Since the Turkish Justice and Development Party (Adalet ve Kalkinma Partisi -
AKP) determined to address the Kurdish question through what is called a
"democratic initiative", there has been hope that political violence would
finally come to an end after 25 years.
Despite its shortcomings, the democratic initiative created a positive
environment and many Kurdish intellectuals openly supported the process. Prime
Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan and Minister of the Interior Besir Atalay have
held many meetings with intellectuals, opinion leaders and leaders of
non-governmental organizations. Pro-Kurdish non-governmental organizations have
also held conferences to discuss possible ways to end the violence.
Yet the outlawed Kurdistan Workers' Party (Partiya Karkeren Kurdistan - PKK)
has recently stepped up its attacks inside Turkey once again. The intensified
PKK violence prompted the army to carry out at least two air raids and a
small-scale ground incursion on rebel bases in northern Iraq. In the past two
months, the PKK has killed more than 60 soldiers. According to the Turkish
military, 130 PKK militants lost their lives in that same time period.
The call to intensify the war this summer was given in January. Cemil Bayik,
deputy head of the PKK and deputy chairman of the Kurdistan Democratic
Confederation (Koma Civaken Kurdistan - KCK, a Kurdish militant umbrella
organization), laid out the PKK's strategy as follows, "There is no reason to
maintain the ceasefire [declared in March 2009]. The Justice and Development
Party government is the last resort in the hand of the Turkish state. If we
remove the AKP from power the state has to sit down with the PKK and negotiate
with the PKK."
Imprisoned PKK leader Abdullah Ocalan also thinks the AKP's Kurdish initiative
aims to eliminate the PKK and its affiliates. In one of his weekly meetings
with his lawyers, Ocalan stated that he would withdraw from being a peacemaker
between the Kurds and Turkish state on May 31. From that time on it has been up
to the PKK leaders in the field to decide whether or not to intensify the war.
The real reason behind the PKK's recent attacks is related to the police
crackdown on the PKK's support bases in the city centers. Since April 2009,
police have regularly launched operations against the KCK network.
In those operations, hundreds of alleged PKK supporters were arrested,
including elected mayors and heads of the local chapters of the pro-PKK Peace
and Democratic Party (Baris ve Demokrasi Partisi - BDP). The local people did
not welcome the arrests. KCK operations temporarily limited the PKK's
activities in the city centers until a new KCK appointee could take over. The
PKK's self-perceived role as the guardian of Kurdish political institutions and
municipalities against the operations of Turkish security forces created
pressure on the group to take revenge.
According to Cemil Bayik, the AKP-ordered operations closed all doors and
removed all opportunities for Kurdish political participation. In a written
statement, the KCK claims:
Our leader, Abdullah Ocalan, is not
responsible for the removal of the unilateral ceasefire. The AKP government,
which is responsible for the intensification of war and loss of lives, is
obscuring the reality through demagogy ... Holding our leader responsible for
this process is a conscious distortion. This attempt is the indication of a new
process of oppression and pressure on Ocalan.
The PKK hopes to
introduce a new political model in the Kurdish region, described as "democratic
autonomy". Abdullah Ocalan created the model based on the example of Northern
Cyprus, where Turkic Cypriots have their own government, parliament, president
and other institutions.
Cemil Bayik described it as "a model that aims to mobilize the Kurdish people
to make their own decisions and have their own governing institutions. It is a
model that aims to organize Kurdish people in the political, social, cultural,
economic and security areas and solve their own problems through their free
will." Bayik thinks that this model will lessen the influence of the Turkish
state on the Kurds.
At the same time as Bayik's endorsement of "democratic autonomy", BDP mayors
organized a meeting in the southeastern Turkish city of Diyarbakir to declare
that they would launch a political campaign in support of democratic autonomy.
According to the statement, the mayors referred to the European Charter of
Local Self-Government (ECLSG), which Turkey signed in 1988 and with certain
conditions adopted in its law in 1991. Indeed, the protocol allows local
municipalities to function as semi-autonomous governments, but because of the
conditions placed on it by the Turkish government they are not able to exercise
as much freedom as they wish. [1]
Bayik claims that the PKK is fighting this time to protect "democratic
autonomy" from Turkish state suppression. It seems the PKK is developing a
strategy to bring Turkey into confrontation with the European Union (EU).
Pro-PKK institutions and politicians hope that the ECLSG protocol provides them
enough room to establish some level of autonomy in which they can escape from
the central government's Turkish nationalist policies.
Yet, they first need to highlight the conditions that Ankara put in place when
it adapted the agreement for its domestic law and bring Turkey into
confrontation with the EU to seek removal of these conditions. The PKK
calculates that Turkey will not want to remove the conditions. Therefore, it
justifies its violence and presents Turkey as a violator of international
agreements.
Despite the PKK's new strategy, the leaders of Turkey imply that intensified
PKK attacks are somehow related to Israel. Erdogan, for instance, sparked
domestic controversy when he argued that the PKK was a "subcontractor" of
foreign powers.
In response, the opposition Republican People's Party (Cumhuriyet Halk Partisi)
asked Erdogan to reveal the power behind the PKK. What is interesting about the
theory of Israeli involvement in the PKK's recent attacks is that even military
generals believe that Israel is supporting the PKK.
Three renowned journalists in Ankara confirmed that Deputy Chief of the General
Staff General Aslan Guner, an Ankara veteran known for his expertise in the
intelligence world, had invited journalists to his office directly following a
December 2009 PKK attack in Resadiye (Tokat province) to inform them of a link
between Israel and the attacks. A TSK spokesman later denied the journalists'
claims.
Given the fact that conspiracy theories sometimes run rampant in Ankara, it is
likely that even high-ranking generals may buy into the conspiracy theories.
However, a journalist revealed (under the condition of anonymity) that when he
visited Minister of Interior Besir Atalay, the minister informed him that Chief
of the General Staff Ilker Basbug also thought that Israel was behind the PKK's
attack on Resadiye that killed seven soldiers. [2]
There are similar concerns in Turkey over possible Israeli involvement in the
May 31 PKK attack on Iskenderun naval base that killed seven servicemen.
In response to allegations concerning PKK-Israeli ties, the KCK issued a
statement citing Ankara's purchase of Heron unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs)
from Israel, which went unaffected by the recent Free Gaza flotilla incident.
The KCK says the UAVs will be used against them and that Erdogan and Turkish
President Abdullah Gul "have openly made an agreement with Israel in order to
annihilate our movement, which totally exposes the insincerity and hypocrisy in
the face of our peoples and the whole Islamic world".
It seems that in the past 25 years nothing has changed in Ankara. Instead of
examining the causes of the problem and trying to understand what motivates the
PKK to increase its use of violence, leaders in Ankara develop conspiracy
theories and blame foreign states.
In the 1990s it was Syria, European countries, Russia and even the United
States that were to blame, but now, soured Turkish-Israeli relations provide a
perfect reason to point the finger at Israel.
The blame-games of Turkish leaders, civilian and military alike, are usually
related to domestic politics and are used to find an easy escape from
responsibilities. This time, however, the Turkish public is asking its leaders
to do something to end the violence, which leaves the Erdogan government on
shaky ground.
Notes
1. Husamettin Inac and Feyzullah Unal, "Avrupa Yerel Yonetimler Ozerklik Sarti
Ve Turkiye'de Belediyeler."
2. Author's interview, Istanbul, January 16, 2010.
Emrullah Uslu is a Turkish terrorism expert and currently a PhD candidate
at the Center for Middle Eastern Studies at the University of Utah. He worked
as a policy analyst for the Turkish National Police's counter-terrorism
headquarters for more than six years.
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