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Intellectuals in Turkey launched "We are
all KCK" campaign
3.11.2011 |
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November 3, 2011
ISTANBUL,— Following the arrest of
61-year-old professor and Peace and Democracy Party
(BDP) Assembly member
Büşra Ersanlı
and 63-year-old publisher and writer
Ragıp
Zarakolu, intellectuals have started
a campaign they labelled "We are all KCK". KCK
(Kurdish Communities Union) is alleged by the
prosecutors to be the "urban wing" of the PKK
(Kurdistan Workers' Party). ANF news agency
reported.
What exactly is this "urban wing", what its scopes
and role is hard to say because the prosecutors so
far have not been able to explain it themselves.
Indeed they keep asking for the arrest of thousands
without specifying why. Worse, they hide behind the
KCK fig leaf and put other charges into the bargain
so to make it almost sure that the people they want
to see in jail actually end up behind bars.
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Lawyer and human rights activist Eren
Keskin. |
A reaction to this indiscriminate and above all
unmotivated arrests has been mounting in recent
weeks, and it kind of reached a pick with the
arrest, last week of Ersanlı and Zarakolu. If there
was any further evidence that the "KCK excuse" could
be used against anyone, that was it.
The new campaign, "We are all KCK", is being
launched by lawyers Eren Keskin, Ayşe Batumlu, Leman
Yurtsever, Hürriyet Şener and photographer Veysi
Altay invited people to take part in this activity.
By now, 50 people,www.ekurd.net
including writer, activists and poet Roni Margulies,
sociologist İsmail Beşikçi, Dr. Şebnem Korurfincancı,
ecologist Bilge Contepe, writer A.Hicri İzgören,
singer Ferhat Tunç, Şanar Yurdatapan and many
leaders from leftist parties and organizations,
signed the petition.
The campaign's promoters announced that this action
will take place in a couple days.
Workers from Office Workers’ Trade Union have today
staged a protest against the government policy of
indiscriminate attacks against people who are
organizing against the ruling Justice and
Development Party (AKP).
KCK-trial, on October 18, 2010 a Turkish
court began the trial
of 152 high profile Kurdish politicians and rights defenders,
accused of being the urban wing of the
outlawed separatist Kurdish (Kurdistan Workers'
Party) PKK rebels.
Over
7748 people were taken into
custody and 3895 persons were
arrested in the scope of KCK operations during the past six months
[till October 2011], the
pro-Kurdish Peace and Democracy Party announced.
Dozens of BDP executives and employees are still in
prison.
Since it was established in 1984, the PKK has been
fighting the Turkish state, which still denies the
constitutional existence of Kurds, to establish a
Kurdish state in the south east of the country, sparking a conflict that has claimed some 45,000
lives.
But now its aim is the creation an autonomous
Kurdish region
and more cultural rights for ethnic Kurds who
constitute the greatest minority in Turkey,
numbering more than 20 million. A large Turkey's
Kurdish community openly sympathise with the Kurdish PKK rebels.
PKK's demands included releasing PKK detainees,
lifting the ban on education in Kurdish, paving the
way for an autonomous democrat Kurdish system within
Turkey, reducing pressure on the detained PKK leader
Abdullah Öcalan, stopping military action against
the Kurdish party and recomposing the Turkish
constitution.
Turkey refuses to recognize its Kurdish population
as a distinct minority. It has allowed some cultural
rights such as limited broadcasts in the Kurdish
language and private Kurdish language courses with
the prodding of the European Union, but Kurdish
politicians say the measures fall short of their
expectations.
The PKK is considered as 'terrorist' organization by
Ankara, U.S., the PKK continues to be on the
blacklist list in EU despite court ruling which
overturned a decision
to place the Kurdish rebel group PKK and its
political wing on the European Union's terror list.
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author or news agency,
firatnews.com | ekurd.net | Agencies
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