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Turkey-Kurdistan (Iraq): Awaiting the
invasion
20.5.2006
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As skirmishes between Turks and Kurds on the
Iraqi border intensify, Katie Scott focuses on the
Kurdish guerrillas currently living in the mountains
of Kurdistan (northern Iraq)
Saturday May 20, 2006
Within one minute, a camp that was filled with
teenagers - soon to be fighters - is empty. Two
commanders, one male and one female, see them off in
a disorderly file while another crouches on the
ground filling the magazine of her AK-47 with
bullets. What we thought was thunder is the sound of
Turkish rockets landing.
An estimated 10,000 PKK (or Kurdistan Workers'
party) guerrillas currently live in the mountains of
northern Iraq. A third of them are women, living and
dying alongside the men. The first women guerrillas
fought hard for this right, battling prejudices
within the PKK that reflected those within Kurdish
society.
Men and women sleep in separate mangas, or huts, but
often eat and train together. Women are educated
separately for those subjects which the commandants
say younger recruits feel uncomfortable talking
about in front of the men - how to reconcile teenage
angst with their life as guerrillas, for example,
and how to cope with their emotions while training
to kill.
The PKK live off the land, but are well supplied
with arms and necessities, based in a country that
turns a blind eye to their presence. This is despite
a history of violence between the PKK and the
Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK), founded in 1975
by Iraq's current president, Jalal Talabani. Life in
summer can be almost idyllic. Goatherds, themselves
PKK fighters, tend herds, which provide meat, cheese
and milk, and return to camp to sleep.
Guerrillas play volleyball on makeshift pitches; men
and women drink sweet tea in the shadow of the
mountains. Winter is harsh, often with deep snow.
All year round groups of fighters disappear along
mountain paths covertly to cross the border to
attack Turkish military targets. All year, from
radios crackling in the guerrillas' pockets, come
reports of casualties from these skirmishes.
The PKK was founded in 1978 by six students from
Ankara University. They vowed to fight for an
independent state for the Kurds, a people divided
between four countries - Turkey, Syria, Iran and
Iraq - and in each of them denied basic human and
political rights. Six years later, the PKK took up
arms, sparking a 15-year armed struggle. An
estimated 37,000 lives have been lost. After a
period of relative calm, tensions are again
mounting.
Attacks on Turkish bases in the Hakkari province of
south-east Turkey have become more frequent since
June 2004, when a five-year ceasefire ended. The
number of Kurds fleeing Turkey to join the PKK is
rising. Many come from villages close to the border,
which Turkey has been systematically destroying in a
bid to undermine PKK support in the region. They
claim 3,000 villages have been razed to date.
Kurds also make the journey from neighbouring states
or from Europe in support of the estimated 12
million Kurdish people living in Turkey. "They call
us Mountain Turks and insist that we speak their
language and live by their culture," one commander
tells a new recruit from Germany. "They say that
everybody who lives in Turkey is a Turk."
The European court of human rights has ruled that
the 1999 trial in Turkey of the PKK leader Abdullah
Ocalan was "neither impartial nor independent";
though a death sentence was lifted, he is still
imprisoned. The PKK continues to fight, funded by
supporters worldwide. Its aim now is not an
independent state, but basic human rights for
Kurdish people in Turkey. Branded terrorists by the
British and US governments, PKK soldiers are dying
at a rate of three a day.
Turkey, a valuable ally in Bush's War on Terror, is
putting pressure on the US to take military action
against PKK bases. Iraqi authorities have so far
ignored repeated calls from Turkey for permission to
attack.
Meanwhile, the PKK remains poised for an invasion
like that of 1997, when many thousands of Turkish
soldiers poured into the Zap valley, defended by
mere hundreds of guerrillas. One female fighter
explained: "We don't want a utopia. Like all people
around the world, we simply want the right to enjoy
our culture and use our language - to live as
Kurds."
Guardian co.uk
South-east Turkey: North Kurdistan
(Kurdistan-Turkey)
Northern Iraq: South Kurdistan (Kurdistan-Iraq)
Estimated 20 million Kurdish people living in Turkey
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