|
Self-government is the right of the
Kurdish Nation
16.11.2007
By Martin Zehr
|
|
|
|
November 16, 2007
In the article entitled
“Towards a new approach to the
Kurdish question” by Dr. Salim Nazzal
there is a new approach in regards to current events
along the border of the Kurdish Autonomous Region.
It goes beyond the usual rhetoric attacking PKK
“terrorists” and “Kurdish separatists”. The title
raises the “Kurdish question” as a national issue,
even if he does qualify Kurds as simply a minority.
The article also traces the actions of the
governments in Iraq, Iran, Syria and Turkey against
Kurdish nationals living within their borders.
Dr. Nazzal criticism of Kurdish parties attempts to
present any effort to unite a Kurdish people for
self-government as inherently rooted in
self-deception. Why is it something less than “realpolitik”,
that Dr. Nazzal presumes to be the necessary
prerequisite for appropriate political policy, if
Kurds organize a government to express their
national will? If the Kurdish people form a
government, raise their own flag and demonstrate
their unity as a people by forming a government, the
reasons lie in the continued refusal of the other
states in the region to represent their national
will.
The same US, that Dr. Nazzal says: “Iraqi Kurdish
political parties have allied themselves with the
USA”, has generously aided Turkey with military aid
for years. It is hardly a secret. Neither does it
define the Turkish government in itself. What
defined the relation of Turkey to the Kurdish nation
was its enforcement of emergency powers, arrests of
Kurdish officials, forced displacements, and
disappearing and torture of PKK and others.
Independence is not the cause of the planned Turkish
invasion. The economic sustainability of the Kurdish
Autonomous Region has been the focus of Turkey in
its campaign to prevent the Kirkuk referendum and
its recent military maneuvers. The few thousand PKK
within the Kurdish Autonomous Region hardly
represents a substantial threat to Turkish
sovereignty.
The existence of governments in the region that have
waged a jihad against Kurdish peoples, gassed
Halabja, and denied them fundamental cultural
recognition or political rights are not some simply
a distant legacy of the Sykes-Picot agreement after
World War I. The recent historical legacy of
treatment at the hands of governments in the region
has as much to do with the priority of
self-government by Kurds as the roles of the US or
Britain in the region. How can any people entrust
the security of their future generations to those
who have acted in such a criminal manner? www.ekurd.net
The fact that “the north of Iraq became a Vietnam
for every Iraqi government since the state
proclaimed its independence in 1924” is less a
product of a position taken by any particular
Kurdish political party then it is the product of
the fundamental denial of political and national
rights within Iraq. Autonomy is a valid recognition
of national rights recognized by the international
community. Denial of human rights and invasion of a
sovereign nation are violations of international
law. Likewise, the thirty year war against the PKK
by the Turkish military has yet to be placed before
world courts for examination.
Dr. Nazzal proposes” we need to differentiate
between oppressed peoples and the political parties
which represent them.” We are talking in the case of
the Kurdistan Regional Government of a government,
and not simply political organizations or parties.
Drawing such distinctions also negates the people
they represent and presents them as simply pawns or
sheep. Turkey’s refusal to recognize the KRG is
consistent with its forced displacements of hundreds
of thousands of Kurds in their “war” against the PKK.
The solution for the Turkish government is intended
to undermine the Kurdish nation’s ability to
function politically together as a people.
Permitting Kurds to speak their own languages in
Ankara, is hardly comparable to enabling them to
function politically represented in their own duly
constituted bodies in their own homeland. www.ekurd.net
Finally, Dr. Nazzal states: “military power will not
solve the problem, but would instead push Kurds
towards frustration and consequently towards
adopting a more aggressive position towards
mainstream society”. He is accurate that military
power will not “solve” the matters of Kurdish
political and national rights. He does negate the
mainstream Kurdish society in posing the matter as
he does. What Iraqi, Turkish, Iranian or Syrian
mainstream society has ever represented the needs
and aspirations of the Kurdish nation?
Martin Zehr is an American political writer in
the San Francisco area whose article on the Kirkuk
Referendum has been printed by the Kurdish Regional
Government.
theconservativevoice com
Top |
Kurd Net
does not take credit for and is not responsible for the content of news
information on this page
|
® 