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IPS - Inter Press Service
August 20, 2012 Monday
TURKEY: KURDISH NORTHERN IRAQ REPLACES SYRIA AS ARMY'S NEW TARGET
by Jacques Couvas
ANKARA, Aug. 20 2012
With attacks by the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) multiplying and
spreading to a larger number of Turkish provinces, Ankara is under
increasing pressure by nationalistic parties to take tougher measures
against Kurdish activism, including a full-blown land incursion by the
Turkish armed forces into northern Iraq.
Since June, the PKK has changed its operating tactics, from
hit-and-run attacks against security outposts to entering urban areas
in an extended geographical area. The focus is still the southeastern
part of the country, where the majority of the population is composed
of ethnic Kurds, but eastern and western provinces such as Van and
Izmir have also been targeted.
Indicative of these tactical changes is the occupation in late July of
Semdinli, a town in the Hakkari province in southeast Turkey bordering
Iraq and Syria, which the PKK held for three weeks. Regular troops
eventually forced the rebels to withdraw, with heavy losses on both
sides.
The Arab Spring has provided a new source of inspiration for the PKK,
according to Idris Bal, a member of parliament with the ruling Justice
and Development Party (AKP) and an expert on domestic terrorism.
The PKK sees an opportunity to foment popular rebellion in
Kurdish-dominated regions of Turkey, with a view to creating a state
which it can govern, Bal said.
The occupation of Semdinli was aimed at sending a message to the world
that things are spiralling out of control in Turkey, he added.
But the Kurdish insurgents' all-out approach is not a totally new
concept in this internal struggle, which began 28 years ago and has
cost 40,000 lives so far. The PKK's former leader, Abdullah Ocalan,
tried it in the 1990s, with limited success.
The PKK has been declared a terrorist organization by Turkey, the EU
and the U.S.
Ocalan, in jail for life since 1999, still influences the PKK's
strategy. In a recent declaration, he predicted that 2012 would be the
"final year" in the all-out Kurdish rebellion, which resumed in 2010,
after seven years of relative calm.
Since 2003, the government of Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan has
tried to find a peaceful solution to the Kurdish problem, against
fierce opposition by the Republican People's Party (CHP) and the
Nationalist Movement Party (MHP).
A series of secret talks between Turkey's national security agency
(MIT) and PKK representatives were held in 2010 in Oslo, facilitated
by the British intelligence services. But the process was abandoned as
the result of a premature leak of the discussions.
The response of the state was to intensify bombing of PKK bases in
northern Iraq, through air force raids. This produced some results,
until the end of December, when military jets killed 34 young ethnic
Kurds at Uludere, near the Turkish-Iraqi border, who were mistaken for
PKK members.
The mass killing triggered nationwide indignation and inflamed
anti-government sentiment in the south and east of the country.
"Parliament should have worked in fall 2011 on a package to provide
basic rights and freedoms to Kurds in order to reach a democratic
solution," said Mehmet Ozcan, chairman of the Ankara Strategy
Institute, a think-tank in the Turkish capital.
"The time was ripe for reform before Uludere, but now it's the PKK
that has the psychological upper hand," said Ozcan, who believes it is
not realistic to expect an end to terror unless a democratic process
addressing the needs of the Kurds is put in place.
The evolution of the Syrian revolt seems, however, to be a stronger
reason for concern among Turkish politicians and the military. The
withdrawal of the Syrian security forces from the border regions with
Turkey and Iraq has left a vacuum which is being exploited by the
Syrian Kurdish minority and the PKK alike.
Although they remained initially loyal to Bashar al Assad's regime,
Syria's Kurds have more recently unveiled aims for independence in a
post-Assad scenario, through the Democratic Union Party (PYD), a
sister organization to the PKK.
The current lack of Syrian authority in the region also facilitates
the mobility of PKK fighters between northern Iraq, Syria and
southeastern Turkey.
Meanwhile, Massoud Barzani, president of the Kurdistan Regional
Government (KRG) in the Kurdistan Region, an autonomous province in
northern Iraq bordering Turkey, has made it clear that he won't enter
into an armed clash with the PKK.
Although Barzani claims he is playing a conciliatory role between the
PKK and Ankara, the KRG has become the host of Kurdish separatist
movements for the region.
Large Kurdish communities live in Iraq, Iran, Syria and Turkey,
totalling 30 to 38 million people, depending on whether national data
or international estimates are used. Turkey accounts for half of the
total. Another two million live in the diaspora, mostly in Armenia and
northern Europe. The Kurds are considered to be the world's largest
ethnic minority without their own country.
The current political instability in the Middle East has revived
aspirations for a Pan-Kurdish state, which could emerge as a new
Muslim regional power, alongside Egypt, Iran, Iraq and Turkey.
The prospect gives Ankara the jitters. Stuck with domestic unrest, a
potential armed intervention in Syria, blocked for now by Washington,
and deteriorating relations with Iran, Erdogan's government is prudent
but jumpy. In recent weeks, it has repeatedly accused both Damascus
and Tehran of providing support to the PKK and has expressed
disappointment over Barzani's passivity.
Meanwhile, the CHP and MHP opposition parties and nationalistic public
opinion are criticising the prime minister for his foreign policy and
lukewarm stance towards the PKK. Last week, voices of observers close
to the ruling party warned the government that contemplating military
intervention in Syria, with or without American consent, was the wrong
approach.
Instead, they said, launching a full-scale, deep and lasting land
forces operation into northern Iraq would be a better use of resources
and soldiers' lives in order to put an end to the Kurdish separatist
violence.
Over dinner late last week with a closed group of journalists in
Ankara, Deputy PM Bulent Arinc said Turkey was pondering an operation
in the Kandil Mountains in northern Iraq, where the PKK headquarters
are located. The government has already obtained authorisation from
parliament.
This will, however, need the approval of Washington, which still
retains policy rights over Iraq, and collaboration with U.S. military
and intelligence, which can provide information on PKK movements.
This may not be so simple to obtain. The Central Intelligence Agency
(CIA) had become suspicious in recent months of Turkey's reliability
as an ally. Such suspicions were borne out last week, when Arinc
admitted that the national security agency, MIT, had been sharing
information with the Iranian intelligence agency, SAVAK. The
information had been provided by American Predators, a type of drone.
"The challenge for Turkey, however, is to conduct this sweeping
operation without alienating the local population living in scattered
villages in Kandil, as well as other Kurds who have nothing to do with
the violence," says Abdullah Bozkurt, a political analyst and expert
on the government's decision-making.
The Semdinli experience confirms that the PKK would not hesitate to
infiltrate residential areas and use them as shields against attacks.
Ankara is concerned that incidents as in Uludere, or Afghan- and
Pakistan-like blunders by the American military, would seriously
tarnish Turkey's reputation as a Muslim model for democracy.
August 20, 2012 Monday
TURKEY: KURDISH NORTHERN IRAQ REPLACES SYRIA AS ARMY'S NEW TARGET
by Jacques Couvas
ANKARA, Aug. 20 2012
With attacks by the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) multiplying and
spreading to a larger number of Turkish provinces, Ankara is under
increasing pressure by nationalistic parties to take tougher measures
against Kurdish activism, including a full-blown land incursion by the
Turkish armed forces into northern Iraq.
Since June, the PKK has changed its operating tactics, from
hit-and-run attacks against security outposts to entering urban areas
in an extended geographical area. The focus is still the southeastern
part of the country, where the majority of the population is composed
of ethnic Kurds, but eastern and western provinces such as Van and
Izmir have also been targeted.
Indicative of these tactical changes is the occupation in late July of
Semdinli, a town in the Hakkari province in southeast Turkey bordering
Iraq and Syria, which the PKK held for three weeks. Regular troops
eventually forced the rebels to withdraw, with heavy losses on both
sides.
The Arab Spring has provided a new source of inspiration for the PKK,
according to Idris Bal, a member of parliament with the ruling Justice
and Development Party (AKP) and an expert on domestic terrorism.
The PKK sees an opportunity to foment popular rebellion in
Kurdish-dominated regions of Turkey, with a view to creating a state
which it can govern, Bal said.
The occupation of Semdinli was aimed at sending a message to the world
that things are spiralling out of control in Turkey, he added.
But the Kurdish insurgents' all-out approach is not a totally new
concept in this internal struggle, which began 28 years ago and has
cost 40,000 lives so far. The PKK's former leader, Abdullah Ocalan,
tried it in the 1990s, with limited success.
The PKK has been declared a terrorist organization by Turkey, the EU
and the U.S.
Ocalan, in jail for life since 1999, still influences the PKK's
strategy. In a recent declaration, he predicted that 2012 would be the
"final year" in the all-out Kurdish rebellion, which resumed in 2010,
after seven years of relative calm.
Since 2003, the government of Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan has
tried to find a peaceful solution to the Kurdish problem, against
fierce opposition by the Republican People's Party (CHP) and the
Nationalist Movement Party (MHP).
A series of secret talks between Turkey's national security agency
(MIT) and PKK representatives were held in 2010 in Oslo, facilitated
by the British intelligence services. But the process was abandoned as
the result of a premature leak of the discussions.
The response of the state was to intensify bombing of PKK bases in
northern Iraq, through air force raids. This produced some results,
until the end of December, when military jets killed 34 young ethnic
Kurds at Uludere, near the Turkish-Iraqi border, who were mistaken for
PKK members.
The mass killing triggered nationwide indignation and inflamed
anti-government sentiment in the south and east of the country.
"Parliament should have worked in fall 2011 on a package to provide
basic rights and freedoms to Kurds in order to reach a democratic
solution," said Mehmet Ozcan, chairman of the Ankara Strategy
Institute, a think-tank in the Turkish capital.
"The time was ripe for reform before Uludere, but now it's the PKK
that has the psychological upper hand," said Ozcan, who believes it is
not realistic to expect an end to terror unless a democratic process
addressing the needs of the Kurds is put in place.
The evolution of the Syrian revolt seems, however, to be a stronger
reason for concern among Turkish politicians and the military. The
withdrawal of the Syrian security forces from the border regions with
Turkey and Iraq has left a vacuum which is being exploited by the
Syrian Kurdish minority and the PKK alike.
Although they remained initially loyal to Bashar al Assad's regime,
Syria's Kurds have more recently unveiled aims for independence in a
post-Assad scenario, through the Democratic Union Party (PYD), a
sister organization to the PKK.
The current lack of Syrian authority in the region also facilitates
the mobility of PKK fighters between northern Iraq, Syria and
southeastern Turkey.
Meanwhile, Massoud Barzani, president of the Kurdistan Regional
Government (KRG) in the Kurdistan Region, an autonomous province in
northern Iraq bordering Turkey, has made it clear that he won't enter
into an armed clash with the PKK.
Although Barzani claims he is playing a conciliatory role between the
PKK and Ankara, the KRG has become the host of Kurdish separatist
movements for the region.
Large Kurdish communities live in Iraq, Iran, Syria and Turkey,
totalling 30 to 38 million people, depending on whether national data
or international estimates are used. Turkey accounts for half of the
total. Another two million live in the diaspora, mostly in Armenia and
northern Europe. The Kurds are considered to be the world's largest
ethnic minority without their own country.
The current political instability in the Middle East has revived
aspirations for a Pan-Kurdish state, which could emerge as a new
Muslim regional power, alongside Egypt, Iran, Iraq and Turkey.
The prospect gives Ankara the jitters. Stuck with domestic unrest, a
potential armed intervention in Syria, blocked for now by Washington,
and deteriorating relations with Iran, Erdogan's government is prudent
but jumpy. In recent weeks, it has repeatedly accused both Damascus
and Tehran of providing support to the PKK and has expressed
disappointment over Barzani's passivity.
Meanwhile, the CHP and MHP opposition parties and nationalistic public
opinion are criticising the prime minister for his foreign policy and
lukewarm stance towards the PKK. Last week, voices of observers close
to the ruling party warned the government that contemplating military
intervention in Syria, with or without American consent, was the wrong
approach.
Instead, they said, launching a full-scale, deep and lasting land
forces operation into northern Iraq would be a better use of resources
and soldiers' lives in order to put an end to the Kurdish separatist
violence.
Over dinner late last week with a closed group of journalists in
Ankara, Deputy PM Bulent Arinc said Turkey was pondering an operation
in the Kandil Mountains in northern Iraq, where the PKK headquarters
are located. The government has already obtained authorisation from
parliament.
This will, however, need the approval of Washington, which still
retains policy rights over Iraq, and collaboration with U.S. military
and intelligence, which can provide information on PKK movements.
This may not be so simple to obtain. The Central Intelligence Agency
(CIA) had become suspicious in recent months of Turkey's reliability
as an ally. Such suspicions were borne out last week, when Arinc
admitted that the national security agency, MIT, had been sharing
information with the Iranian intelligence agency, SAVAK. The
information had been provided by American Predators, a type of drone.
"The challenge for Turkey, however, is to conduct this sweeping
operation without alienating the local population living in scattered
villages in Kandil, as well as other Kurds who have nothing to do with
the violence," says Abdullah Bozkurt, a political analyst and expert
on the government's decision-making.
The Semdinli experience confirms that the PKK would not hesitate to
infiltrate residential areas and use them as shields against attacks.
Ankara is concerned that incidents as in Uludere, or Afghan- and
Pakistan-like blunders by the American military, would seriously
tarnish Turkey's reputation as a Muslim model for democracy.