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DIYARBAKIR,
Turkey, July 5 (AFP) - Back in armed action after a
five-year pause, Kurdish rebels are seeking to
extract further concessions from Turkey, testing
Ankara's ability to maintain stability and keep its
European Union membership bid on track.
Some 100 rebels and soldiers have been killed in the
southeast since April, when clashes markedly
intensified, months after the Kurdistan Workers'
Party (PKK) in June 2004 called off a unilateral
ceasefire, arguing that Ankara's reforms to expand
Kurdish freedoms are inadequate.
The unrest has sparked fears that chaos may again
engulf the region and shatter Ankara's
democratization efforts.
The PKK's advocacy of a democratic Turkey respectful
to Kurdish ethnic identity has evolved into a demand
for Kurdish autonomy within a federal system, an
amnesty for the rebels guaranteeing their
participation in political life, and freedom for
their jailed leader Abdullah Ocalan.
"If war starts in earnest again, the Turkish economy
will go upside down and the EU will become an
impossible dream," said a PKK activist, who
identified himself only as Sahin, as he explained
why a 5,000-strong guerrilla force chose to once
again confront NATO's second largest standing army.
"Turkey doesn't dare risk its stability, and we have
nothing to lose," said Sahin, 40, who spent nine
years in jail for membership in the PKK but has now
"shifted to legal ground," working with the
pro-Kurdish Democratic People's Party in Diyarbakir,
the main city of the southeast.
The PKK, blacklisted as a terrorist group by the
United States and the EU, waged a campaign for
self-rule in southeast Turkey between 1984 and 1999,
resulting in about 37,000 deaths and massive
destruction of property.
The brutal state response to PKK violence led to
gross human rights breaches and opened a wide
confidence gap between Ankara and the Kurds, who
make up about a fifth of the country's 70-million
population.
After Ocalan was captured in 1999, the PKK abandoned
its claim to statehood and declared a unilateral
truce.
Ankara, meanwhile, lifted emergency rule in the
southeast, allowed Kurdish to be taught at private
schools and used in public television broadcasts,
and passed laws to compensate war victims.
Political scientist Dogu Ergil said the PKK's return
to armed action was destined to fail in a world
where "terrorism is no longer condoned as a
legitimate form of opposition, even if it is for a
just cause."
The PKK, however, may still create problems for
Turkey's EU bid.
"To join the EU, politics should be free of
violence," Ergil said. "The continuing unrest shows
that the Kurdish problem is not yet solved."
Kurdish politicians publicly distance themselves
from the PKK, but back most of its demands and want
an amnesty.
"We've gone beyond the point where weapons can have
a say in solving problems," Diyarbakir's Kurdish
mayor Osman Baydemir said. "We have to draw the PKK
to the platform of democratic struggle."
Although Ankara's fence-mending moves have eroded
popular support for the PKK, the man in the street,
exasperated by years of bloodshed, also says the
rebels should be pardoned and military operations
stopped.
The Kurdish demands, however, are unwelcome in
Ankara.
Many Turks believe the Kurds are using the country's
EU bid to advance separatist ambitions under the
cover of human rights reforms.
Moreover, public support for EU membership, the
driving force behind Turkey's democratic reform
effort, has declined amid increasing European
hostility to this Muslim nation's accession to the
bloc.
"Turkish nationalism is fanning Kurdish
nationalism," Ergil said.
Moreover, he argued, Ankara lacks any comprehensive
strategy to tackle the many social and economic
problems of the Kurdish region, where the legacy of
conflict is entangled with rampant poverty and
enduring feudal traditions.
"It is a terrible stalemate," Ergil said. "Turkey is
in suspense."
AFP
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