During the period of ‘low intensity warfare’ of the 1990s, as it is called by Turkish officials, the Kurdish provinces of Turkey witnessed a series of shocking events which have been recorded in many human rights organizations reports. Just a short period after the leader of PKK (Kurdistan Workers Party), Abdullah Ocalan, was captured and handed over to Turkey, the ‘low intensity warfare’ appeared to cease. In order to prevent an ethnic conflict between the Kurdish and Turkish people, Ocalan had asked for an end to intensive nationwide protests and appealed to the Kurdish guerrilla forces to pull back behind the borders as a gesture of goodwill. As a response to this appeal, the majority of the Kurdish guerrilla forces pulled back to Northern Iraq, and declared a unilateral ceasefire to end their aggressive action. The Turkish government permitted Ocalan to send his messages to the public through his defence lawyers, and the press to broadcast these messages. There was a virtual ceasefire. The Turkish armed forces ended their widespread operations in Kurdish provinces, and the government promised the peoples of Turkey to take the necessary democratic and legislative steps for Turkey’s integration into the European Union. The first step was the abolition of capital punishment. As a result, for the first time in the history of 70-year-old Turkish Republic, the leader of a Kurdish uprising is spared execution and Turkish army refrained from any more trans-border military campaigns against a 5000-strong guerrilla force as it used to do frequently before.
During the ‘low intensity warfare’ that had continued for almost fifteen years, the USA played a decisive role. Turkey needed the diplomatic and military support of the USA to pursue this war, and the support was granted. As a price, Turkey openly accepted becoming an ally to Israel. This was a striking development, since up to that date Turkey, which defines itself as a Muslim country, traditionally seemed to be closer to the Palestinian and Arab position and preferred to relate itself to Israel covertly through USA. A conflict between Turkey and USA in Middle East policies emerged and has continued over the degree of autonomy of the Kurds of Northern Iraq. Eventually USA left the destiny of the Kurds of Turkey in the hands of the Turkish State, while at the same time bowing to the demands of the Iraqi Kurds for enhanced autonomy. As a result, the Turkish state has been extremely wary about this autonomy, considering it to have a provocative effect on its own Kurds.
Today, the Kurdish policy of the Turkish state is different from its traditional policy, which was to deny the existence, culture and language of the Kurds. The real success of the Kurdish liberation movement was to force this step to be taken in the early 90’s. Until then, the official thesis of Turkish state was that there was not such a thing as Kurdish culture and Kurdish language. Therefore, Turkish state was arguing that Kurds were not existing as a nation. The military coup accomplished on September 12, 1980 with the support of US government led to a harsh imposition of this official thesis on Kurdish people once again. Today, as obliged to change its traditional policy, the Turkish state is trying to urge the Kurds to accept a ‘solution’ plan that is even more regressive than the minority rights. Turkish state is not accepting the Kurds to carry out two basic activities, namely education and media broadcasting in the Kurdish language, which are essential in constructing a modern identity. Currently, KADEK (Freedom and Liberation Congress of Kurdistan: an organization which has been established as a result of the transformation of PKK to a ‘National Congress’ type organization), which continues to be the political centre of the Kurdish liberation movement, is defined as a terrorist organisation, and the Turkish state is attempting to eliminate its leadership, including Ocalan. The Amnesty Act, or ‘The Resocialisation Act’ of 2003, was aimed at the Kurdish guerrillas, the majority of whom are based in the mountains close to the Turkish border. It proclaims amnesty for the guerrillas who pleaded guilty, and leaves the leadership outside the coverage of the Act. This Act seems to be a softened version of the ‘Regret Act’ which had been used during the period of ‘low intensity warfare’ to recruit the ‘confessors’ who are also used for counter-insurgency activities. The political parties, which are the legal component of the Kurdish liberation movement, although being the leading parties in local elections in the Kurdish provinces, can not get any members into the Parliament due to the high vote threshold (10%) applied in general elections. These parties are trying to survive in a vicious circle of being banned as a result of the lawsuits brought against them and setting up again under a new name.
The year 2003 has been a year in which the Kurdish liberation movement has demanded radical democratic steps to be taken to attempt to solve the Kurdish problem. KADEK has declared that the unilateral ceasefire it declared rendered meaningless by the Turkish state, which adopted a strategy of leave-to-decay and has forced war as the only solution. Defence lawyers of KADEK leader Ocalan have been prevented from meeting their client whose health has deteriorated considerably under solitary confinement conditions. An increase in the operations of the Turkish armed forces and in the skirmishes between the Turkish and guerrilla forces this summer has resulted in a sudden increase in the causalities on both sides. At the same time, the Turkish government launched an intense propaganda campaign to secure the success of the ‘Resocialisation Act’. Turkish state responded fiercely to the political campaigns carried out by the Kurds demanding education in the mother tongue and a general amnesty, and made it clear that they would not negotiate beyond the limits imposed.
The Kurds in Turkey are feeling that they have reached a historical turning point. One of the problems of the Kurdish opposition is that they can not succeed sufficiently in organizing permanent and integrated civil disobedience actions. Various components of the Kurdish liberation movement have difficulties in creating a coordinated and permanent political force. For example, the demands of the Kurdish students to be educated in their own mother tongue was not supported by other components of the Kurdish liberation movement and the Kurdish student activists were left on their own. The National Security Council, which has been the real political force in Turkey took the issue in its agenda, and reported that necessary precautions must be taken in order to prevent the campaign from succeeding. When the student activists were pacified by detainments and arrests, there was no permanent initiative left to express strongly the demands for education in their mother tongue. The urgency of the demand for education in the mother tongue is still on the agenda, and the Kurdish liberation movement could not establish specialised organisations to focus on this issue.
Recently, as a response to an appeal by KADEK, a new campaign of ‘Democratic Solution for Peace’ has been initiated in which all the components of the Kurdish liberation movement are involved. The main aims of the campaign, which will be carried out until the end of November 2003, are: a permanent and mutual ceasefire, an end to the solitary confinement of Ocalan which has caused a deterioration of his health, and a powerful and organised expression of the demands of the Kurdish people. As a response to the Kurdish problem, which determines the destiny of millions, the Turkish government is insisting on the policy of isolation and confinement of the Kurdish liberation movement. In order the campaign to succeed, the authoritarian psychological conditioning among the activist that reduces the solution to the conflict between the Turkish army and the KADEK guerrillas should be transcended and an organised grassroots activism should be established.
Another problem that the Kurdish liberation movement should solve is to understand better the opportunities of global solidarity and make an intense effort to engage itself to the latter. When Ocalan was handed over to Turkey in February 1999, Kurds exhibited widespread and massive protests not only in different part of Kurdistan but all over the world. It is obvious that the Kurds had become an opposition power that transcends the borders of the regions in which they are divided and isolated from each other. With wide global support, the ‘Democratic Solution for Peace’ campaign can make a difference. The campaign can help to overcome the repression that is aiming to isolate and suffocate the Kurdish liberation movement by confining it into regional borders.
We may briefly summarize how the campaign has proceeded till now. Broadly, two kinds of actions and demonstrations have taken place. First, there were many non-legal demonstrations to which people varying from one hundred to 2,000 have participated. They took mostly the form of civil disobedience and have been realized in Kurdish regions as well as in the slums of the big cities of Western Turkey where millions of Kurds have been expelled during the war. Mostly Kurdish youth and women have played an active role in these demonstrations. On the other hand, there were legal demonstrations and rallies in the leadership of DEHAP, the legal component of Kurdish Liberation Movement. These were relatively massive rallies with thousands of participants, especially in Kurdish regions of Turkey. In the meantime, the lawyers of Abdullah Ocalan have met with the concerned authorities in UN and with CPT (European Committee for the Prevention of Torture and Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment) in order to call them for taking urgent steps to prevent the deterioration of Ocalan’s health.
There is a crucial question at this historical moment: Will the Kurdish liberation movement be a beaten to obedience, or will it avoid to become a component of the vicious circle of terrorism and be a determined defendant of the rights and freedoms of the people it represents, the rights which emanates from the principle of self determination?
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