Tag: Ocalan

Three Powerful Men Decide Turkey’s Future

By: Kadri Gursel for Al-Monitor Turkey Pulse. Posted on March 12.

Turkey’s future is to be decided by the nation’s three most powerful men, by the equilibrium they shape among themselves and by deals they forge with each other.

Recep Tayyip Erdogan leaves a wreath-laying ceremony at the mausoleum of Mustafa Kemal Ataturk, founder of modern Turkey, in Ankara, Aug. 1, 2012. (photo by REUTERS/Stringer)

About This Article

Summary :

Kadri Gursel writes on the three men who are critical to Turkey’s future: Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan; Abdullah Ocalan, imprisoned head of the Kurdistan Workers Party [PKK]; and Fethullah Gulen, exiled head of the Gulen Sunni movement.

Original Title:
Three Powerful Men Decide Turkey’s Future
Author: Kadri Gursel
Translated by: Timur Goksel

The first and the most powerful is already at the zenith of political power: Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan. He is also the most powerful, most capable civilian leader after the founder of the Turkish Republic, Mustafa Kemal Ataturk. His colleagues who know from his younger days speak of him as “reis,” [”president” in formal usage and ”chief” colloquially]. The people who joined him at his current post call him “patron” [the boss]. In official bureaucratic milieu, among party members and businessmen close to him he is “beyefendi” [sir or esquire]. Not only is he the most powerful man of Turkey, but because he enjoys exercising his power and doesn’t want to share it with anyone else, he is a personality that instills fear in his party AKP, in the state structure and the society.

The second most powerful man is serving a life sentence and has been in prison for 14 years: Abdullah Ocalan, who founded the separatist, armed Kurdish organization, the Kurdistan Workers Party [PKK] in 1978 and who personally led it until 1999 when he was apprehended in Kenya and handed over to Turkey. Since his imprisonment the PKK has changed drastically. The Kurdish issue became politicized and regionalized and has become a mass movement. Among many political and societal variables the key issue that hasn’t changed in the Kurdish movement has been the loyalty to Ocalan’s historical leadership. This is why the Kurds close to the PKK say “Honorable Ocalan’’ or in brief “the Leadership” when they speak of him. Ocalan is a figure that unites Kurdish nationalists.

The AKP rule and their media use a code for Ocalan that is derived from the name of the island where his private prison is: Imrali.

Those in the power, to avoid perceptions that they are in a dialogue with Ocalan through intelligence officials, refrain from using his name and prefer to say “Imrali.”

The third powerful man is a Sunni religious leader living in voluntary exile in the United States for 14 years: Fethullah Gulen. Gulen, who started out as a mosque imam, is the founder of an Islamic socio-political movement that is now spread worldwide. He is its spiritual leader. The movement has several labels: “Gulen Movement,” “Service” or the most popular version in Turkey, “Cemaat” [a congregation or faith community]. Their followers are known as “Gulenists.” Those who admire Fethullah Gulen call him “hocaefendi” [a scholar esquire].

Those who don’t like him call him ‘’Pennsylvania’’ after the state he moved to in 1999 when he left Turkey because of military pressure. Some call him “Across the Ocean.”

The main engine of the Gulen Movement that has long become globalized is education. They have close to 1,000 schools in more than 120 countries, including universities.

In Turkey they have a nationwide school and student hostel network with tens of thousands of teachers and hundreds of thousands of students. Vast majority of their students are on scholarships. The revenues that turns the wheels come from their capitalist ventures and donations collected by a network of organizations of powerful businessmen. The movement also has a strong media network with daily Zaman and Samanyolu TV channels as its flag ships.

But the most extraordinary political power attributed to the Gulen Movement is the network it has reportedly built inside the state mechanism, especially in judiciary and security sectors.

Today, many impartial observers agree that the current neo-Islamist rule of Turkey has been able to eliminate in just three years the military-bureaucratic tutelage power centers that saw themselves as the guardians of the Ataturk Republic with police actions and judicial procedures mainly thanks to harmonious work of the Gulenist cadres in the police and the judiciary.

Although their statures are widely divergent, there are commonalities in the leaderships of Erdogan, Gulen and Ocalan that render them powerful and consequential.

All three are extremely charismatic, all three have exceptional influence on their constituencies, all three are visionaries and finally all three have alternative societal projects. All three with their visions and leaderships carried changes they brought about to outside of Turkish borders.

And there is no fourth man who has similar attributes.

Until recent past, chiefs of general staff used to be counted among the powerful figures of the land but not anymore. Turkey has changed and will change more.

The change in Turkey now proceeds on two axes: Erdogan’s overly personalized authoritarian president project, and peace with the Kurdish movement.

What Turkey’s new regime will look like and status of Turkey’s relations with the Kurdish reality in the Middle East will largely be determined by the interaction between these two axes.

To make is clearer and more concrete we must say this: Although there was no cause-and-effect relationship, the a la carte presidential model Erdogan wants for himself and settlement of the Kurdish issue became linked to the peace negotiations at Imrali. Despite efforts to keep them under wraps, it is now known that the negotiations between Turkish intelligence officials who represented Erdogan’s authority and Ocalan have been going on since last October.

The negotiation platform of a “new constitution” on which the presidential system and peace issues were debated was in a format of give-and-take.

For the presidential system Erdogan desires, a constitutional amendment is required as well as for the settlement of the Kurdish issue. To meet the equality demands of the Kurds a neutral definition of citizenship that doesn’t require “Turkishness,” education in the mother tongue and partially fulfilling the demand for autonomy by empowering local administrations are all required constitutional adjustments.

If progress is wanted in the peace process, then the constitution has to be amended to meet these Kurdish demands. Erdogan’s AKP doesn’t have enough parliamentary seats to submit a constitutional draft to a public vote. AKP can negotiate only with the pro-Kurdish Peace and Democracy Party [BDP] for a presidential system. Other parties are categorically refusing to negotiate for such a system.

A reality emerged when the daily Milliyet on Feb. 28 published the minutes of the meeting three BDP parliamentarians held with Ocalan at Imrali a few days earlier. The topic of BDP supporting the presidential system was on the agenda of the Imrali meeting and Ocalan, despite some reservations, was amenable to support Erdogan’s presidency.

Nevertheless, it will not be easy for the Erdogan government to market a “AKP-BDP constitution” to majority nationalist conservative Turkish public unless the PKK military forces leave Turkey before a possible constitutional referandum in the fall and for Turkey’s 30-year terror question to be considered as done with.

An interesting feature of the “’Imrali Minutes” report was the harsh accusations of Ocalan against the Gulen Movement. Ocalan claimed the summons by the specially authorized prosecutor of Hakan Fidan, the undersecretary of National Intelligence Organization for questioning on Feb. 7, 2012, was “”actually a coup attempt” and implied it was the Gulen Movement behind it. Ocalan went as far as to claim that the objective of the summons was to arrest the prime minister on charges of treason and labeled the Gulen Movement as new “counter-guerrilla.”

We will perhaps understand better in the future why Ocalan made such severe accusations against the Gulen Movement. The Gulen media since 2009, especially after 2011, have been increasingly supportive of police operations that resulted in arrests of thousands of Kurdish activists, there has been a perceptible antipathy against the Gulen Movement in Kurdish public opinion. But this is not enough to explain Ocalan’s outburst.

What is definite is this: The crisis that began Feb. 7, 2012, with the summons for questioning of Hakan Fidan, the MIT undersecretary who happens to be one bureaucrat Erdogan trusts most, culminated in ending the de facto partnership for power between the Gulen Movement and the AKP.

It is true that the Gulen Movement, with its media assets, its undeniable influence over conservative voters and its potential power within the state, is a key actor. But what is apparent is that the movement has not yet decided its final position on Erdogan’s presidency and the peace process with the PKK and that they are somewhat undecided with these issues.

The Gulen Movement has adequate power to influence these processes this or that way once it makes up its mind.

The clarification of the interaction among “the three” also depends on the Gulen Movement to determine its inclination.

Kadri Gürsel is a contributing writer for Al-Monitor‘s Turkey Pulse and has written a column for the Turkish daily Milliyet since 2007. He focuses primarily on Turkish foreign policy, international affairs and Turkey’s Kurdish question, as well as Turkey’s evolving political Islam. He joined the Milliyet publishing group in 1997 as vice editor-in-chief of a newly launched weekly news magazine, Artı-Haber, and was Milliyet’s foreign news editor from 1999 until 2008. Gürsel was also a correspondent for Agence France-Presse between 1993 and 1997, and in 1995 was kidnapped by the PKK, an experience he recounted in his book Dağdakiler (Those of the Mountains), published in 1996. He is also chairman of the Turkish National Committee of the International Press Institute.

Read more: http://www.al-monitor.com/pulse/originals/2013/03/erdogan-ocalan-gulen-turkey-pkk-peace-process-presidency.html#ixzz2NRFfoUTn

March 13, 2013

Could a Kurdish PM of Turkey lead the Movement to redraw the Boundaries of the Middle East?

by Hamma Mirwaisi and Alison Buckley

March 8, 2013

In 1962, when Nelson Mandela was given a life sentence for his attempts to free his country from oppression, few thought he would become the President of South Africa after twenty-seven years of imprisonment. When Dr Martin Luther King Jr. was assassinated in 1968, who would have dared to hope that a black man would one day be President of the United States? Similarly, in today’s Middle East, the possibility of a Kurdish guerrilla leader ever becoming the President of say, Iraq, also seems remote, but not impossible.

However, potential changes in the political leadership of nearby Turkey are much more likely. Apart from the proposition that current Turkish President Abdullah Gül is prepared to co-operate with Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s long held Presidential ambitions by switching jobs with him, political pundits and voters would do well to consider Kurdish leader Abdullah Öcalan as the most likely Prime Ministerial candidate to bring Turkey true peace.

Left field answers are needed to solve the range of problems in the Middle East. The previously troublesome relations between the Turks and the Kurds of Turkey could be vastly improved by the election of Abdullah Öcalan to the position of Prime Minister of this divided nation.

A brief survey of Ocalan’s personal and political history, including his participation in the struggle to unite Kurdish people within the Turkish, Iranian, Iraqi and Syrian territories of their Ancient Median ancestors, explains the recent recognition by middle power Turkey of his considerable influence and value as a potential peace maker and promoter of stability in the region.

As a child of poor parents Abdullah Ocalan was born in Omerli, a village in the Halfeti-District, Province of Urfa, in the Kurdish Southeast of Turkey in 1949. Leaving his village after secondary school, he studied Political Sciences at the University of Ankara. He successfully completed his studies and entered the civil service in Diyarbakir.

Rejecting the unacceptable treatment of the Kurdish people, who were denied the right to live their own identity and culture by the Turkish state, Abdullah Ocalan became an active member of the Democratic Cultural Associations of the East, an organization supporting the Kurdish people’s demands. After the military coup in 1971 he progressively investigated the Kurdish question.

In 1978 the Kurdistan Workers Party, or PKK, was founded with Ocalan as party leader, a post he retains until today. Besides numerous works on culture and the general situation of his people, Mr. Ocalan has explored subjects like philosophy, matters of faith, gender and environmental issues in plenty of lectures and books.

In response to continuing persecution, the Kurdistan Workers Party or PKK launched an armed struggle against the Turkish central government in 1984. Their aim was to exercise the right of the Kurdish people to self-determination. During this war approximately 40,000 people lost their lives.

When Israeli commandos raided Nairobi fourteen years ago, Kurdish leader Ocalan was ‘coincidentally’ tracked down to Kenya and captured by the Israeli Mossad in a spy drama worthy of a Hollywood blockbuster movie.

The six travelers arriving at Nairobi’s Jomo Kenyatta International Airport looked like any other tourists on safari. They were casually dressed and carried huge jungle green backpacks.

Nothing betrayed the fact that this party of five men and a woman were Mossad agents whose mission in the country would thrust Kenya into the international spotlight, expose its close ties to Israeli security services and cause a diplomatic row that saw then Foreign Affairs minister Bonaya Godana order all Kenyan embassies closed for a day.

The Israelis came to town 14 years ago last month because of the presence in Nairobi of Abdullah ‘Apo’ Ocalan, at the time one of the world’s most wanted men.

Turkey’s secret services with US and Israeli co-operation kidnapped Kurdish leader Abdullah Ocalan and returned him to Turkey to be humiliated on a TV show and then sentenced to death, which was later, commuted to life imprisonment.

Today, in a significant turnaround, Turkey is negotiating with imprisoned Kurdish leader Abdullah Ocalan to bring peace for the Kurds in Turkey.

The success of these efforts depends substantially on the willingness of the people of Turkey to acknowledge the historical and cultural origins of the Kurdish people living amongst them and to respect their deep connections to the roots of their Aryan civilization.

The large numbers of extremist Turks in the ‘Gray Wolf’ organization would be well advised to avoid a clash with the Kurdish Kangal, the giant shepherd dog who prefers peace to war, but will not allow his flock to be mauled by wild beasts. Wolves that are tamed become intelligent and co-operative companions for humans, protecting the pack from attacks and ensuring its survival. Turkish leaders could learn valuable lessons from the animal world.

One way of justly sharing the resources traditionally owned by the Airyanem Vaejah people in the Aryan Lands from Pakistan to Turkey and from Kurdistan to the countries of the former Soviet Union is the establishment of a Middle Eastern Economic Union. This proposed solution would allow each ethnic or national group such as Turks, Kurds, Persians and others to have their own independent country within an economic union similar to the EU of Europe. Considering the ongoing threats to the integrity of the European Economic Union, the establishment of a Middle Eastern counterpart may well be the solution to the persistent global financial crisis, creating another economic power house to shore up endemic weaknesses.

A seasoned problem solver with and open mind, as Prime Minister of Turkey Abdullah Öcalan is ably suited to negotiate and lead the discussion and development of such a vision for the future. He promotes the proposal in the interests of peace and stability, but whether the other major regional players such as the US, EU, Israel, and Russia will be prepared to examine its feasibility and inestimable benefits in the face of the present suffering, destruction and hopelessness currently besetting the Middle East is yet to be seen. However emerging economic powers such as India and China might well be inclined to welcome its potential for economic expansion and partnerships.

Now a potential Prime Minister, Abdullah Öcalan started his political life with a small group determined to fight for justice in Turkey and now he has millions of followers in the region. An enduring organizer and motivator of those willing to work indefinitely for peace and stability, like other modern political trailblazers he has survived war, incarceration, and violent opposition to emerge as one of the Middle East’s foremost champions of human rights, democracy, and the peaceful resolution of the multiple conflicts plaguing the region.

Note: In an effort to examine the origins of the Kurdish conflict with Turkey, Iran, Iraq, and Syria, the conflict between the Palestinians and Israel, and the Arab-Persian conflict, we have launched a series of historical novels to develop better understanding between the Aryan and other peoples now living in the Middle East. The first, Vashti, Queen of the Ancient Medes provides insights into the life of this little known and oft maligned Queen, whilst throwing significant light on the true historical place of the subject of the second novel, Esther, Mystery Queen of the Medes, well known for her role in the establishment of the Jewish Purim festival. These ancient tales of personal power ploys, harems, conspiracies and inter-imperial power machinations reveal unique insights into an almost forgotten but rich continuous culture paralleling the most influential of past and present civilizations.

By Hamma Mirwaisi and Alison Buckley

Hamma Mirwaisi and Alison Buckley are authors of the historical novels Vashti Queen of the Ancient Medes (Kurds) and Esther Mystery Queen of the Medes (Kurds). They are working to revive the ancient “Airyanem Civilization” record in this series of books, and are calling for the establishment of an “Economic Union” for the Middle East to solve some of the problems among the population of that part of the world.

March 9, 2013
Turkey and the Kurds: the era of mass hypnosis is over
There are no taboos left on the Kurdish issue and Recep Tayyip Erdogan knows the geopolitical importance of resolving it
- - Yavuz Baydar
  - guardian.co.uk,
A pro-Kurdish demonstrator gestures during a protest in Istanbul on February 15, 2013 held to mark the 14th anniversary of the capture of Kurdistan Workers’ party (PKK) leader Abdullah Ocalan. Photograph: Murad Sezer/Reuters

Since the start of this year, the Justice and Development party (AKP) has emerged from what looked like an impasse over Turkey’s three-decade-long Kurdish conflict. The pace of change has been intense.

But slow-motion progress in the background has often been overlooked: over the course of 15 years the public debate, backed by small-scale reforms, has evolved from the archaic militarist jargon of “there are no Kurds here, only mountain Turks”. Ankara is now conducting direct negotiations with the jailed PKK leader, Abdullah Ocalan – once demonised as a baby killer and chief terrorist by a venomously nationalist “mainstream” media.

Today, there are no more taboos left on the subject. All gone. The period of official denial is over. So is the mass-hypnosis inflicted on the Turkish people by the old establishment. Even Kemal Ataturk, the once untouchable founder of the republic, is under fire these days for his role in the systematic oppression of Turkey’s Kurds during the 1920s and 30s.

Yet, as recently as 2012, the Sri Lankan model still held some sway in Ankara: total annihilation of an armed rebellion by military means only. It was abandoned quickly: the spread across borders of Kurdish militants and the army’s failures in counter-insurgency made it an impossible position to maintain even for the toughest hard-liners. It looked as if talks, already initiated in 2009 without success, were the only way. The turmoil in Syria and good relations with Iraqi Kurds has also made it a priority.

But the give-and-take process is only just beginning. The task of dealing with a problem which has massive cross-border dimensions is huge.

At home, the prime minister, Recep Tayyip Erdogan also has to deal with a public split on the issue and a fierce opposition of nationalists and Kemalists. He has to mesh the process with the development of a new, democratic constitution. He has to make careful calculations with regard to all his neighbours that have Kurdish populations – Iraq, Syria and Iran – who are following his moves uneasily.

In Ankara’s corridors of power, the reasoning goes like this: unless Turkey adopts a new constitution, its social fabric will remain weak, and it won’t be able to proceed further on the path towards EU membership. Unless Turkey deals peacefully with its own Kurdish issue, it won’t be able to control the Kurdish unrest in Syria and Iraq or play the role it aspires to, that of a strong regional player.

Sworn enemies of the AKP here are certain that Erdogan will use the process to achieve his dream of becoming Turkey’s Putin. They are joined by a more cautious chorus of liberals and moderate Muslims, who voice legitimate concerns that democratisation could be undermined if he pushes the issue of an empowered presidency too far.

But there is no concrete sign that Erdogan will; neither does he need a new model for executive power. The current one makes already Turkey’s president more powerful than Barack Obama.

For Ocalan, it is also complicated. The “deal” with Ankara may lead, after disarmament and a mass amnesty synched with the adoption of a new constitution, to his freedom. But, given the sensitivity of the process, it is an issue neither side wants to raise at the moment. The PKK will not vanish with disarmament. The idea instead is to pull it fully into national and local politics, without arms.

In terms of opposition, there is not much that stands between Erdogan and his goal. The elected opposition, the Kemalist CHP and ultra-nationalist MHP, are led by political midgets whom Erdogan is able to mock daily. The greatest opponent of a “civilian solution” to the Kurdish issue, the army, has been pushed back into the barracks, by coup trials and prison verdicts.

The economy, which has created a middle class that is now larger than ever, makes conditions ripe for things to move forward. If the only real obstacles domestically are acts of folly or provocations by the “shadow state”, the real unknown is how neighbouring countries will react. Despite some mutual mistrust, Erdogan is counting on on his strong trading partner, Massoud Barzani, the Iraqi Kurdish regional president, to assist in disarmament. It is also in Barzani’s interests to get rid of a insurgency movement based in his own territory.

If the process succeeds according to the “disarmament-amnesty-reform” framework, both Kurds and Turks who will be winners. Any country in the geopolitical area that wins over the region’s Kurds will have an advantage over the others.

Erdogan’s dream is to rule over a country freed from the shackles of the Kurdish issue and a outdated constitution.

And who knows, maybe he also dreams of a Nobel peace prize.

via Turkey and the Kurds: the era of mass hypnosis is over | Yavuz Baydar | Comment is free | guardian.co.uk.
March 8, 2013
Community columnist: Hopes of a peaceful new year in Turkey

By LAYLA YOUNIS

Community columnist Layla Younis.

Imprisoned founder and leader of the Kurdistan Workers Party Abdullah Ocalan outlined a plan for party members to halt attacks in Turkey on March 21, the Kurdish and Persian new year celebration, according to The Associated Press. Ocalan’s proposal further would have his fighters withdraw from Turkey later this summer to their bases in northern Iraq.

Turkey and the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) have been fighting for about 30 years, fighting that has led to the deaths of 40,000 people. However, the recent discussions between Turkey and Ocalan can lead to a peaceful Nowroz, as the new year celebration is called.

Nowroz has usually led to conflict between Turks and Kurds. Such was the case last year, but this year, peace may finally come.

Ocalan, even though in prison, still has authority over the PKK. In November, Ocalan asked political prisoners who were thought to be involved with PKK in Turkey to end a hunger strike. They ended their strike after the 68th day.

The prisoners were asking for the right to speak Kurdish in the Turkish school system, the authorization of the Kurdish language in Turkish legal courts and an end to the solitary confinement of Ocalan.

Ocalan reportedly demands that in exchange for withdrawal that Turkey would release hundreds of party activists from prison. He did not demand autonomy or a federation for Kurds.

While Ocalan and Turkey have been considering peace talks for months, PKK co-founder Sakine Cansiz, along with two other women, was shot dead Jan. 10 in Paris. Fidan Dogan, a Kurdistan National Congress member, and Leyla Soylemez, a Kurdish activist, also were killed.

The PKK is considered a terrorist organization to the United States and European Union, but Kurds living in France demonstrated against the killings when news of the three women’s death came out.

Peace talks were thought to be derailed because of the situation in France, but Turkish Deputy Prime Minister Bulent Arinc told NTV television that Ocalan sent letters to Kurdish political parties.

Kurdish legislator Nazmi Gur confirmed to The Associated Press that legislators received Ocalan’s proposal but said this is just a draft of the peace proposal.

“The ultimate version will take shape after input and proposals from the (Kurdish) party and others involved,” Gur said.

As someone who was born in Kurdistan, the region in Iraq, and understands the Kurdish culture, I find the peace talks between Kurdistan and Turkey to be hopeful. But how long will this supposed peace actually last?

The Turkish government or prime minister has not said anything about stopping Turkish attacks on the PKK, even though Ocalan has asked the PKK, in writing, to come to some sort of peace agreement.

These peace talks might settle disputes during Nowroz, but relations between Turkey and Kurdistan might go straight back to how they were.

Layla Younis, who was born in Kurdistan, Iraq, but raised in the United States, is an undergraduate student studying journalism and English.

via Community columnist: Hopes of a peaceful new year in Turkey : Opinion.

March 3, 2013
Locked in a fateful embrace: Turkey’s PM and his Kurdish prisoner
Catastrophes within Turkey and across its borders are pushing Erdogan and Öcalan towards peace. Will they grab it?
- Ian Traynor and Constanze Letsch Istanbul
- guardian.co.uk, Friday 1 March 2013 15.32 GMT
Supporters of the pro-Kurdish Peace and Democracy party hold a picture of jailed PKK leader Abdullah Öcalan. Photograph: Bulentkilic/AFP/Getty Images

A couple of hours south of the marinas of Istanbul in the middle of the Sea of Marmara sits Imrali island, a no-go area sealed off by the Turkish state. The island is Turkey’s most high-security prison – its the equivalent of Alcatraz or Robben Island in South Africa – adapted to incarcerate one man, Abdullah Öcalan, the founder of the Kurdistan Workers’ party (PKK) – an armed group of Kurdish fighters engaged in an insurrection against the Turkish state for 30 years.

Public enemy No 1 to the Turks, lionised by the Kurds, Öcalan has been demonised by Ankara for most of the 14 years he has been in solitary confinement on the island. The prime minister, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, even said recently he would have liked to have seen Öcalan executed.

In recent weeks that has changed, raising hopes of a breakthrough in the quest to settle one of the world’s longest-running and most debilitating ethnic conflicts, which has cost up to 40,000 lives over 30 years.

Turkey’s intelligence chief, Hakan Fidan, has been visiting the island to cultivate Öcalan.

“Fidan and Öcalan have managed to understand each other,” said Ayla Akat, a Kurdish MP who is one of the few politicians to have visited the prisoner.

The inmate’s brother Mehmed has become a visitor. Erdogan announced the provision of a TV for the guerrilla leader. The government is keen to reveal how many books Öcalan has read and the fact he plays football and basketball on the island where he has been joined by five prisoners.

In short, Turkish demonisation of Öcalan has given way to a process of humanisation paving the way for peace talks that some, including Turks and Kurds, liken to the UK-Irish negotiations that led to the Good Friday accords.

“The novelty is not that the state is talking to Öcalan – that’s happened before – but that they are admitting it,” said Cengiz Çandar, an analyst of the conflict. “There are new unprecedented elements that have raised expectations of a breakthrough. That can also be very dangerous.”

Of the estimated 30 million Kurds in Iraq, Iran, Syria and Turkey, around half are in Turkey, concentrated in the south-east but also dispersed to the big cities in the west of the country, not least Istanbul, home to about 3 million.

The momentum towards the “Imrali process” – as the incipient peace talks are being dubbed – has been provided by a series of tragedies and catastrophes both regional and within Turkey, apparently bringing both sides to conclude they have fought themselves to a stalemate.

“There has to be a political solution. The armed struggle has run its course. But the PKK will continue to fight if there is no political solution. Both sides know that’s the case,” said Akat.

The past 18 months have been one of the most vicious periods of the 30-year insurgency, leaving 900 dead, the heaviest casualty rate since Öcalan was captured in Kenya in 1999, the International Crisis Group said.

In the same period, the Turkish authorities jailed thousands of Kurdish activists, sparking a hunger strike last autumn involving up to 600 inmates. Just when it became critical in October, Öcalan ordered the strike to end and everyone complied.

It was a persuasive demonstration of the leader’s power after 14 years in jail, making it plain that if Erdogan wanted to sue for peace, he would need, indirectly, to talk to Öcalan.

“The war can go on without Öcalan but there can be no peace without Öcalan. Everyone understands that,” said Mazlum Dinç, one of the Kurdish leader’s lawyers.

“Öcalan is the one person who can bless a compromise agreement. He remains the paramount figure,” said Hugh Pope, the crisis group’s analyst in Istanbul.

If the bloodshed, jailings, and stalemate are pushing the parties to the negotiating table, the other big factor is regional, where the dynamic favours the Kurds over the Turks, supplying a further reason for Erdogan to soften.

As a result of the Iraq war, the Kurds of northern Iraq in effect enjoy home rule. An estimated 3,000 PKK fighters are holed up in the Qandil mountains of Iraq, with a similar number inside Turkey. But the most recent game-changer has been the civil war in Syria on Turkey’s south-eastern border. The PKK’s Syrian cousins now control tracts of north-east Syria and also might expect to win regional autonomy in a postwar settlement.

The Turkish and Syrian Kurds have gained control of about 435 miles of the border.

“It’s Bashar Assad’s revenge against Erdogan,” said a senior European diplomat. “He has ceded north-east Syria to the Kurds to cause trouble for Ankara.”

Others say the Kurdish control of the region is simply a result of the war. “Turkey’s Middle East policy has crashed, exposing it to the Kurds. It needs a deal with the PKK to be stronger in the region against Baghdad and Tehran,” said Pope.

The rush of boat trips to the prison shifted up a gear at the weekend when three members of the Kurds’ Peace and Democracy party (BDP) – to the PKK what Sinn Féin was to the IRA – were allowed to visit Öcalan for a tightly monitored eight hours to obtain his thoughts on peace talks and returned with a long letter from the leader.

The talk in Ankara and Istanbul is of the PKK calling a ceasefire next month during the Kurdish new year celebrations, of a possible release of Turkish hostages held by the PKK, and of the fighters retreating into the Iraqi mountains while laying down their arms from August.

According to leaks in the Turkish press on Thursday, Öcalan told his visitors the peace process had to succeed, since the alternative was “war and chaos”, warning that a force of 50,000 Kurdish insurgents would escalate their fight against the Turkish state. It was not clear who leaked the transcript and why but the incident only thickened the air of conspiracy and manipulation surrounding the process.

If Öcalan still rules the roost with the Kurds, the same is true of the other side where decision-taking stops and starts with Erdogan, unassailable in Turkish politics as he approaches 10 years in office. He aims to emulate Russia’s Vladimir Putin next year by swapping the premiership for an executive presidency under a new constitution.

This week Erdogan has been loudly anticipating the prospect of PKK disarmament and making disparaging remarks about the Kurds, hardly the behaviour of someone seeking to build trust across the communal divide. The latest example of Erdogan raising hackles came on Friday when the US secretary of state, John Kerry, visiting Turkey, took the prime minister to task for remarks calling Zionism a crime against humanity.

Erdogan is famously inscrutable. He is refusing to say what is in a peace process for the Kurds or what may have been promised to Öcalan by his messenger Fidan.

This lack of candour is feeding suspicion and recrimination on the Kurdish side, and complaints from the main Turkish opposition party, which broadly supports the peace moves.

“There’s a new generation of Kurds that has known nothing but war,” said Hayri Ates, a Kurdish politician. “Their villages were destroyed, all the unsolved murders and disappearances. They’re destitute. And they blame all their grievances on Turks. It’s an angry generation. Now the country is polarised and Erdogan’s party is hegemonic. But it is going to have to talk to the Kurds on equal terms.”

The scepticism about Erdogan’s good faith is reinforced by statements from the government side.

“You have to take into account the sensitivities of non-Kurdish citizens,” the deputy prime minister, Hüseyin Çelik, said. “We have to manage public opinion. Öcalan is a political prisoner who still has influence over his organisation. But Öcalan and the PKK can’t get anywhere by killing people. You cannot shake hands with a fist.”

Western diplomats in Ankara doubt the seriousness of the parties, saying while both sides have fought to a stalemate, they are not weary enough to abandon hopes of prevailing by force.

There are strong suspicions that Erdogan is being driven less by a strategic vision but by tactical scheming aimed at concentrating his political power through the new constitution.

Nonetheless, the public choreography of the peace process is different from anything that has gone before, also encouraging a wary optimism even on the Kurdish side.

“There have been many attempts at peace talks since 1993,” said Mesut Yegen, a Kurdish sociologist in Istanbul and a historian of the conflict. “This time is different. For the first time Erdogan is a partner you can trust. And Turkey has to act while Öcalan is still able to deliver.”

Nihat Ali Özcan, a Turkish counter-terrorism expert in Ankara, thinks time and the political dynamics in the region are on the Kurds’ side. “Öcalan has a lot of time on the island, while Erdogan has a very expensive watch,” he said.

But he says decades of brutality on both sides have engendered an unforgiving climate which will be hard to change. “We can tolerate 500 deaths a year. It’s considered normal.”

While it is unclear what Erdogan is offering, if anything, the Kurdish demands amount to a straightforward package of civil rights denied to them since the modern republic was founded 90 years ago: education in their own language; recognition in the proposed new constitution that Turkey is not a republic of “Turks” but also of Kurds and the other 40 ethnic minorities in the country; election laws that lower the threshold for entering parliament currently designed to minimise Kurdish representation; greater decentralisation and regional government. The Kurds will also demand that Öcalan be allowed to swap his island isolation for a form of mainland house arrest.

“Turkey has had an indefensible policy towards the Kurds since 1925 and it has blown so many chances,” said Pope. “This is simply about equal rights and justice.”

He added the potential for a breakthrough had seldom been better. “I’ve never seen the situation so pregnant with possibility, he said.”

Erdogan and Öcalan appear to be deadly enemies locked in a fateful embrace, with Turkey’s future hinging on whether they are bold enough to take a risk for peace.

The price of failure will be high, the likelihood of a return to even worse bloodshed in a conflict calculated to have cost Turkey up to $450bn (£300bn), according to government figures.

The prize of a settlement could seal Erdogan’s place in history as the greatest national figure since Kemal Atatürk, the republic’s founder, and see him awarded the Nobel peace prize.

“It’s not the last chance and it’s not the best chance,” said Çandar. “But it’s a good chance.”
March 2, 2013
Is Turkey ready to become a ‘binational’ state?

The Republic of Turkey was the heir of the multinational, multi-faith and multi-linguistic Ottoman Empire. Its founding fathers sought to create a homogenous nation-state similar to the attempts of the ethnic groups that had previously seceded from the empire. Almost a century later, despite the ongoing controversy surrounding the matter, we can safely say that this goal was to a large extent achieved.

However, some groups, primarily the Kurds, were able to resist the nation-state project. Ultimately, Turkey has reached a new stage of its century-old nation-state project.

There were many reasons why the completion of the nation-state project through the inclusion of the Kurds has not been entirely possible: The first reason was the size and density of the Kurdish population. Secondly, Islamic practices played an important role in sustaining the Kurdish ethnic identity and language. Thirdly, the Kurdish identity was also enhanced and protected by democracy, social mobilization and the market economy. Fourthly, the fact that most Kurds lived outside Turkey also mattered. Another reason linked to this is the military advantages bestowed upon the Kurds by regional conflicts. In addition, globalization, the promotion of human rights, and enhanced communication technologies have all generally contributed to the development of micro-nationalisms.

Finally, the efforts of the outlawed Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) to build an identity and a political status through the use of violence have also hampered the full realization of the Turkish nation state project.

Today, the Turkish government is trying to come up with a solution that will keep its own Kurds inside Turkey. As former prime minister and president Süleyman Demirel declared in the early 1990s that he recognized the Kurdish reality, Prime Minister Erdoğan has also expressed that he recognizes and respects the Kurdish identity. He has also declared the end of assimilation and “denial” policies.

Erdoğan’s statements show that he also knows how difficult this process is. Though currently at the apex of his power, he also knows that he cannot escape from his fate. The question is this: How can we satisfy the Kurds who are represented by the PKK, and who want to rise up from the position of an ethnic group to the position of a nation with political institutions inside Turkey? And how can we do this without making the Turks mad? Erdoğan hopes that Islam will be the answer.

The Turkish government took irreversible steps when it knocked on the door of the PKK’s jailed leader Abdullah Öcalan on Imralı island for negotiations. Although the government does not explicitly state this, Turkey is on the fast track to becoming a binational state. The real debate involves how this will be achieved and how the new state will look. Notwithstanding the final outcome, the Turks have already completed their nation building process, while the Kurds are on the verge of an uncertain adventure in their latecomer nation-building process.

February/21/2013

PRINTER FRI

via NİHAT ALİ ÖZCAN – Is Turkey ready to become a ‘binational’ state?.

February 28, 2013