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TURKEY TAKES TWO-PRONGED APPROACH TO FIGHTING PKK
By Daniel Steinvorth
Spiegel Online
March 4 2008
Germany
Turkey's incursion into northern Iraq to fight the PKK may be over, but
the government of Recep Tayyip Erdogan is a long way from solving the
"Kurdish problem." Erdogan's AKP party is trying another approach --
winning over Kurds with concessions and job promises.
The Kaya family keeps photographs of their son Mehmet displayed in
the living room of their house. The photos show a young man in a
grayish brown uniform, wearing a red star on a yellow background,
the symbol of the banned Kurdish Workers' Party, or PKK. Draped over
the pictures is the red, yellow and green flag of Kurdistan; simply
displaying the Kurdish flag is a crime in itself.
Two female students have set up a camera in the Kaya family's living
room. They are filming the interview for Roj TV, a pro-PKK satellite
network that is also banned under Turkish law, even if its headquarters
are in faraway Denmark.
In early February, before Turkey launched its ground offensive in
northern Iraq (more...), Mehmet Kaya was killed in an exchange of
fire with government troops. The family drove from Diyarbakir into
the mountains to identify the son's body. "He had already written me
a farewell letter a long time ago," the mother says into the camera,
her voice choked with emotion. "In the letter he wrote: 'You have
four other children. Let them fight for our cause.'"
The students are pleased with their recording. It will soon be
aired on the channel, as an example of the injustices Kurds face in
southeastern Turkey.
No one knows how many Kurds in the region are even receptive to
such messages anymore. Even the government of Prime Minister Recep
Tayyip Erdogan can only guess how popular the PKK, founded in 1978
and classified as a terrorist organization by the United States and
the European Union, is in Diyarbakir. Diyarbakir, considered the
unofficial capital of Turkey's Kurds, is one of Turkey's poorest and
most neglected cities. Unemployment generally ranges between 60 and
70 percent; in some neighborhoods, it is as high as 90 percent.
This is the epicenter of the ongoing conflict between the Kurds and
the Turks, 200 kilometers (124 miles) from the Iraqi border and worlds
away from Europe. The region is also home to Turkey's most important
military base, where its F-16 fighter jets take off, emitting a dull
booming noise that sounds like thunder, on their missions to bomb PKK
camps as part of Turkey's Operation Sun. It is also a place where
Kurdish youth still volunteer to join the PKK, and where the AKP,
Erdogan's conservative Islamic party, is trying to gain a foothold.
So far it is the pro-Kurdish Democratic Society Party (DTP) which
enjoys the trust and captures the majority of the votes of residents
in and around Diyarbakir. It was the only party to criticize the
government's military campaign in northern Iraq, and in recent days
the DTP has called for demonstrations in major Turkish cities. Public
prosecutors accuse the party of being too closely aligned with the
PKK, and a petition to ban the DTP is currently before Turkey's
Constitutional Court.
Nejdet Atalay, 32, doesn't deny the association with the rebels at
all. "They have grown out of the history of our people, and they
come from within our ranks." Atalay, wearing a sand-colored suit,
is the DTP's new chairman in Diyarbakir. He says that he operates
within the tradition of the "Kurdish struggle for freedom," but that
he pursues it with democratic means. This, Atalay explains, is why his
party has abandoned the old Kurdish demand for an independent state.
People like Atalay envision the Kurds being granted the kinds of
rights that minorities like the Scots, the Basques and the Catalans
have already been granted: their own regional parliament, a regional
government and recognition of the Kurds as a civilized people in the
Turkish constitution. But what would happen to the PKK fighters in
the mountains? "We need a peaceful solution," he says. "They must be
granted amnesty."
The rebels in northern Iraq see things differently. PKK commander
Murat Karayilan (more...) has threatened to "take the war into the
cities." Karayilan is one of the PKK's leaders who are said to be
hiding out somewhere in the impassable mountains of northern Iraq.
With words like these, Karayilan awakens memories of the civil war
the PKK fought against the Turkish army in the 1980s and 1990s,
in which the official death toll reached 40,000.
The PKK has also been taking the war to Diyarbakir lately. In early
January, a remote-controlled bomb exploded near a luxury hotel in
the city's downtown area, killing five and injuring dozens.
Although the attack was meant for Turkish soldiers, most of the
victims were civilians. The PKK later announced that it was a "horrible
mistake," which it regretted deeply. Since then the anti-government
group's reputation has suffered tremendously in a place that would
normally be its stronghold.
The Turkish prime minister's party has been trying to make inroads
in Diyarbakir for some time. Abdurrahim Hattapoglu, a 43-year-old
Kurdish business consultant, is the local head of the AKP. Like his
role model Erdogan, Hattapoglu wears a moustache and necktie.
Standing in front an oversized portrait of the prime minister, he
talks about how he plans to conquer the "Kurdish stronghold."
Of course, he admits, mass unemployment here in the southeast is
devastating, but the planned dam on the Tigris River, scheduled to
begin operation in five years, will bring change to the region. "It
will provide an additional 300,000 hectares (741,000 acres) of usable
land," he says. "That will create at least as many jobs." What he
neglects to mention, however, is that hundreds of villages and the
historic sites of the town of Hasankeyf will have to be flooded --
the price of progress.
The AKP captured an impressive 41 percent of the vote in Diyarbakir in
the 2007 parliamentary elections, an enormous gain over the 16 percent
it garnered in elections only five years earlier. Prime Minister
Erdogan did not introduce this massive shift by investing in the
region, but by uttering a few overdue words. In 2005, he became the
first prime minister in Turkey's history to travel to Diyarbakir,
where he conceded that Turkey has a "Kurdish problem," adding that
it was also his problem.
"That was a historic moment," says Irfan Babaoglu, a reserved man
who is chairman of the Kurdish Writers' Association. "He gave us hope.
But then he took it away again when he didn't keep his promises."
A sign in Babaoglu's office reads: "Ji Kerema Xwe Re Cixare Neksinin,"
Kurdish for "Please do not smoke." He was careful not to have
the sign printed on official paper, because that would have been a
potential offence. All official statements, signs or brochures in the
Kurdish language are still forbidden, even though many residents of
Diyarbakir speak and read almost no Turkish. Abdullah Demirbas, the
mayor of Diyarbakir, was suspended because he had service brochures
printed in Kurdish, even though he also had them printed in Arabic
and Armenian. He will soon go on trial on charges of distributing
"propaganda for the goals of the PKK terrorist organization."
"Of course, it is no longer forbidden to speak Kurdish on the
street," says author Babaoglu. "But Kurdish classes are still banned
in public schools. Often Kurdish speeches are forbidden during
election campaigns, as are the use of Kurdish names for newborn
babies, because the Kurdish letters W, X and Q do not exist in the
Turkish alphabet." He says that he too is torn between Turkish and
Kurdish, between the official and the vernacular language. According
to Babaoglu, many Kurds have, like him, the same schizophrenic
relationship with their own culture.
"Assimilation is a crime against humanity," Erdogan told Turks during
a visit to Germany in mid-February (more...). Back home, he faced
journalists asking whether the roughly 15 million Kurds were also
permitted to apply this brazen statement to themselves. A short time
later, the government announced that Kurdish-language programs could
now be broadcast nationwide on TRT, the government-run television
network. Was it a new beginning, or just another promise that will
not be fulfilled?
NEWSLETTER Sign up for Spiegel Online's daily newsletter and get the
best of Der Spiegel's and Spiegel Online's international coverage in
your In- Box everyday.
Until now, only heavily regulated local stations have been permitted
to broadcast in Kurdish, but for no more than 45 minutes a day and
only with Turkish subtitles. Gun TV is one of those stations. Its
commissioning editor, Diren Keser, 29, recently appeared in court
because the word "Kurdistan" was used in one of the station's
programs. The misstep could cost him ~@50,000 ($75,000).
Getting their own state of Kurdistan is no longer the dream of most
Kurds. If there is a Kurdistan at all, it is the region across the
border in northern Iraq, which is why the Turkish army is a thorn in
its side. Officially, at least, the targets of the ground offensive
that ended last Friday were the PKK camps in the mountains. It was
by no means a permanent withdrawal. Indeed, the Turkish military
leadership now plans to build 11 permanent bases in the mountains,
to keep the PKK on its toes. "There are further lessons that we need
to teach," Turkish General Yasar Buyukanit told reporters Monday at a
briefing on Turkey's incursion into Iraq. "There will be operations
when needed. We will continue. We will try to inflict heavier blows
on the PKK."
According to official sources, 24 soldiers and 237 rebels died in
Operation Sun. One family or another will likely be leaving Diyarbakir
soon, to pick up the body of a son.
By Daniel Steinvorth
Spiegel Online
March 4 2008
Germany
Turkey's incursion into northern Iraq to fight the PKK may be over, but
the government of Recep Tayyip Erdogan is a long way from solving the
"Kurdish problem." Erdogan's AKP party is trying another approach --
winning over Kurds with concessions and job promises.
The Kaya family keeps photographs of their son Mehmet displayed in
the living room of their house. The photos show a young man in a
grayish brown uniform, wearing a red star on a yellow background,
the symbol of the banned Kurdish Workers' Party, or PKK. Draped over
the pictures is the red, yellow and green flag of Kurdistan; simply
displaying the Kurdish flag is a crime in itself.
Two female students have set up a camera in the Kaya family's living
room. They are filming the interview for Roj TV, a pro-PKK satellite
network that is also banned under Turkish law, even if its headquarters
are in faraway Denmark.
In early February, before Turkey launched its ground offensive in
northern Iraq (more...), Mehmet Kaya was killed in an exchange of
fire with government troops. The family drove from Diyarbakir into
the mountains to identify the son's body. "He had already written me
a farewell letter a long time ago," the mother says into the camera,
her voice choked with emotion. "In the letter he wrote: 'You have
four other children. Let them fight for our cause.'"
The students are pleased with their recording. It will soon be
aired on the channel, as an example of the injustices Kurds face in
southeastern Turkey.
No one knows how many Kurds in the region are even receptive to
such messages anymore. Even the government of Prime Minister Recep
Tayyip Erdogan can only guess how popular the PKK, founded in 1978
and classified as a terrorist organization by the United States and
the European Union, is in Diyarbakir. Diyarbakir, considered the
unofficial capital of Turkey's Kurds, is one of Turkey's poorest and
most neglected cities. Unemployment generally ranges between 60 and
70 percent; in some neighborhoods, it is as high as 90 percent.
This is the epicenter of the ongoing conflict between the Kurds and
the Turks, 200 kilometers (124 miles) from the Iraqi border and worlds
away from Europe. The region is also home to Turkey's most important
military base, where its F-16 fighter jets take off, emitting a dull
booming noise that sounds like thunder, on their missions to bomb PKK
camps as part of Turkey's Operation Sun. It is also a place where
Kurdish youth still volunteer to join the PKK, and where the AKP,
Erdogan's conservative Islamic party, is trying to gain a foothold.
So far it is the pro-Kurdish Democratic Society Party (DTP) which
enjoys the trust and captures the majority of the votes of residents
in and around Diyarbakir. It was the only party to criticize the
government's military campaign in northern Iraq, and in recent days
the DTP has called for demonstrations in major Turkish cities. Public
prosecutors accuse the party of being too closely aligned with the
PKK, and a petition to ban the DTP is currently before Turkey's
Constitutional Court.
Nejdet Atalay, 32, doesn't deny the association with the rebels at
all. "They have grown out of the history of our people, and they
come from within our ranks." Atalay, wearing a sand-colored suit,
is the DTP's new chairman in Diyarbakir. He says that he operates
within the tradition of the "Kurdish struggle for freedom," but that
he pursues it with democratic means. This, Atalay explains, is why his
party has abandoned the old Kurdish demand for an independent state.
People like Atalay envision the Kurds being granted the kinds of
rights that minorities like the Scots, the Basques and the Catalans
have already been granted: their own regional parliament, a regional
government and recognition of the Kurds as a civilized people in the
Turkish constitution. But what would happen to the PKK fighters in
the mountains? "We need a peaceful solution," he says. "They must be
granted amnesty."
The rebels in northern Iraq see things differently. PKK commander
Murat Karayilan (more...) has threatened to "take the war into the
cities." Karayilan is one of the PKK's leaders who are said to be
hiding out somewhere in the impassable mountains of northern Iraq.
With words like these, Karayilan awakens memories of the civil war
the PKK fought against the Turkish army in the 1980s and 1990s,
in which the official death toll reached 40,000.
The PKK has also been taking the war to Diyarbakir lately. In early
January, a remote-controlled bomb exploded near a luxury hotel in
the city's downtown area, killing five and injuring dozens.
Although the attack was meant for Turkish soldiers, most of the
victims were civilians. The PKK later announced that it was a "horrible
mistake," which it regretted deeply. Since then the anti-government
group's reputation has suffered tremendously in a place that would
normally be its stronghold.
The Turkish prime minister's party has been trying to make inroads
in Diyarbakir for some time. Abdurrahim Hattapoglu, a 43-year-old
Kurdish business consultant, is the local head of the AKP. Like his
role model Erdogan, Hattapoglu wears a moustache and necktie.
Standing in front an oversized portrait of the prime minister, he
talks about how he plans to conquer the "Kurdish stronghold."
Of course, he admits, mass unemployment here in the southeast is
devastating, but the planned dam on the Tigris River, scheduled to
begin operation in five years, will bring change to the region. "It
will provide an additional 300,000 hectares (741,000 acres) of usable
land," he says. "That will create at least as many jobs." What he
neglects to mention, however, is that hundreds of villages and the
historic sites of the town of Hasankeyf will have to be flooded --
the price of progress.
The AKP captured an impressive 41 percent of the vote in Diyarbakir in
the 2007 parliamentary elections, an enormous gain over the 16 percent
it garnered in elections only five years earlier. Prime Minister
Erdogan did not introduce this massive shift by investing in the
region, but by uttering a few overdue words. In 2005, he became the
first prime minister in Turkey's history to travel to Diyarbakir,
where he conceded that Turkey has a "Kurdish problem," adding that
it was also his problem.
"That was a historic moment," says Irfan Babaoglu, a reserved man
who is chairman of the Kurdish Writers' Association. "He gave us hope.
But then he took it away again when he didn't keep his promises."
A sign in Babaoglu's office reads: "Ji Kerema Xwe Re Cixare Neksinin,"
Kurdish for "Please do not smoke." He was careful not to have
the sign printed on official paper, because that would have been a
potential offence. All official statements, signs or brochures in the
Kurdish language are still forbidden, even though many residents of
Diyarbakir speak and read almost no Turkish. Abdullah Demirbas, the
mayor of Diyarbakir, was suspended because he had service brochures
printed in Kurdish, even though he also had them printed in Arabic
and Armenian. He will soon go on trial on charges of distributing
"propaganda for the goals of the PKK terrorist organization."
"Of course, it is no longer forbidden to speak Kurdish on the
street," says author Babaoglu. "But Kurdish classes are still banned
in public schools. Often Kurdish speeches are forbidden during
election campaigns, as are the use of Kurdish names for newborn
babies, because the Kurdish letters W, X and Q do not exist in the
Turkish alphabet." He says that he too is torn between Turkish and
Kurdish, between the official and the vernacular language. According
to Babaoglu, many Kurds have, like him, the same schizophrenic
relationship with their own culture.
"Assimilation is a crime against humanity," Erdogan told Turks during
a visit to Germany in mid-February (more...). Back home, he faced
journalists asking whether the roughly 15 million Kurds were also
permitted to apply this brazen statement to themselves. A short time
later, the government announced that Kurdish-language programs could
now be broadcast nationwide on TRT, the government-run television
network. Was it a new beginning, or just another promise that will
not be fulfilled?
NEWSLETTER Sign up for Spiegel Online's daily newsletter and get the
best of Der Spiegel's and Spiegel Online's international coverage in
your In- Box everyday.
Until now, only heavily regulated local stations have been permitted
to broadcast in Kurdish, but for no more than 45 minutes a day and
only with Turkish subtitles. Gun TV is one of those stations. Its
commissioning editor, Diren Keser, 29, recently appeared in court
because the word "Kurdistan" was used in one of the station's
programs. The misstep could cost him ~@50,000 ($75,000).
Getting their own state of Kurdistan is no longer the dream of most
Kurds. If there is a Kurdistan at all, it is the region across the
border in northern Iraq, which is why the Turkish army is a thorn in
its side. Officially, at least, the targets of the ground offensive
that ended last Friday were the PKK camps in the mountains. It was
by no means a permanent withdrawal. Indeed, the Turkish military
leadership now plans to build 11 permanent bases in the mountains,
to keep the PKK on its toes. "There are further lessons that we need
to teach," Turkish General Yasar Buyukanit told reporters Monday at a
briefing on Turkey's incursion into Iraq. "There will be operations
when needed. We will continue. We will try to inflict heavier blows
on the PKK."
According to official sources, 24 soldiers and 237 rebels died in
Operation Sun. One family or another will likely be leaving Diyarbakir
soon, to pick up the body of a son.