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Turkey's Kurds could rise up, shun PKK: Osman Ocalan
18.1.2012 |
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Osman Ocalan, Abdullah Ocalan's younger brother,
speaks to Reuters during an interview in the small
town of Koy Sanjaq in the semi-autonomous Kurdistan
region of northern Iraq January 17, 2012 Photo:
Reuters
January
18, 2012
KOY SANJAQ,
Kurdistan region 'Iraq', — The failure of Turkey
and the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) to find a
peaceful end to their 27-year-old conflict could
lead to an uprising by Kurdish youths fed up with
both sides, similar to the Arab Spring, the brother
of the PKK's jailed leader said.
The festering war in Turkey's southeast has killed
about 40,000 people, displaced many more and
tarnished the image of Turkey as it seeks to present
itself as a champion of democracy and stability in
the Middle East, and join the European Union.
Since Turkey captured PKK leader Abdullah Ocalan in
1999, the PKK has declared repeated unilateral
ceasefires, but all have been ignored by Ankara
which, along with the United States and the EU,
classifies the PKK as a terrorist organisation.
Meanwhile Turkish Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan has
granted some cultural and language rights to the
country's Kurds, who make up as much as 20 percent
of the population, to try to stem support for the
insurgency and end the almost daily clashes.
In Turkey's parliamentary election in June last
year, both Erdogan's AK Party and the pro-Kurdish
Peace and Democracy Party (BDP) won strong support
in the mainly Kurdish southeast.
"The AKP government under the leadership of Erdogan
created hope in Kurdish circles," Osman Ocalan,
Abdullah Ocalan's younger brother, told Reuters in
the small town of Koy Sanjaq in the semi-autonomous
Kurdistan region of northern Iraq.
"Kurds supported Erdogan's party thinking it would
bring a peaceful solution ... The people also gave
serious support to the party backed by the PKK, that
is the BDP. The message of the people was 'solve the
problem'," said Ocalan, who left the PKK in 2004,www.ekurd.net
dissatisfied with its undemocratic nature.
"Neither the PKK nor the AKP government read this
message correctly," he said in an interview late on
Tuesday. "The AKP misused the support of the people
to suppress the guerrilla movement and the PKK
thought the people back them so they could continue
the violence." "Both sides are abusing the support
of the people," he said.
UPRISING
Between them, the state and the PKK have eliminated
almost all the moderate Kurdish political voices in
Turkey, leaving a huge gulf to be bridge if there is
ever going to be peace. Leaks to the media in
September last year of recordings of secret peace
talks hosted in Norway between Turkish intelligence
agents and PKK leaders appear to have signalled the
end of behind-the-scenes efforts to end the
conflict.
Instead the fighting has reignited. The PKK killed
24 Turkish soldiers in an attack in October, and the
army went on to kill 49 PKK militants in a large
operation. "Now the people have understood that both
sides have failed this test," said Ocalan, sitting
below a brightly coloured picture of his smiling
elder brother, currently jailed in Turkey, emerging
from clouds, arms outstretched toward a child
dressed in traditional Kurdish clothes.
"What will be the stance of the Kurdish people?
Kurds will increasingly behave more independently of
the PKK ... But that doesn't mean they will support
the governing party," he said. While large
demonstrations in Turkey's southeast last year
heralded talk of a Kurdish Spring in the wake of
uprisings in the Arab world, widespread protests
fizzled out.
Ocalan said that was partly because the PKK feared
being sidelined by a genuinely popular protest
movement. But incidents such as a Turkish air strike
last month that killed 35 civilian smugglers on the
border with Iraq could still enflame the streets.
While acknowledging the bombing was a
mistake, no Turkish leader has yet apologised.
"Just as the people of the Middle East rose up and
overthrew dictatorial regimes, the Kurds of course
will not leave this oppression unanswered," he said.
"The Kurdish people will begin an uprising just like
in Tunisia, Egypt, Syria and elsewhere. Whether that
will that happen in six months or in a year it is
impossible to say."
Since it was established in 1984, the Kurdistan
Workers' Party 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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