed also to the ultra-nationalist backlash amongst a section of Turkish opinion that has put the AKP government on the defensive and forced it to slow down the reform process that could ensure further rights for the Kurdish minority extending beyond the cultural and linguistic spheres. The AKP’s foot-dragging on the issue has led to Kurdish disappointment and in some cases increased sympathy for the PKK fighters after an initial period of rising expectations bordering on euphoria.

    Above all, it seems that the PKK’s recent activities are related to the accelerating process of constitutional reform set in motion by the AKP government after the recent elections. A Preparatory Constitution Commission of 12 members — three each from the four parties represented in parliament including the Kurdish Peace and Democracy Party (BDP) — has been set up to produce a draft constitution to replace the military supervised and crafted 1982 constitution that can be debated in parliament and among the general public. The issue of Kurdish identity (or rather how the identity of Turkish citizens is to be defined in the new constitution) will be one of the main subjects to be discussed by the commission. If, despite the differences on this issue, progress is made toward greater acceptance of a multi-ethnic definition of the Turkish identity, it would take the wind out of the PKK sails.

    The pro-Kurdish BDP, which has 36 members in the 550-member parliament (although six of them are currently in jail allegedly for supporting the PKK), was expected to be a major player in the constitution drafting process. However, it seems to have become hamstrung by its refusal to distance itself from the PKK and its leader Abdullah Ocalan, who is currently imprisoned in Turkey. In conversations BDP leaders repeat ad infinitum that no solution can be found without the concurrence of Ocalan and the PKK fighters who they refer to as “the young men in the mountains”. However, this formula is unacceptable to the other Turkish parties who consider PKK to be a terrorist organization. The BDP, which was beginning to be increasingly perceived as the legitimate face of Kurdish sub-nationalism in Turkey, has drastically reduced its effectiveness as the Kurdish interlocutor in constitutional talks by surrendering its autonomy to the PKK and appearing to many to be nothing more than the latter’s political arm.

    Moreover, BDP leaders constantly repeat the formula that no solution to the Kurdish problem can be found except on the basis of “democratic autonomy”, which they stubbornly refuse to define. When pressed they say that this must be negotiated by the government with Ocalan. While the Turkish government may not be totally averse to such negotiations, as recent reports of talks between MIT, Turkey’s intelligence agency, and PKK leaders have revealed, it would be impossible for any Turkish government to publicly admit that it has been negotiating with what it terms a terrorist organization and its leader. The BDP could have adopted the role of acting as the primary Kurdish interlocutor and negotiating an end to the conflict if it had had the political courage to distance itself from PKK. Unfortunately, it has not been able to grasp this opportunity.

    The BDP’s refusal to define “democratic autonomy” is mirrored by large segments of the Turkish elite, including many in the ruling AKP, who refuse to countenance any derogation from the model of the unitary state and the myth of a monolithic Turkish identity imposed by the Kemalist elite since the early years of the Republic, in defiance of the multi-ethnic nature of Turkish society. It is time that the AKP, as well as the main opposition party, the CHP, which is the standard bearer of Kemalism, seriously reconsider their stance on the issue of a unitary mono-ethnic state. Federalism or quasi-federalism is usually the best antidote to separatism. Imposing a contrived mono-ethnic identity and a unitary state remote from the concerns of peripheral areas and populations normally aggravates, rather than resolves, separatist problems.

    A federal system is not necessarily antithetical to a strong center and need not come at the latter’s expense. In fact, as the experience of successful federations from the United States to India demonstrate, a federal system bolsters the legitimacy of the central government in the long run and aids in the process of nation-building, rather than hindering that process. As these examples demonstrate, trappings of autonomy are often more important than its content. Furthermore, they also reveal that federalism need not have an economic rationale for it to be successful. A federal system is basically a political tool utilized to respond to ethnic and geographic diversity even if it means that more prosperous regions must continue to subsidize the poorer parts of the country. In the final analysis, this is a small sacrifice to maintain national unity.  

    The solution to Turkey’s Kurdish conundrum may, therefore, lie in some form of devolution of powers to regional entities. It will help both in the consolidation of democracy in the country as well as give greater legitimacy to a central government whose political and economic record under the AKP is in other ways extremely impressive. However, in order to achieve this goal the Turkish elite and the AKP government must break decisively from the outmoded thinking of the Kemalist past and show a degree of political flexibility that has unfortunately been in short supply thus far. Furthermore, they will have to do so even as PKK terrorism increases in the short-term, more as an act of desperation rather than of carefully thought political strategy. Prime Minister Erdogan has the stature, legitimacy, and charisma to make this decisive break from the Kemalist past. If he does so, it will demonstrate that he is a real statesman and not merely an extraordinarily skillful politician.

    Mohammed Ayoob is the university distinguished professor of international relations at Michigan State University and adjunct scholar at the Institute for Social Policy and Understanding.

  • Crackdown on Kurds tests limits of Turkish democracy

    Crackdown on Kurds tests limits of Turkish democracy

    Thomas Seibert

    Nov 4, 2011

    Turkish soldiers patrol a road in Hakkari province on October 22. Turkish troops killed some 250 Kurdish militants in the country's south-east last month in retaliation for the death of 24 soldiers.
    Turkish soldiers patrol a road in Hakkari province on October 22. Turkish troops killed some 250 Kurdish militants in the country's south-east last month in retaliation for the death of 24 soldiers.

    ISTANBUL // Opposition parties and intellectuals in Turkey say the arrest of hundreds of people accused of supporting Kurdish militants is part of a political crackdown that could undermine the hard-won democratic achievements of recent years.

    Ragip Zarakolu, the owner of a publishing house, and Busra Ersanli, a professor of international relations, were among more than 40 suspects sent into pretrial detention by a court in Istanbul this week.

    Prosecutors accuse them of supporting the Union of Kurdish Communities (KCK), an organisation they say is steered by the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK), a rebel group fighting Turkey since 1984 in a conflict that has killed thousands.

    The arrests were part of an ongoing investigation against the KCK that started in 2009. About 500 people, among them many Kurdish politicians, have been jailed awaiting trial, according to the interior ministry.

    Prosecutors say the KCK has been trying to set up PKK-run institutions of administration and justice in the Kurdish south-east, but critics say the government is trying to silence Kurdish voices.

    Following the arrest of Mr Zarakolu and Ms Ersanli, a group of about 700 academics, writers and other intellectuals issued a statement saying the move was a “severe blow” to democratisation.

    “The arrests are going beyond the classical law-enforcement type of preventive action,” Cengiz Aktar, a political scientist in Istanbul and a signatory to the statement said this week.

    “They are directly targeting freedom of expression.”

    Turkey has liberalised many draconian laws regulating free speech in its bid to become a member of the European Union in recent years, but existing anti-terror laws give law-enforcement agencies and prosecutors vast powers to act against suspects even if there is scant evidence, critics say.

    “The arrests of Ragip Zarakolu and Busra Ersanli represent a new low in the misuse of terrorism laws to crush freedom of expression and association in Turkey,” Emma Sinclair-Webb, a Turkey researcher at Human Rights Watch, said.

    Mr Zarakolu, the owner of the Belge publishing house, has been prosecuted before because of books dealing with the Kurdish and the Armenian issues. Ms Ersanli, a political scientist at Istanbul’s Marmara University, is an adviser to the Peace and Democracy Party (BDP), Turkey’s main Kurdish party. The BDP is part of a commission drafting a new constitution for the country.

    No charges have been made public but news reports say the arrests centred on activities of the BDP Policy Academy, an institute for training officials. Courses included lectures on the PKK’s history and the concept of local autonomy for the Kurdish area, but also lessons on women’s rights, according to newspaper reports.

    Critics say police and prosecutors are going overboard in their effort to prove suspects have actively supported the PKK.

    The Radikal newspaper reported this week that prosecutors had asked Ms Ersanli about arcane details of some of her notes for a seminar at the BDP academy during their interrogation. According to the newspaper, the professor was asked why she used the term “citizen of Turkey” in her notes, instead of “Turkish citizen”. Erkan Kanar, the professor’s lawyer, told the newspaper the prosecution approached his client’s notes as if they were PKK documents.

    “We are seeing the Turkish police casting the net ever wider in the crackdown on legal pro-Kurdish politics,” Ms Sinclair-Webb, the rights activist, said. “Unless there is clear evidence of people plotting violence or providing logistical support to armed groups, prosecutors and courts should throw these cases out.”

    The BDP has said the KCK arrests amounted to “political genocide” against Kurdish officials. But in a time of heightened tensions following the death of 24 Turkish soldiers last month in the bloodiest PKK attack in decades, other opposition parties found it harder to criticise the arrests.

    The Republican People’s Party, the main opposition group in parliament, decided not to vote on a statement condemning the arrests because some deputies said they would not sign a declaration of support for KCK suspects because of their alleged links to the PKK.

    Prof Aktar said the arrests were part of a government strategy to solve the Kurdish conflict by force. Following the recent PKK attack, the Turkish military staged a week-long operation in south-eastern Turkey and northern Iraq, during which about 250 PKK fighters were killed, according to the general staff in Ankara.

    “It is largely based on law enforcement and repression,” Prof Aktar said of the government’s approach. “What is missing is the democratic, the political component.”

    tseibert@thenational.ae

    via Crackdown on Kurds tests limits of Turkish democracy – The National.

  • Turkey’s Demands and Kurdistan’s Answers

    Turkey’s Demands and Kurdistan’s Answers

    By REBWAR KARIM WALI

    Rebwar 413301926The wave of arrests of Kurds in Turkey as well as violence between the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) and the Turkish security forces that began again in July show no signs of abating.

    The latest episode was the October 19 attack by PKK fighters on Turkish military bases in Hakkari province that led to the highest number of Turkish casualties since 1993.

    In response, the police have joined the military’s new operations against the PKK. The police have also detained and imprisoned hundreds of Kurdish political activists as part of what is known as “KCK dossier.”

    The KCK stands for the Union of Communities in Kurdistan, which was founded by the PKK’s jailed leader, Abdullah Ocalan. A PKK leader recently told me that the number of arrests have not been this high since the 1980 military coup.

    The most recent PKK attack shocked Turkey and drew a strong reaction from the Kurdistan Region of Iraq as well. In a message of condemnation, Kurdistan Region’s President Massoud Barzani described the attack as a “crime” and noted that it came as there were ongoing efforts to find a political solution to Turkey’s Kurdish issue.

    The office of Kurdistan Prime Minister Barham Salih also denounced the attack. Shortly afterward, based on a request from Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, former Kurdistan Region Prime Minister Nechirvan Barzani met with the Turkish prime minister and foreign minister in Ankara on a trip representing the region’s president. It was announced that the Kurdistan Region president would soon visit Ankara as well.

    Turkey demands the Kurdistan region provide military assistance in its fight against the PKK. But to what extent is that possible?

    “The Turkish army doesn’t have the same zeal and energy as it once did, and the PKK is no longer afraid of it”

    According to informed Turkish sources, the Turkish plan appears as follows: A) Turkey can militarily occupy all areas in the Kurdistan Region that the Kurdish Peshmarga and security forces cannot control; B) The Kurdistan Region should promise that its Peshmarga forces will not attack Turkey, aid the PKK or allow its fighters to attack Turkish soldiers.

    Turkey, in return, has promised to return control of all areas to the Kurdistan Regional Government’s Peshmarga forces when the forces are able to secure the areas.

    According to the Turkish sources, the response of the Kurdish delegation to this proposal has been the following: A) The Kurdistan Region understands its responsibility to not allow its soil to be used for attacks against its neighbors; B) The Peshmarga forces will not take part in any fighting in support of any side; C) There is only one solution to this problem and that is a peaceful and political one. D) Ocalan’s conditions need to be improved and the government should talk to him.

    Turkey is hoping to achieve two major goals in relation to the PKK.

    First, to lower the bar of Kurdish demands before the process begins to amend the constitution. This can be done by delivering a blow to the PKK.

    Second, the PKK has become a problem for Turkey’s ambitious foreign policy. The clashes between the PKK and the army undermine Turkey’s focus on its foreign and regional policy, so Turkey wants to rid itself of that problem.

    If these are the main Turkish goals in battling the PKK, the Kurdish group also wants to increase pressure on the PKK as much as possible.

    Even if Ocalan was not freed, he would be placed under house arrest. The PKK and Ocalan need be accepted as the only partners in resolving the Kurdish issue and need to engage in open negotiations.

    The Kurdistan Region cannot engage in any military cooperation with Turkey because the Kurdish political leadership believes this problem can’t be solved through war. The Kurdish public would never allow this to happen.

    Therefore, Barzani’s trip to Ankara can be only useful in terms of advancing a political solution. The direction Turkey has taken will lead to nowhere. The role that the Kurdistan Region has played in the past in convincing the PKK to announce a ceasefire needs to continue because that role is important for the PKK, Turkey and the Kurdistan Region.

    That role ending would especially harm the PKK. The current complications in Turkey’s Kurdish areas and the end of large-scale civilian activities are a testament to that claim.

    But it seems the PKK is no longer ready to accept a ceasefire because it sees the current circumstances as in its interest. Besides, the Turkish army doesn’t have the same zeal and energy as it once did, and the PKK is no longer afraid of it.

    The PKK has become a mobile state and has shown that neither the pro-Kurdish Peace and Democracy Party (BDP) or any Kurdish political figure has the capital and initiative to make decisions in the name of Kurds. So, in the end, Turkey should decide that all roads lead to Ocalan and his conditions.

    If Ocalan is taken out of Imrali prison and is allowed movement, he will pour some water on the fire that has currently engulfed Turkey. The PKK will lay down arms and Turkey will rid itself of this conflict. The Kurdistan Region can play a crucial role in this regard.

    via Rudaw in English….The Happening: Latest News and Multimedia about Kurdistan, Iraq and the World – Turkey’s Demands and Kurdistan’s Answers.

  • THE KURDISH TRIBES OF THE OTTOMAN EMPIRE

    THE KURDISH TRIBES OF THE OTTOMAN EMPIRE

    THE KURDISH TRIBES OF THE OTTOMANEMPIRE
    BY MARK SYKES
    PREFACE

    kurdishtribes

    THE materials collected in the ensuing pages are the results of about 7,500 miles of riding and innumerable conversations with policemen, nluleteers, mullahs, chieftains,sheep drovers,horse dealers,carriersand other people capable of giving one first hand information. The results I fear are extreinelymeagre,but I hope they may prove of use to future travellers.

    As hardly anything has been written on the subject in the English language heretofore,I have not been able to make a study of the Kurds from a biblio-graphical point of view. However, I trust that this will not detract from the interest of the work. I may add that I had amongmy servantson my last journey representatives from the three most importantsections of the Kurds,so that I was able to obtain interpreters without any great difficulty,a matter of someimportance amidst the conflictingdialects of the nomadsand sedentarymountaineers.

    In preparing the following list of the varioustribes of the Kurdish race I have endeavoured to simplify the work of future students by marking down and cataloguingas many of the tribes as have come either directly or indirectlyunder my notice.

    After variousabortiveattempts at setting them down in a manner comprehensible to any one but myself, I have decided for the purposesof this work to break up the regionsinhabitedby Kurds into six zones; to each of these zones a section of the catalogueis devoted, each section containinga separate enumeration.

    The Kurdish Tribes of the Ottoman Empire by Mark Sykes [1]
    Source: The Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute of Great Britain and Ireland, Vol.38 (Jul. – Dec., 1908), pp. 451-486 PDF Download

  • 1915 events were Genocide – Turkish MP

    1915 events were Genocide – Turkish MP

    78205ISTANBUL. – Turkish MP from Kurdish Peace and Democracy Party, Altan Tan restated his words recently said in the international scientific conference in Artuklu University in Mardin, Turkey in the interview with Agos Armenian newspaper published in Istanbul.

    Altan insisted that Kurds and Muslims also played a role in the 1915 Genocide implemented against Armenians.

    “Not all Kurds though took a sword. However, Kurds do have their serious share of blame in the Genocide,” Altan stated criticizing also the attitude of the Muslims in rejecting the Genocide.

    Altan Tan had earlier stated that as a political figure he calls the 1915 events Genocide implemented against Armenians. No matter what the conditions were, those people were killed. The proof is the territory and the demographic situation. At that time 13 million people lived in Turkey and Armenians made 10% of the population. Currently the population is 75 million, while Armenians are only 40,000, MP had stated.

    via 1915 events were Genocide – Turkish MP | Armenia News – NEWS.am.