From kurds at gn.apc.org Mon Apr 1 19:58:50 1991 From: kurds at gn.apc.org (kurds at gn.apc.org) Date: 01 Apr 1991 18:58:50 +0000 (GMT) Subject: WELCOME Message-ID: WELCOME TO THE KURDISH CONFERENCE The purpose of this conference is to help establish communication between the Kurdish people and the rest of the world. You are probably aware of the dangers faced by the Kurds in Iraq. In case you do not know about the attacks upon Kurdish villages with chemical weapons, the massacre of 5,000 men, women and children in March 1988 at the small town of Halabja, and other horrors, you will find all these reported and documented in this conference. But you will also find answers to the questions that many people never bother to ask. Why did this trouble start? And when? Who are the Kurds? Are there really 25 million of them? (This would make the Kurds the 4th largest nationality in the Middle East.) Why is the ancestral homeland of the Kurds split up and placed under the rule of several non-Kurdish governments? How long have the Kurds occupied their mountains? (Did you know that one of the earliest chronicled encounters between Kurds and a foreign army was recorded by the Greek general Xenophon before the birth of Christ?) But the history of the Kurds is not all warfare. Kurdish poetry, music, cuisine - we'd like you to know about these too. Please think of this conference as a reference library of material about the Kurds. In addition to historical articles and features on aspects of Kurdish life, it will also contain reports of the latest news from Kurdistan. We will continue to post news items on MIDEAST.GULF and MIDEAST. GENERAL and discussion topics on MIDEAST.FORUM. But since all Kurdish items will also be copy-posted here, in time, this conference will be a complete record. From mlorin at igc.apc.org Thu Apr 11 17:39:15 1991 From: mlorin at igc.apc.org (Matthew Lorin) Date: Thu, 11 Apr 1991 09:39:15 -0700 (PDT) Subject: WELCOME References: Message-ID: Helloe Mideast.kurds My name is Matt Lorin and I am the director of a new organization called the Student Human Rights Exchange (see gn.humanrights #196). I am working to build bridges between huamn rights organizations and concerned and motivated students. I received a call this morning from an undergraduate at Harvard who wants to become active in the Kurdish cause. I refered him to your organization but also thought you might wish to contact him directly. Harvard undergraduates have an exceptional track record of strong student activism on human rights issues. A call to him might be just the empowerment he needs to press him into service. His name is Allan Galpar, (617) 493-2302, in Cambridge, MA., USA. Please continue to keep us informed. I'd love to help spread the word to students around the world. I expect, hope, you've been in contact with Cultural Survival. If not, please call them. They are a powerful and well respected NGO concerned with the rights of indigenous peoples around the world. They work out of the Anthropology Dept. at Harvard. Good Luck and continue the good work. Peace, Matt Lorin From kurds at gn.apc.org Thu Apr 11 23:52:27 1991 From: kurds at gn.apc.org (kurds at gn.apc.org) Date: 11 Apr 1991 22:52:27 +0000 (GMT) Subject: WELCOME References: Message-ID: Thanks Matt for the information. We will get in touch with the people you mention. If anyone else wants to make contact, but does not wish to leave information like addresses or telephone numbers on a public conference, please simply mail us at gn:kurds. (Just 'Kurds' if you are on GreenNet.) From kurds at gn.apc.org Sat Apr 6 21:17:45 1991 From: kurds at gn.apc.org (kurds at gn.apc.org) Date: 06 Apr 1991 20:17:45 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Kurds bombed with chemicals Message-ID: =EVERY INDIVIDUAL ACCORDING TO HIS SPECIALITY= ARAB BA'ATH SOCIALIST PARTY COMMAND OF ZAKHO BRANCH NATIONAL DEFENCE BATTALIONS COMMITTEE Strictly confidential and Personal Subject: Directive Comradely greetings. [I refer to] the letter of National Defence Battalions Committee S/Sh/1175 dated 9th June 1987, which refers to the letter of the Bureau of the Organisation of the North (marked Strictly confidential and Personal) 28/2650 dated 3rd June 1987 which include the following: 1. Human presence, the delivery of food or machinery are totally forbidden in the villages included in the second stage of village collectivisation. Those [villagers] who wish to return should be allowed to do so; but their relatives are not allowed to contact them without prior information of the security authorities. 2. Human presence is totally banned in those areas in which the forbidden villages of stage one are situated. Presence is equally forbidden, after 21st June 1987, in the case of those villages included in stage two. 3. No activity is permitted after the conclusion of the harvest season, which must end by 15th July 1987. No agricultural activity is allowed thenceforth for the following summer and winter seasons. 4. Grazing is also taboo in these areas. 5. The military force within any of the districts in question are instructed to kill any human or animal found. These areas will be designated as absolutely no-go areas. 6. Those [villagers] included in the deportation plan are to be informed about resettlement. They will therefore be held responsible for any failure towards fulfilling these orders. [This letter has been prepared for your information to do accordingly: every individual according to his speciality.] [Signed] Comrade Ali Moashna Kadhum Secretary of the Committee * * * * * * * Do you remember hearing, amidst all the noise of the Gulf War, reports that Saddam Hussein had in the past used chemical weapons 'on his own people'? Those people were Kurds. Although officially Iraqi citizens, it's doubtful if any of them considered themselves to be Saddam's own people. For generations the Kurds of Iraq have sought independence, or at least autonomy, from Baghdadi rule. The debate goes back to the very founding of Iraq in 1918. Of what is today the Kurdish province of Iraq, the newly founded League of Nations said that: "If the ethnic argument alone had to be taken into account, the necessary conclusion would be that an independent Kurdish State should be created, since the Kurds form five-eighths of the population". - League Commission Report quoted in A.J.Toynbee 'A Survey of International Affairs, 1925' The point is unresolved, the debate now drowned in the general clamour of the Middle East. Along the way, countless thousand Kurdish civilians have lost their lives. It is not clear exactly when the Iraqi government began to use chemical weapons against the Kurds. Some would place it as long ago as the mid-sixties. In the summer of 1965, Mr Jalal Talbani accused the Iraqi government in a press conference at the [British] House of Commons of using poison gas in Kurdistan and cited as evidence the purchase by the army of 25,000 British-made gas masks from Spain. After the Ba'athist coup of 1968, further evidence of the use of poison gas and napalm came to light. Throughout the seventies there was evidence that Iraq was experimenting with poisons, chemicals and hormones on political prisoners. "Many died in mysterious circumstances, some only days after being released and in the absence of autopsies, coroners and a free press... This continued until the death in a famous London hospital of Abdul Rahman Bazzaz, an ex-Ambassador to London and the only civilian prime minister since 1958. A detailed report appeared in the Sunday Times in 1971, accusing the Iraqi government of administering certain poisons which caused his paralysis and untimtely death. "During the late seventies, Kurdish and Iraqi prisoners were again experimented upon with toxic materials, which could have been the prelude to a more ambitious and sinister mass weapon. It took a long and agonising war, the resources of the Iranian government, the full glare of television cameras upon the blistered and dying faces to convince the world of Mr Saddam's unethical practices." - The Kurdish Observer, December 1987 issue During the eighties, these Iraqi weapons of mass destruction were at last deployed -- against Iranian infantry in the Iran-Iraq war -- and against defenceless Kurdish villagers. One of the first Kurdish villages to be bombed with chemicals was Sheikh Wasanen. It was a small place, some 60 mud houses and about 300 people. In April 1987, several Iraqi air warplanes flew into the valley and made repeated bombing runs against the village. It was a slaughter. A Kurdish peshmerga - freedom fighter - who witnessed this attack says: "I was stationed further along the valley, not far from Sheikh Wasanen. I saw the jets diving again and again to bomb the village. After the bombs fell, the people ran outside as though they thought they had escaped injury. But they ran into the chemical and died." - Testimony of Khalil Hamad Hassan to KCC, London On April 15th and 16th 1987, thirty-four Soviet made Iraqi Sukhoi jets bombed the Kurdish villages of Haledin and Balisan. "We entered Balisan not all that long after the bombs had fallen. Bodies were lying in the street. The bodies had gone blue, but there was no other sign of injury. My friend Abdullah Habib went to where a woman lay dead, with arms round her small children. As he bent down over their bodies he collapsed and died. Another friend rushed to help him also died. Where I was standing, just ten feet away, the air was breathable." - Testimony of Khalil Hamad Hassan, ibid The destruction of these villages was part of 'phase one' of the Iraqi plan for 'deportation' and 'resettlement', referred to in the captured Iraqi document which we have reproduced (above) at the beginning of this topic. But the worst horror had yet to come. Deep inside Iraqi Kurdistan lies the small Kurdish town of Halabja. On 16th March 1988, about 6,000 of its men, women and children met hideous deaths. Witnesses said that Iraqi warplanes flew overhead and, in more than 20 separate raids, dropped clusters of bombs on the town. Explosions spread huge clouds of white gas over sections of the city. A deadly white smog enfolded Halabja. The aftermath was described in the Washington Times, on March 23rd: "Bodies lie in the dirt streets or sprawled in rooms and courtyards of the deserted villas, preserved at the moment of death in a modern version of the disaster that struck Pompeii. A father died in the dust trying to protect his child from the white clouds of cyanide vapour. A mother lies cradling her baby alongside a minibus that lies sideways across the road, hit while trying to flee. Yards away, a mother, father and daughter lie side by side. In a cellar a family crouches together. Shoes and clothes are scattered outside the houses." Next week, we will publish an interview with a woman who survived the Halabja massacre and who today lives in London. Would you like to know more about the Kurds? Please respond now, for a Kurdish conference. This topic posted by: The Kurdish Cultural Centre 14 Stannary Street London SE11 4AA, UK Telephone: (+44) 71 735 0918 Fax: (+44) 71 582 8894 Greennet User ID: Kurds From kurds at gn.apc.org Sat Apr 6 21:21:55 1991 From: kurds at gn.apc.org (kurds at gn.apc.org) Date: 06 Apr 1991 20:21:55 +0000 (GMT) Subject: The West & Saddam Hussein Message-ID: =CAN'T THE WEST UNDERSTAND?= The following is the text of an editorial published in the December 1987 issue of the KURDISH OBSERVER. What makes it doubly poignant is its date -- four months before Halabja -- thirty seven months before the start of the Gulf War. There is some gloriously ironic stuff here. * * * * * * THE IRAQ-IRAN WAR. NO PEACE WITH SADDAM. In August 1980, Saddam Hussein, absolute ruler of Iraq and its president for life, paid an unusually long visit to Saudi Arabia, where he secretly confered with a high powered American team from the Pentagon and the State Department. Less than three weeks later, the lavishly equipped Iraqi Army invaded Iran, causing wanton death and destruction in its wake to many defenceless cities and towns. "The battle of destiny against the magi has been won, glory shall be restored to the Arabs", declared Saddam to his servile, appointed, National Assembly on 24th September 1980. In the chaos of revolutionary Iran and amid the American hostage crisis, when animosity towards the Islamic Republic (Iran) was gathering momentum in the West, 'Saddam's blitzkrieg' was the perfect formula to subdue a potentially volatile embryonic Islamic movement which threatened Western interests in the region. And although a gleeful West was proven wrong in its predictions of a speedy victory for Saddam and the replacement of Ayatollah Khomeini with a 'moderate' alternative, it achieved many of its objectives -- -- the dissention and weakening within the anti-imperialist and progressive camp regionally and worldwide -- the rejuvenation of neo-colonialism -- the collapse of the oil cartel and depletion of the dollar reserves of oil rich countries -- leading to an increasing strangehold by the IMF on them and other third world countries -- the marginalisation of urgent regional issues like the Lebanon, and the Palestinian and Kurdish conflicts -- finally, the great profits gleaned from open or illicit trade with both sides, especially in war materials. America and the West's unconvincing protestation of neutrality in the conflict is only for domestic consumption. It is an undisputed fact that their support for Iraq in supplying intelligence data, sophisticated weaponry and men from the armies of their proxies the Egyptians and the Jordanians, plus financial support by the Gulf States, has been the mainstay of Saddam who would otherwise have collapsed long agoand saved both countries (Iraq and Iran) the devastation and tragedy of a futile war which he initiated. Resentment and hatred is building up slowly but surely in both countries towards the West. Why prop up a regime which has forfeited all rights to legitimacy by requesting a foreign state to invade its own territory and kill its citizens as the Turkish army has frequently done in the past few years. A regime which uses poison gas and chemical weapons against its own citizens. Saddam's despotism is surely unmatched in contemporary history, not even by Papa Doc or Pol Pot. Every day of his rule adds thousands of victims and prolongs the agony of the two most vital, historic and most industrious nations in the region. Justice demands that Saddam be removed, for then and only then can peace come about. A Coalition of Democratic, progressive and Patriotic forces elected freely by the people of Iraq, without pressure or coercion by any external country or power, and not in the least Iran, is the only way to bring an everlasting peace and tranquility between Iraq and Iran and achieve the legitimate rights of our long suffering Kurdish people in both countries. Can't the West understand? That while they demanded nothing less than the unconditional surrender from Hitler and did not conclude peace with Germany until 6 years after its Conquest, the request to identify the guilty party in the Iraq-Iran war is but a modest demand. [Iran had said that Iraq must be named as the aggressor before it would accept the UN ceasefire resolution.] OR DO THE INHERITORS OF THE NUREMBERG TRIALS FEAR THAT THEIR CULPABILITY IN THIS ATROCIOUS WAR WILL BE FULLY EXPOSED WITH THE DEMISE OF THEIR BOY, SADDAM?!!!! * * * * * * * One April day in 1988, a man called Azad Abdullah was one of a group of peshmergas -- Kurdish freedom fighters -- who came across dozens of people, blistered and burned, stumbling silently from a stricken village in the Kurdish region of Garmiyan. Among them were a small boy and girl, clinging to each other. While running away through a wheat field they had come under attack from an Iraqi helicopter and become separated from their parents. The parents had died but the children did not know this. They kept saying that when it grew light they would go and look for them. They thought it was night. They did not realise that they were blind. (Testimony of Azad Abdullah to KCC, London) Almost to the day, a British Junior Foreign Office Minister was forecasting that British industry would soon find "a large market in Iraq". (12th April 1988) Was the British Government unaware of what was going on in Iraq? Surely not. It was barely a a month since the terrible chemical attack on Halabja in which more than 6,000 men, women and children met their deaths. Once the Iraq-Iran war had ended in August 1988, there could be no doubt that Iraq's army had begun a massive, and particularly brutal push against the Kurds -- a chemical offensive so massive that it shocked even the West. World leaders, including Turkey's Turgut Ozal, the USA's George Schultz and Britain's Sir Geoffrey Howe, called the Iraqi actions 'genocide' and 'barbaric'. On 8th September 1988, five months after Halabja, Amnesty appealed directly to the United Nations Security Council to stop the massacre of Kurdish civilians by Iraq. Nothing effective was done. Two days later Nicholas Ashford wrote in the Independent: "The bully boy of Baghdad looks as though he is again going to get away with his butchery and barbarism. Saddam Hussein is hardly likely to rein in his troops until they have completed their bloody mission. His hope of depopulating Kurdistan and solving the Kurdish problem once and for all, may yet become a reality." - The Independent, 10th September 1988 Unbelievably, despite the fact that there was now no doubt that Saddam Hussein was conducting a genocide against the Kurds, Western countries still hesitated to condemn Iraq outright on the use of chemical weapons. But on 16th September, 1988, a Kurdish leader, Jalal Talabani, addressed a letter to the British Government. The following is an extract: "We were hoping that the UN peace efforts to end the [Iraq-Iran] War would result in restraining Iraq from persisting in its chauvininstic policy towards the Kurds. We had high hopes that the International Community, in the face of the immense human tragedy prevailing in Kurdistan, would address itself, at last, to the political and human dimensions of the Kurdish issue and act to relieve the misery endured by our people for so long. "The Kurds have no official access to the United Nations to whom our numerous appeals and memoranda have gone unanswered. Although they stand condemned by the International Community for the use of chemical weapons in the [Iraq-Iran] War, Iraq has exploited what seems to be the world's indifference to their continued use against the Kurds to persist in their policy of genocide in Kurdistan. "One of our few remaining hopes is that democrats and those who cherish values of justice, peace and freedom would voice their concern for the plight of the Kurds. That is why I am making this direct appeal to you on behalf of the Iraqi Kurdistan Front, which represents all Kurdish political organisations in Iraq... to reques that Britain as a permanent member of the Security Council: 1) Raises the matter with the Security Council which has already passed a unanimous resolution condemning the use of chemical weapons in the [Iraq-Iran] War. 2) Presses the UN Secretary General to ensure that a peaceful solution to the Kurdish question is also on the agenda for the peace talks in Geneva. 3) Makes a direct approach to the Iraqi government to express its condemnation of Iraqi policy of genocide in Kurdistan. "We are hopeful that the British Government will take this matter most seriously as Britain's long term interests and international standing cannot lie in supporting or appearing to condone a dictatorship whose life span cannot last much longer. Surely, the gravity of the situation requires the British response to be more than just a formal diplomatic protest." What was the British Government's response to this grave situtation? 'The United Kingdom has a credit line to Iraq worth approximately $300 million, expected to double when reconstruction starts. West Germany agreed a $165 credit line in 1987.' - The Independent, 5th October 1988 British credit to Iraq did indeed almost double when Trade Minister Tony Newton travelled to Baghdad at the head of a 20-strong delegation. In his pocket were credit lines for Anglo-Iraq trade worth #340 million for 1988-89. According to the Sunday Times newspaper, between 1988 and last year British firms Matrix Churchill and Bimec Industries played a key role in helping Iraq to develop the long-range SCUD missiles that are now hitting Israel and Saudi Arabia. Sam Smith, Chairman of Bimec Industries, said he was shocked at the idea that his company's products were being used for missile production. He said the Department of Trade and Industry had approved the contract in July 1989. July 1989 was more than a year after Halabja and the blinded children of Garmiyan. "[Iraq's] is a regime which continues to defy any normal and reasonable definition. "It a government that has accumulated the worst human rights record in recent history, but it is also a member state of the United Nations which many other members deem expedient to placate. "It is a one-man horror show where Saddam Hussein, the 'Leader-Hero' is consumed in his search for means of mass destruction (chemical weapons, missiles, super guns, nuclear weapons) and is being helped by Western companies and manufacturers who are willing to look the other way in the interest of commercial profit. "It is a government by deceit and duplicity, yet it can, with impunity, embarrass others who want improved trade relations and lucrative contracts at any price." - The Kurdish Observer, June 1990 Weeks after this piece in the Kurdish Observer, Iraq invaded Kuwait. Would you like to know more about the Kurds? Please respond now, for a Kurdish conference. This topic posted by: The Kurdish Cultural Centre 14 Stannary Street London SE11 4AA, UK Telephone: (+44) 71 735 0918 Fax: (+44) 71 582 8894 Greennet User ID: Kurds From kurds at gn.apc.org Sat Apr 6 21:24:57 1991 From: kurds at gn.apc.org (kurds at gn.apc.org) Date: 06 Apr 1991 20:24:57 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Text of Amnesty ad about Kurds Message-ID: =YOU DON'T HAVE TO BE KURDISH - JUST HUMAN!= The following is the text of an advertisement which we helped to create for Amnesty International. It ran in British newspapers during the last months of 1990 and was successful in recruiting members and raising money for Amnesty. As reproduced here, it is not intended as an appeal for money. But if after having read it, anyone feels moved to help either Amnesty or ourselves, we shall not object. The Kurdish Cultural Centre is a registered charity, No 800883. The text is as originally published. Eagle-eyed readers may note that at one point, Margaret Thatcher is mentioned. At the time of first publication, she was still Prime Minister of the UK. ================================================================= "WHEN OUR CHILDREN WERE DYING, YOU DID NOTHING TO HELP. NOW GOD HELP YOUR CHILDREN." [Iraqi Kurdish refugee] The Kurdish district of Garmiyan in the mountains of north- eastern Iraq used to be a pretty place. There were wheat fields and apricot orchards. The gardens grew melons and pomegranates and grapes. Most houses had a cow tethered outside. One April morning in 1988, the mountainsides echoed to the drone of Iraqi bombers and the flat thud of chemical bombs. A white cloud drifted among the apricot blossom. Whoever breathed it, died. Later that day, a group of Kurdish guerillas came across dozens of people, blistered and burned, stumbling silently from a stricken village. Azad Abdulla was one of the guerillas. "Can you imagine," he asks, "what it's like to die this way? If it's cyanide you get dizzy and choke. If it's mustard gas your skin blisters and your lungs begin to bleed and you drown in your own blood." Abdulla laughed when we showed him a leaflet telling Americans in Saudi Arabia how to survive a chemical attack. (We will reproduce the leaflet in a future topic.) It advises turning off the air-conditioning and standing under a running shower. But the Kurdish villagers had no such luxuries. Instead, they had to evolve their own crude methods of coping with poison gas attacks. They would retreat into a cave after lighting a fire at its mouth. They would climb to the tops of mountains. They would wet turbans and wrap them round their faces. On that April morning there had been no time to take even these crude measures. Azad Abdulla and his companions found a small boy and girl clinging to each other. While running away through a wheat field they had come under attack from an Iraqi helicopter and become separated from their parents. The parents had died but the children did not know this. They kept saying that when it grew light they would go and look for them. They thought it was night. They did not realise that they were blind. Almost to the day (on April 12th 1988), a British Foreign Office Minister was forecasting that British industry would soon find "a large market in Iraq". Was he unaware that Saddam Hussein was systematically gassing Iraq's Kurdish minority? Surely not. Only three weeks earlier, more than 5,000 men, women and children had died horribly in an Iraqi chemical attack on the Kurdish town of Halabja. The atrocity received worldwide TV and newspaper coverage. "Bodies lie in the dirt streets or sprawled in rooms and courtyards of the deserted villas, preserved at the moment of death in a modern version of the disaster that struck Pompeii. A father died in the dust trying to protect his child from the white clouds of cyanide vapour. A mother lies cradling her baby alongside a minibus that lies sideways across the road, hit while trying to flee. Yards away, a mother, father and daughter lie side by side. In a cellar a family crouches together." (Washington Times, March 23rd 1988). The world was shocked. But not shocked enough to do anything effective. While the USA condemned Iraq's use of chemical weapons, calls for sterner action were resisted. According to James Adams, Defence Correspondent of the Sunday Times, such western impotence must have acted as an incentive to President Saddam Hussein. The world's inaction is a subject about which we at Amnesty International can no longer remain polite. For years we have been exposing atrocities committed by the Iraqi government. Nothing effective has ever been done. On 8th September 1988, five months after Halabja, Amnesty appealed directly to the United Nations Security Council to stop the massacre of Kurdish civilians by Iraq. Nothing effective was done. A year after Halabja, we published a report detailing how a baby was seized as a hostage and deliberately deprived of milk to force its parents to divulge information. How children as young as 5 years old had been tortured in front of their families. We revealed that that at least 30 different forms of torture were in use in Iraqi prisons, ranging from beatings to burning, electric shocks and mutilation. Torturers had gouged out the eyes of their victims, cut off their noses, ears, breasts and penises, and axed limbs. Objects were inserted into the vaginas of young women, causing the hymen to break. Some of these methods had been used on children. The report failed to move the United Nations Human Rights Commission which, days after its publication, voted not to investigate human rights violations in Iraq. Saddam Hussein's annexation of Kuwait seems to have taken many people by surprise. Why? Why be surprised by the savagery of the Iraqi regime that daily tortures and kills Kuwaiti citizens? Why be surprised that westerners trapped by the invasion are now helpless hostages? Why be surprised that young Britons and Americans now face the chemical weapons that wiped out thousands of defenceless Kurdish villagers? Yes, we told you so. In '80, '81, '82, '83, '84, '85, '86, '87, '88 and '89. And you did nothing effective to help. You, Margaret Thatcher, did nothing effective. You, George Bush, did nothing effective. You -- yes you -- reading this advertisement, did nothing effective. Right now you have a choice. Get offended, or get involved. This advertisement is an appeal for more members and more money. But we must tell you frankly that there is now little Amnesty can do for the people trapped in Iraq and Kuwait, be they Kuwaitis, Westerners, Asians, or the 4 million Iraqi Kurds who are also in effect trapped. So why should you join us? BECAUSE we failed with Iraq. Failed to make any impact on Saddam Hussein. Failed to stir the United Nations into doing anything effective. Failed to reach enough ordinary people, like you, who were willing to channel their outrage into constructive action. God knows how many lives this failure will yet cost. We have got to make it impossible in future for governments to ignore the genocide of helpless women and children. It must become morally unacceptable for governments to look at photographs of dead children from places like Halabja and then carry on 'business as usual' with the murderers. That's why you should join us and, if you can afford it, make a donation to our campaign funds. (Small donations gratefully received, businessmen please think big.) "We were screaming till we could not speak." says Azad Abdulla, "and yet no-one listened." It's you he's talking to. Can you hear what he's saying? XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX X X X Joining Amnesty International costs 15 UK pounds. X X Students, pensioners, unwaged: 6 UK pounds. X X For more details, please write or telephone: X X X X Amnesty International British Section X X 99 Rosebery Avenue X X London EC1R 4RE X X Tel: 071 278 6000 X X X X Amnesty also welcome donations. X X X X The Kurdish Cultural Centre urges all who value X X human rights and wish to do something practical X X and effective to help suffering people, to join X X Amnesty International. X X X XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX X X X If you'd like to join the Kurdish Cultural Centre X X ---- YOU DON'T HAVE TO BE KURDISH, JUST HUMAN ---- X X please send a cheque for 12 UK pounds made out to: X X X X Kurdish Cultural Centre X X 14 Stannary Street X X London SE11 4AA X X Tel: 071-735 0918 X X X X Students, unwaged and pensioners: 5 UK pounds X X X X We too welcome donations. No Iraqi dinars please. X X X XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX Would you like to know more about the Kurds? Please respond now, for a Kurdish conference. This topic posted by: The Kurdish Cultural Centre 14 Stannary Street London SE11 4AA, UK Telephone: (+44) 71 735 0918 Fax: (+44) 71 582 8894 Greennet User ID: Kurds From kurds at gn.apc.org Sat Apr 6 21:31:41 1991 From: kurds at gn.apc.org (kurds at gn.apc.org) Date: 06 Apr 1991 20:31:41 +0000 (GMT) Subject: List of destroyed Kurdish villages Message-ID: The following are the names of Kurdish villages destroyed by the Iraqi government between 1985 and June 1987. =District of Diyala= Zilan Drwzney Megyd Lawe Drwzney Hamey Shaswir Kaze Marin Shekh Langery Gewre Shekh Langery Bchwk Ban Aseyaw Kere Blagey Kwn Syamerw Kwlegw Ban Sndwk Taza Shar Hagey Lar Kwkz Sey Tepan Kwbe Chaleswrg Saed Husen Ga Kull Fatah Hame Aelky Dwanze Eymam Zerdiwy Gewre Zeriwy Bchwk Tlyshan Tepe Spey Shetakan Lalben Chatel Peere-Feke Tepe-Kesen Gakhor Fakke Reheem Werake Mehmood Fake Eawbare Serchem Hajie Hassan Tepe Ali Aeen Faress Said Murad Bawe Mehmood Said Marile Korey Chaiee Goban Welie Haye Nasalih Ibrahim Khan Said Jeznie Fettah Omer Bekre Shel Kireze Kewa Chermw Shikel Seyde Awelikwt Hagy Awid Bey Bne Wely Heye Hesere =District of Suleimaniya= Kani-Kaila Hana Woshka Boka Shorawa Khiwata Jobrail Badawan Baklan Kani-Watman Shikh Mansorian Kani-Mazo Harsha Khidran Miowza Basaree Kalkan Towa-Koot Chawtan Shiramar Tepashonkara Jeshana Kani-Goma Kani-Berdina Kaiwany Geora Kolajakh Kolard Kariz Kon Senger Sartka Kilkasmak Kamisha Kalat Kaka Balikh Wlaghlo Berda-Sheen Dolpishky-Serow Dolpishky-Khwarow Dolphishky-Nawarast Kona-Masee Jertawa Keiwany-Bechook Azaban Kashti Dack Nawgirdan Dolan Ahmedawa Awayee-Rostembeg Gilack Kona-Koter Khamza Mara-Rush Mokba Gapilon Henjera Alikay-Khwarow Alikay-Serow Kani-Espan Ahmed Bernaw Torany Shikh Selam Torany Shikh Aziz Torany Shikh Saeed Zerdy Hamay Mahmood Nahyai Tilako Kela Kochalee Pyaza Jar Mirga Ser Waree Noawa Hermick Hertel Ziewa Chiway Serow Chiway Khwarow Melook Mawet Soorakelat Koredawee Konjireen Amadeen Bitwan Keily Serkend Zeinel Deshty Tly Berda Pan Kera Baba Bergaroo Digal Hebas Jackel Keshlakh Derla Waza Berdazerd Simky Kotabyan Bakhy Ashty Reshkie Goranka Keesalawa Mei Kokan Soora-Kelat Noora Bab Kenaroi Jafery Shikh Hagee Frizela Kani-Shiran Chinara Towa Rushie Kani-Benaw Bie Sepyan Mirza Rostem Torba Girda Soran Kollay Kani Maran Jerdana Gollan Wazool Miradie Kliecha Kani-Merwary Kelbeza Kani-Berdina Bie Selmin Alan Hasil Kani-Keway Kon Kani-Keway Chogh Yekshie Dary Khelan Kazam Khako Khol Niskajo Zerengow Kazaw Kazawy Sikh Hussen Mohwany Rostem Mehmod Kani Serow Mehmod Kany Khyrow Awayee Hame Aziz Tepy Keram Malwan Tepe Kell Sewele Meshe Serow Sewele Meshe Khyrow Heyas Tepe Resh Kelowran Keltkey Mehmodrashid Shatwan Biere Reshke Nawgrdan Dowlas Tepegoolawy Lamarkazy Shekraly Khalid O Hagy Mehmod Taslogay Share Zowr Komashy Hemeroshy Beg Komashy Chawla Swary Kawchik Tash Mowany Melatahir Mowany Mirza Mowany Kon Mowany Haney Hassan Kalegow Kany Fankay Khwarow Greze Kany Pelke Bakrawa Zemeky Serow Zemeky Khwarow Dellen Kshlakhe Besharety Khwarow Besharety Serow Tepekore Khely Heme Gomelar De Khon Taze De Tepe Sefay Serow Tepe Sefay Khwarow Sheshky Serow Sheshky Khwarow Kolkny Ahmed Faky Karam Kolkny Hagy Hame Soor Kolkny Hayel Kolkny Smaeel Kasrew Kachaly Mall Tepe Resh Dablakh Kazan Kany Bardene Lengawa Dar Berrow De Kon Hezarmerd Bingerd Alchokh Kany Pan Kany Sefar Kele Pei Serdawa Kosh Taya Gopek Bebe Jag Dergezeny Khwarow Dergezeny Serow Heyas Cholmek Mortek Aziz Awa Daranma Shekh Wesal Aliyewe Glezerde Kany Peke Heme Smel Naw Grdan Berde Ker Taklawa Semawan Kany Shaswar Kany Pench Sham Rakan Be Ali Ali Awa Gosh Kot Per Bayye =Hewler District= Ali Mansor Lakawa Kany Binaw Kany Chinar Kone Koter Kolle Hakez Bazeger Tekeran Kenkawa Koreta Kshlak Habas Chakal Homerak Kelekan Khewate Kany Pere Mala Dawod Kany Goran Towe Spy Keyal Karez Klaw Chalke Kolkole Kany Mekaeel Hanarany Khwarow Dareben Perke Henarany Khwarow Kolla Resh Sherkan Golemerke Kaneye Resh Rmawez Allane Kirkuk Ashan Sharsene Tallawe Benawe Totmere Harote Kon Sartke Ashkewte Katy Spelik Berow Zeney Blakow Mara Balisan* Kany Bard Shmelik Shekh Wasanen* Berawa Sere Derash Sheree Serow Sheree Khwarow Khoran Shele Darberole Awdalan Kasry Asky Koyee Sewesan Yaremesh Hewany Serow Hewany Khwarow Bamordkan La Elaha Elalla Gewrany Khwarow Gewrany Serow Mame Jelke Meir Rostam Spy Gre Akonaby Serow Akonaby Khwarow Kerowte Bonkene Chneran Dowre Lassy Freez Chom Hayder Shawger Koretan Konegorg Kany Soor Payze Hawar Powrege Merekan Dowshehe Elinjaky Saydan Grde Soor Kany Bzre Kerdiz Kerzwr Chlebeshe Hemze Kor Komk Row Awena Kshka Chwm Zerdelai-Khwarow Chwm Zerdelai-Serow Chl Beser Chale Grdele Pelkane Roote Sofe Braiem Rolke Berekan Sermezra Birechna Bestanae Gewr Bestanae Bchwk Latan Hereje Omara Swr Sablach Mirzafa Bordkei Gewra Kere Chnagha Eaghemra Nemre Serdes Palanian Shek Shirwan Siaw Helewa Awdelwk Ashalek Tendura Hastawa Serawa Chnina Iedy Kzler Swreze Swrbeshi Kakela Swrbeshi Hemze Konekier Grdi Aweban Shikhanan Shefrinawa Mekhshwma Dole Sze Grd Lanka Teter Awa Omer Mameke Birei Areban Se Biran Plnga Mer Hozar Gostga Braima Lek Kush Tepei Bchwk Hordke Gchka Kwl Tepesere Kwl Tepei Khwarow Koche Blble Sher Awa Biemar Kofa Kran Topzawa Grdarasha Trpa Spian Mnare Pierdawd Doo Sere Sekochan Se Nala Gere Shekhan Dola Bekre Omerawa Khzna Helw Gool Shmamr Sefeh Mala Omer Chemedwez Kawgh Kewr Noferan Kelate Swran Dire Kepran Satoor Kewrebend Chlwk Grdesher Grabedraw Kesewe Merza Ahmed Mam Zawa Chemen Daldaaman Aza Konian Arab Kend Towrek Bagha Mnara Jnka Bndezr Rekhnawa Swbra Earmcha Kereetagh Awene Ali Mala Dawd Shemswle Zaga Kadrie De Merebre Terjan Seadawa Dhimar Ge Hchel Metrad Klawresh Gamesh Tepe Kshaf Alla Lhieban Cheghemide Khdrjija Chighllwk Demakar Grdashina Melek Afa Kepenk Resh Shekhe Las Bere Beraza Nassr Kurtan Drw Koza Panka Hassan Beg Khezne Grdi Gom Mela Kere Mli Hot Telel Khime Gawre Telel Khime Bchwk Chele Heweze Shoriga Hasarok Sewke Shorezewrdka Berzewar Zemzemok Smail Awa Said Obied Majid Khormele Majidawa Zmarie Merzan Zmarie Sabier Said Amin Awla Fat Paranian Gereswr Hewarfar Chnewban Grnw Kela Sheen Wadi Al-Gurab Mshar Maie Bika Gere Besha Doo Grwkani Bchwk Grd Koshene Kone Sikhwr Muhsinawa Shelmash Gezwld Khzna Se Grokan Mehmer Omeran Kelate Soran Azikend Perespee Chwar Goman Alia Rash Pongene Braim Bawl Grda Bol Serme Telemetar Dingawa Gokuz Grdi Rewa Chwar Berde Dwanza Hawar Keleshkhan Mhedi Kalati Swran Hemza Aga Shora Pelka Kocha Spilkan Peer Dwaood Shwan Hushter Alwk Zurna Grda Pan Laswr Hamin Merde Gomasheen Grda Rashe Bagha Mrake Dartoo Kona Gurg Gereswr Pongine Chemrge Grdish Hemze Beg Bakhcke Kani Sagan Kani Geni Tomawa Biowka Shera Bot Mame Chovan Terwar Hajee Wossw Rswl Bchkol Akhura Kani Soske Berber Shewe Piran Bana Kalat Banj Maran Shakhe Peske Mam Sheerin Goptepa Tekewr Perer Bawe Kop Gomatal Arian Tergena Baklan Ashkewta Teke Kani Derbend Germk Talebani Gewra Talebani Bchwk Elengagh Merzan Shiew Ashok Mam Klinje Kilaspee Kordawa Kani-Lela Baghanzier Askikoya Chwomi Hayder Solawk Ziearat Kelasenji Serow Kelasenji Khwarow Kirza Haji Ahmed Allawa Sooraban Kishka Wotka Derbend Aliawa Gomespan Henara Dongzaw Sherabuti Serow Sherabuti Khwarow Geraw Goreshir Zirgwiz Ashka Geliawa Zieret Shikhen Serochawa Hershem Mirakhor Derbendy-Saied Kepran Shakhoran Kharbe-Draw Shikh Memoodyan Baba Geesk Pankan Diree Karitan Jana Tierkalow Beere-Bat Jastan Kendara Kale Sofi Smaie =District of Kirkuk= Sergeran Gorga Dara-Khorma Chaeil Sie Biran Gabelaka Kheraba Kooch Kebran Gebraw Gezwashaw Herhelala Serd Gichma Cheneghe Kebry Ali Melhewily Pelkane Serbeshakh Derbendy Gwm Myreban Mykalw Jane Arytan Sofy Smayl Kendaly Yarmje Kendaly Kwndy Gawara Lawar Hajy Shykhan Hassan Blbas Darmanaw Khwshaw Sey Kuchan *Died in chemical attack on Shekh Wasanen village 16.4.1987 Yousif Hamze Khider 34 yrs 16.4.1987 Honer Yousif Hamze 4 yrs 16.4.1987 Khider Slayman Khider 20 yrs 16.4.1987 Amena Khider Nabe 35 yrs 16.4.1987 Amena Ahmed Haje 22 yrs 16.4.1987 Huseen Esmael Wsw 40 yrs 16.4.1987 Rebwar Ali Rasul 2 yrs 16.4.1987 Ali Rasul Khider 26 yrs 16.4.1987 Ryzan Ali Rasul 40 yrs 16.4.1987 Hayat Khamza Khider 22 yrs 16.4.1987 Hamed Majed Salem 3 yrs 16.4.1987 Salam Majed Salem 4 yrs 16.4.1987 Aseya Majed Salem 9 yrs 16.4.1987 Salem Majed Salem 10 yrs 16.4.1987 Aesha Ibrahim Ali 60 yrs 16.4.1987 Mryam Azez Hamed 60 yrs 16.4.1987 Karim Mahmod Ali 85 yrs 16.4.1987 Rasul Slayman Khider 12 yrs 16.4.1987 Kalel Slayman Khider 8 yrs 16.4.1987 Fatwa Hassan Taha 40 yrs 16.4.1987 Kazwan Mhamed Eyssa 2 yrs 16.4.1987 Serbaz Mhamed Eyssa 4 yrs 16.4.1987 Hayat 25 yrs 16.4.1987 Nazenen Husses Eysmael 3 yrs 16.4.1987 Zaher Hamed Amen 18 yrs 16.4.1987 Yousif Hamed Amen 16 yrs 16.4.1987 Star Hamed Amen 8 yrs 16.4.1987 Hajy Esmael Wsw 80 yrs 16.4.1987 Kajej Mahmud Ali 35 yrs 16.4.1987 Kajej Abdula 19 yrs 16.4.1987 Sadek Abdula 75 yrs 16.4.1987 Fatma 55 yrs 16.4.1987 Rahym Hamed Amen 20 yrs 16.4.1987 Hamed Haje Rasul 26 yrs 16.4.1987 Sofey Mustafa Azez 45 yrs 16.4.1987 Mhamed Kurshid Salem 6 yrs 16.4.1987 Khajej Kurshid Salem 7 yrs 16.4.1987 Star Osman Karem 5 yrs 16.4.1987 Rzgar Osman Karem 6 yrs 16.4.1987 Adyba Osman Karem ? yrs 16.4.1987 Hasyba Osman Karem 15 yrs 16.4.1987 Safye Osman Karem 6 yrs 16.4.1987 Zlykhe Mustafa Mahmud 30 yrs 16.4.1987 Saadye Osman Karem ? yrs 16.4.1987 Hussen Khider 25 yrs 16.4.1987 Ali Hussen Eyssa 35 yrs 130 others - we do not have their names - died in the attack on Shekh Wasanen. A small place, of some 60 mud houses and about 300 people, it was one of the first Kurdish villages to be bombed with chemicals. Khalil Ahmed Hassan, a Kurdish peshmerga - freedom fighter - saw what happened. "I was stationed further along the valley, not far from Shekh Wasanen. I saw the jets diving again and again to bomb the village. After the bombs fell, the people ran outside as though they thought they had escaped injury. But they ran into the chemical and died." - Testimony of Khalil Hamad Hassan to KCC, London The Iraqi aircraft - eyewitnesses speak of 34 Soviet Sukhoi jets - also bombed the Kurdish village of Balisan. "We entered Balisan not all that long after the bombs had fallen. Bodies were lying in the street. The bodies had gone blue, but there was no other sign of injury. My friend Abdullah Habib went to where a woman lay dead, with arms round her small children. As he bent down over their bodies he collapsed and died. Another friend rushed to help him also died. Where I was standing, just ten feet away, the air was breathable." - Testimony of Khalil Hamad Hassan, ibid *Died in chemical attack on Balisan. 16.4.1987 Osman Haje Shekhe 28 yrs 16.4.1987 Salmy 45 yrs 16.4.1987 Heybet Wesman 28 yrs 16.4.1987 Hewla Shynkw 70 yrs 16.4.1987 Fwrde Mwlad Esmael 18 yrs 16.4.1987 Abdul Ibrahym 54 yrs 16.4.1987 Ibraheym Amin 13 yrs 16.4.1987 Hamed Hamed Amyn 12 yrs 16.4.1987 Sedradyb Hamed Amyn 12 yrs 16.4.1987 Khanzad Rahmin Amyn 13 yrs 16.4.1987 Khatwyn Hamed Amyn 6 yrs 16.4.1987 Azar Hamed Ibrahym 6 yrs 16.4.1987 Fathwle Azar Amyn 4 yrs 16.4.1987 Ismayl Azar Amyn 3 yrs 16.4.1987 Kurdistan Azar Amyn 1 yr 16.4.1987 Aesha Khider 26 yrs 16.4.1987 Hamed Hama Abdul 16 yrs 16.4.1987 Hussain Ismayl Yousif 40 yrs 16.4.1987 Safye Hussain Ismayl 17 yrs 16.4.1987 Faryde Hussain Ismayl 2 yrs 16.4.1987 Hymen Hamed Sktiny 42 yrs 16.4.1987 Hayat Hamed Sktiny 30 yrs 16.4.1987 Haje Ismael Yousif 80 yrs 16.4.1987 Yousif Hamed Amyn 18 yrs 16.4.1987 Sywr Hamed Amyn 8 yrs 16.4.1987 Star Ahmed Ismayl 8 yrs 16.4.1987 Zeyan Hamed Ismayl 2 yrs 16.4.1987 Aesha Hamed Ismayl 5 yrs 16.4.1987 Behar Hamed Ismayl 1 yr 16.4.1987 Khajyj Mahmud Abas 40 yrs 16.4.1987 Mryam Majyd Salym 14 yrs 16.4.1987 Khajij Slyman Khider 50 yrs 16.4.1987 Fatma Hassen Jaha 50 yrs 16.4.1987 Abdule Hassan Ali 10 yrs 16.4.1987 Shyryn Hussen Mustafa 5 yrs 16.4.1987 Shadye Hussen Mustafa 3 yrs 16.4.1987 Mustafa Azez Mustafa 65 yrs 16.4.1987 Meram Azez Mustafa 60 yrs 16.4.1987 Sozan Aziz Ali 3 yrs 16.4.1987 Fatma Aziz Ali 18 months 16.4.1987 Sadek Abdule Hussen 65 yrs 16.4.1987 Fatima Ahmed 6 yrs 16.4.1987 Rahym Hamed Abdule 20 yrs 16.4.1987 Frmysk Khurshyd 1 yr 16.4.1987 Kadre Khurshyd 5 yrs 16.4.1987 Shwkrye Khurshyd 3 yrs 16.4.1987 Omar Khurshyd 2 yrs 16.4.1987 Hashem Azez Hamed 4 yrs 16.4.1987 Aesha Azez Hamed 8 yrs 16.4.1987 Sywa Azez Hamed 2 yrs 16.4.1987 Muhamed Rasul Bapyr 22 yrs 16.4.1987 Ali Bapyr Ali 60 yrs 16.4.1987 Zwlykha Hassen Taha 55 yrs 16.4.1987 Rasul Hamed Amyn 75 yrs 16.4.1987 Aram Mustafa Rasul 2 yrs 16.4.1987 Awat Mustafa Rasul 4 yrs 16.4.1987 Asmar Ahmed Hamed Amyn 35 yrs 16.4.1987 Rwnak Jalal Ahmed 4 yrs 16.4.1987 Rwpak Jalal Ahmed 3 yrs 16.4.1987 Rwkye Mustafa Abdula 18 yrs 16.4.1987 Bykhal Maulud Kader 1 yr 16.4.1987 Zyrak Hamed Amyn 2 yrs 16.4.1987 Chyman Hamed Amyn 2 yrs 16.4.1987 Hyrsh Hassen Mustafa 1 yr 16.4.1987 Haymn Hassen Mustafa 10 yrs 16.4.1987 Halyme Salym Mahmud 55 yrs 16.4.1987 Abubakr Muhamed Slyman 1 yr 16.4.1987 Mryam 40 yrs 16.4.1987 Hawsat Abdula Kadir 9 yrs 16.4.1987 Sartep Saleh Alyas 3 yrs 16.4.1987 Ali Eyssa 35 yrs 16.4.1987 Haybat Wasman 35 yrs 16.4.1987 Ali Eyssa 7 yrs 16.4.1987 Hamdye Muhamed Khider 18 months 16.4.1987 Shyryn Ahmed Hussen 18 months 16.4.1987 Chymya Kala Amin 1 day 16.4.1987 Chymya Hussen 1 day ...and many more. The birds which are killed in the skies - Though the stars, the clouds, the wind And the sun do not see them, The horizon plays deaf, The mountains and waters forget them - Yet some tree Must witness the criminals And write their names In its roots. - Sherko Bekas From kurds at gn.apc.org Sat Apr 6 21:35:30 1991 From: kurds at gn.apc.org (kurds at gn.apc.org) Date: 06 Apr 1991 20:35:30 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Iraqi genocide documents Message-ID: The following official Iraqi government documents leave no room for doubt that Saddam Hussein's regime was operating a policy of persecution, deportation and GENOCIDE in Kurdistan. #1. From: Ali Hassan Majid, Military Governor of Iraqi Kurdistan The letter of the first legion SF/1725 dated 21/6 notified by a letter of positions FL 1 SF/4098 dated 22/6/1987 begins as follows: (A letter from the leadership of the Northern Organisation's office SF/4008 dated 20/6(:) In view of the end of the officially expired period for collecting the Security-Prohibited villages which will expire on 21/6, we decided to implement the following from 22/6 onwards: 1. All Security-Prohibited villages shall be considered to be places (bases) of the subversive agents of Iran and successors- of-treason and the like of Iraqi traitors.* [*ed: They mean Kurdish partisans and their families] 2. Human and animal existence in these areas shall absolutely be prohibited and (the areas) shall be considered as operation zones in which shooting shall not be restricted by any instructions unless issued from our base. 3. Travelling to and from the areas, and farming or agricultural, animal or industrial exploitation, in the areas shall be completely forbidden and all concerned authorities are responsible to follow up this subject seriously and each within their speciality. 4. Your commands shall prepare special attacks from time to time using artillery, helicopters and jets against as many of those possible existing in these prohibited areas during all times, days and nights.* [*Ed: they did, using chemical weapons] 5. Anyone found within those prohibited areas shall be detained and interrogated by the Security Organs. Those whose ages lie between 15 and 70 years shall be executed after benefiting from their information. 6. The concerned security organs shall interrogate those who surrender themselves for a maximum period of 3 days and when necessary 10 days and if the interrogation required more than this time they need to get our sanction either by phone or cable. We hope the above shall be executed by each within their speciality. Over.) Signed: Ali Hassan Majid, Military Governor [Ed: The 'Security-Prohibited' order was applied to large tracts of Kurdistan and hundreds of Kurdish villages populated by innocent civilians suddenly found themselves in a killing zone. Please bear in the mind that this was Phase TWO of the operation! The scope of the tragedy that was unrolling across Kurdistan was defined in some detail in the following communique.] #2. From: Ali Moashna Kadhum, Secretary, National Defence Battalions Committee ARAB BA'ATH SOCIALIST PARTY COMMAND OF ZAKHO BRANCH NATIONAL DEFENCE BATTALIONS COMMITTEE Strictly confidential and Personal Subject: Directive Comradely greetings. [I refer to] the letter of National Defence Battalions Committee S/Sh/1175 dated 9th June 1987, which refers to the letter of the Bureau of the Organisation of the North (marked Strictly confidential and Personal) 28/2650 dated 3rd June 1987 which include the following: 1. Human presence, the delivery of food or machinery are totally forbidden in the villages included in the second stage of village collectivisation. Those [villagers] who wish to return should be allowed to do so; but their relatives are not allowed to contact them without prior information of the security authorities. 2. Human presence is totally banned in those areas in which the forbidden villages of stage one are situated. Presence is equally forbidden, after 21st June 1987, in the case of those villages included in stage two. 3. No activity is permitted after the conclusion of the harvest season, which must end by 15th July 1987. No agricultural activity is allowed thenceforth for the following summer and winter seasons. 4. Grazing is also taboo in these areas. 5. The military force within any of the districts in question are instructed to kill any human or animal found. These areas will be designated as absolutely no-go areas. 6. Those [villagers] included in the deportation plan are to be informed about resettlement. They will therefore be held responsible for any failure towards fulfilling these orders. [This letter has been prepared for your information to do accordingly: every individual according to his speciality.] [Signed] Comrade Ali Moashna Kadhum Secretary of the Committee [Ed: Reading these documents, are you not irrestibly reminded of Nazi plans for the Jews: deportation, resettlement, mass murder by gassing. If Hitler had been able to gas the Jews simply by bombing and shelling with cyanide and nerve gas, would he have bothered to build the ovens of Belzec and Auschwitz? After the Holocaust the Jews gained their own country. Who in the West remembers, let alone cares about, the Kurdish dead?] Would you like to know more about the Kurds? Please respond now, for a Kurdish conference. This topic posted by: The Kurdish Cultural Centre 14 Stannary Street London SE11 4AA, UK Telephone: (+44) 71 735 0918 Fax: (+44) 71 582 8894 Greennet User ID: Kurds [The first response to this topic is a list of Kurdish villages destroyed by the Iraqis in the period PRECEDING these documents. To this we have appended the list of the dead (those whose names we know) from just TWO villages on that list. We are not asking you to read the whole list. Just scroll through it and you will get some idea of the extent of the disaster suffered by our people.] From kurds at gn.apc.org Sat Apr 6 21:36:32 1991 From: kurds at gn.apc.org (kurds at gn.apc.org) Date: 06 Apr 1991 20:36:32 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Iraqi genocide documents References: Message-ID: The list of destroyed villages is item 6 on this conference. From kurds at gn.apc.org Sat Apr 6 21:38:55 1991 From: kurds at gn.apc.org (kurds at gn.apc.org) Date: 06 Apr 1991 20:38:55 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Gulf War, a Kurdish perspective Message-ID: The following is the text of an article written by Sarbast just before war broke out in the Gulf. It provides a clear and excellent exposition of the significance of the unresolved Kurdish question in leading up to the present crisis. A must for anyone who wants to understand the causes of the current crisis. It is difficult to avoid comparison between Hitler's attempt to wipe out the Jews and Saddam Hussein's desire to get rid of the Kurds in Iraq. It is also difficult not to note the general tendency in the international community and even the press to underestimate the importance of the Kurdish problem in the political equations and inter-state relations of the Middle East. While there are widespread talks about the necessity of resolving all the Middle East's outstanding problems, we hardly hear any mention of the Kurds. Why? Are the Kurds less important than the Palestinians? While the crimes committed against the people of Kuwait by the Iraqi army of occupation since the August 2nd invasion must be deplored, one should also ask oneself: is the fate of 25 million Kurds of less concern to the world than a mere three quarters of a million Kuwaitis? Is the Kurdish question not one of the paramount elements of instability in the Middle East? I believe it is. One live example in hand to prove my claim is the present crisis in the Gulf. Let us for a while refresh our memory and try to find links between Saddam's domestic and foreign adventures and manoeuvres in the last 20 years or so, and see where the Kurds fit in. Why was Saddam forced to make the concessions that he made to Iran in 1975 - namely to give up half of the Shat-al-Arab waterway? On March 11, 1970, an autonomy agreement was signed between the Iraqi regime and the Kurdish movement, which was at the peak of its strength at the time, under the leadership of the late General Mustafa Barzani. This agreement was supposed to be implemented in four years. But when the time came, in 1974, Iraq refused to honour its promise. And the war broke out once again. Iran (then under the Shah), which has got its own Kurdish problem, thought that this was a golden opportunity to establish itself as the regional superpower while also making sure that the Kurds never got anywhere in any part of Kurdistan. The Shah started arming and funding the Barzani movement with the full backing of the CIA. When Saddam (he was vice-president at the time, but still the strongest man) found himself cornered under the increasing pressure of the Kurdish guerilla movement to the extent that the very existence of his regime was at stake, he conceded half of Shat-al-Arab to the Shah (Algeria agreement), who in return stopped supporting the Kurds. And the movement came to an end. However, less than a year passed before the Kurdish people reorganised themselves and resumed their armed struggle against the Iraqi government. When the Shah was overthrown and Ayatollah Khomeini came to power in 1979, Saddam sought to exploit the turmoil of post revolutionary Iran and tried to regain what he had given away himself. Adopting the rhetoric of Arab nationalism and "defending the eastern frontiers of the Arab world", on September 22nd 1980, he led the Iraqi people to a war with Iran that would last eight bloody years. The result: a million dead to Saddam's credit. Not long after beginning the war, Saddam had realised that he would certainly be defeated by the much larger Iran. But thanks to all the military technology and economic assistance that he received from West and East, (not forgetting Gulf money and his large scale use of chemical weapons), and thanks to the stubbornness of the Iranian mullahs, Saddam came out as a survivor and even managed to claim "victory" when Khomeini finally decided to drink the "poisoned chalice" and Iran accepted Security Council resolution 598, demanding a ceasefire, in July 1988. Since then, Saddam has been fully aware that, in order to satisfy Iran, he had to go back to the 1975 Algeria accord: to surrender all his war gains for nothing in return. And this meant giving up sovereignty over his only access to the Gulf. He therefore had to look for a soft target to make up for this loss and to achieve his other ambitions (such as becoming leader of the Arab world). Kuwait proved too tempting to resist. I also believe that there was another equally important reason which contributed towards finalising his decision to invade Kuwait: occupying Kuwait provided him with a perfect excuse by which he would "fulfil" all the Iranians "wanted", without being seen to be defeated or humiliated in the eyes of Arabs and Iraqis. Thus one can say that if it were not for the Kurds, Saddam would not have been forced to give up sovereignty over Shat-al-Arab, might not have started the war with Iran - although the West might still have pushed him towards that war in order to stop the spread of Islamic fundamentalism - and, last but absolutely by no means the least, he might not have invaded Kuwait in the dramatic style that he did. Each of the countries occupying Kurdistan (Iraq, Iran, Turkey, Syria) has always tried to exploit the Kurds of one or more of its neighbouring countries for its own purposes. But all of them have always agreed to suppress the Kurdish people's demand for their rights or any form of self-rule, no matter how limited. There have been reports in the past few days that possible aims for Turkey's eagerness to be involved in the Gulf crisis include ensuring that after a war no Kurdish state is formed in northern Iraq; or even "retaking" Mosul and Kirkuk, oil rich provinces in southern Kurdistan that most Turks believe were unjustly wrenched from them in December 1925 by the British mandate in Iraq. Considering these facts, one can only wonder why not try to find a solution for this long standing and complicated problem of the Middle East? However, there are two reasons that have contributed towards diluting the importance of the Kurds. First, one has got to be objective: the lack of a clear united vision among the Kurdish political movement itself as to what kind of solution it is seeking. Presenting the case as a mere internal problem of each of those countries surely does not attract sufficient international sympathy. Secondly, the obvious unwillingness among the West and the US - the USSR does not have an influential role to play any more - to upset their allies in the Middle East. This is particularly true in the case of Turkey, which is determined to fight Kurdish nationalism and aspirations. Whichever the case may be, unless this factor of instability suits the West and the Americans - ie, they can use it in times of need to play one state against another - then it is only logical that they should practise their influence in order to reach a just and lasting solution to the problem. And now the clock is ticking away towards a catastrophic war in the Gulf, the consequences of which go beyond our wildest imagination. In my opinion, the Kurdish element has been the most decisive one in bringing the Middle East to this end. It would therefore be naive to try to establish what in Whitehall is known as the PCRSS - post-crisis regional security structure - without addressing the Kurdish question as well. It is time to abandon the argument that the colonially imposed borders on Kurdistan are inviolable. It is time to get the records straight and to reconcile justice with history. Britain, as a nation that, after the First World War, played a leading part in the arbitrary carving up of the Middle East, has an historical and moral obligation to try to include the Kurds in the eventual political equation of the region. Let us not forget that people's desire to determine their own destiny and to live freely in their own land is essentially at the root of international law. In order to reach a lasting peace and a "regional security structure" in the Middle East, the West should not opt for the easy way out - maintaining the status quo. Sarbast Aram Co-ordinator Kurdish Cultural Centre 14 Stannary Street London SE11 4AA Tel: +44 71 735 0918 Fax: +44 71 582 8894 From kurds at gn.apc.org Sat Apr 6 21:41:45 1991 From: kurds at gn.apc.org (kurds at gn.apc.org) Date: 06 Apr 1991 20:41:45 +0000 (GMT) Subject: URGENT APPEAL BY KURDS Message-ID: "ARE WE NOT HUMAN?" As you read this, millions of Kurdish women, children and old people are trapped without food or shelter in the icy heights of the Zagros mountains. Without your help, they're going to die. In their haste to escape a massacre, families fled their homes in the middle of the night. They took only what they could carry, in many cases just a small child. They're wandering the mountains in thin night garments. In the Zagros tonight, the temperature will once again plunge to ten degrees below zero. The Kurdish children up there have no warm coats, no blankets. Many of them are barefoot in the snow. The only warmth they will find is in the arms of their mothers, until the women freeze or starve to death. What will become of the woman whom journalists found crouching among the rocks, her face contorted in the final pangs of childbirth? How will her bewildered family look after her? They have no medicines. No tent for shelter. Not even a blanket to wrap the newborn child in. Even if they survive the sub-zero cold, they have nothing to live on except melted snow. It will be a miracle if that child survives. Please be our miracle. We need to get food, blankets, tents and medicines out to the refugees immediately. We have no money to pay for them. (Whatever we had went last year to help Kurdish children in refugee camps in Turkey. They fled the massacres of 1988.) We've even had to borrow the money to pay for the cost of running this advertisement appeal. Please give as much as you humanly can. (The money promised by governments is still not nearly enough and may be too late. Any money you give us will go straight to Kurdistan immediately.) You can donate either by cheque or by credit card by using the coupon at the bottom of this page. KILL ANY HUMAN OR ANIMAL Right now, the most important part of this message is what you've just read. But behind the tragedy is a story that ought to be told. Despite media interest over the last few months, no-one has yet grasped the scale or horror of what has been happening in Kurdistan. Let us attempt, however inadequately, to give you some idea of what it is that the Kurdish families are fleeing. In June 1987 orders were issued from the office of Ali Hassan al-Majid, Military Governor of Kurdistan. (The same man whom Saddam Hussein recently elevated to the post of Interior Minister.) The orders referred to thousands of small Kurdish villages and farms spread out across an area of valley and mountainside the size of Yorkshire and Northumberland. The orders said: "Human presence is totally banned in those areas in which the forbidden villages are situated. Grazing is also taboo in these areas. The military force within any of the districts in question are instructed to kill any human or animal found." (Order of the Bureau of the Organisation of the North (marked Strictly confidential and Personal) 28/2650 dated 3rd June 1987) "Your commands shall prepare special attacks from time to time using artillery, helicopters and jets against as many of those possible existing in these prohibited areas during all times, days and nights." (Order from Ali Hassan Majid dated 20th June 1987.) What these orders left unsaid was that the weapons used in the 'special attacks' would be chemicals. THE HORRORS OF SPRING They had started using chemicals early in 1987. One of the first Kurdish villages to be hit was Sheikh Wasanen, in the Balisan Valley. It was a small place of some 60 mud houses and about 300 people. A Kurdish guerilla, or peshmerga, who saw the attack, tells how the people, who had never known chemical bombing, died. "I was stationed along the valley, not far from Sheikh (Wasanen. I saw the jets diving again and again to bomb (the village. After the bombs fell, people ran outside (celebrating because they thought they had escaped injury. (But they ran the chemical and died." - Testimony of Khalil Hamad Hassan to Kurdish Cultural (Centre, London A day later, 34 Soviet-made Iraqi Sukhoi jets bombed the Kurdish villages of Haledin and Balisan. "We entered Balisan not all that long after the bombs had fallen. Bodies were lying in the street. The bodies had gone blue, but there was no other sign of injury. My friend Abdullah Habib went to where a woman lay dead, with arms round her small children. As he bent down over their bodies he collapsed and died. Another friend rushed to help him also died. Where I was standing, just ten feet away, the air was breathable." - Testimony of Khalil Hamad Hassan, ibid A FATE WORSE THAN DEATH On a fine spring morning in 1988, a peshmerga called Azad Abdullah came across dozens of people, blistered and burned, stumbling silently from a stricken village in the Garmiyan region of Kurdistan. "Among them were a small boy and girl, clinging to each (other. While running away through a wheat field they had (come under attack from an Iraqi helicopter and become (separated from their parents. The parents had died but (the children did not know this. They kept saying that (when it grew light they would go and look for them. They (thought it was night. They did not realise that they (were blind." - Testimony of Azad Abdullah to Kurdish Cultural Centre, (London. This is when we learned to flee. When chemical shells are dropping in and all around a village, the only hope is to get right away of the area as quickly as possible. "People were running wildly in all directions. There was (no time to stop and think. I saw one family with five (small children. The parents picked up two children each. (They were crying. They kissed the fifth child tenderly (all over his face. Then they simply ran. The last child (had to be left to his fate." - Testimony of Haji Ahmed to Kurdish Cultural Centre, London. MASSACRE AT HALABJA The worst horror had yet to come. Deep inside Kurdistan lies the town of Halabja. On 16th March 1988, more than 5,000 of its men, women and children died in a massive chemical attack. Eyewitnesses described how Iraqi warplanes flew overhead in more than 20 separate raids and dropped clusters of bombs on the town. Explosions spread huge clouds of white gas. A deadly white smog enfolded Halabja. "Bodies lie in the dirt streets or sprawled in rooms and courtyards of the deserted villas, preserved at the moment of death in a modern version of the disaster that struck Pompeii. A father died in the dust trying to protect his child from the white clouds of cyanide vapour. A mother lies cradling her baby alongside a minibus that lies sideways across the road, hit while trying to flee. Yards away, a mother, father and daughter lie side by side. In a cellar a family crouches together." - Washington Times, March 23rd 1988. ARE WE NOT HUMAN? Now you know why the Kurds are fleeing Saddam Hussein's army. Why old people crippled with arthritis are willing to drag their limbs up steep mountain paths. Why women would rather take their little children hungry into a wilderness of ice than trust the promises of Saddam Hussein. But can you explain why, at the time of writing, neighbouring countries have closed the international border? Threatened to use force to turn the refugees back? Why Saddam Hussein's artillery and helicopter gunships, which hardly fired a shot against the Allied armies, are freely permitted to go on slaughtering defenceless Kurdish women and children? Our people celebrated the victory of the Allied armies over Saddam Hussein. They are asking what kind of law it is that protects Saddam's mounstrous regime against 'interference in internal affairs', while refusing even to acknowledge their basic human rights. The old Kurdish man quoted on BBC TV news put it at its simplest. 'Are we not human?' he asked. PLEASE GIVE GENEROUSLY As a registered charity we are not permitted to make political comments in a public appeal. But there's no need. Just ask yourself the following questions. Were you ever aware in 1988 that Saddam's government was using chemical weapons against the Kurds? If not, why not? Did you hear of a single official protest or attempt at intervention by any nation? Are you aware of a single positive action that was taken to help? Did any nation suspend its economic and military aid to Iraq while these massacres were going on? Did the UN Security Council even acknowledge a single letter or memorandum sent to them in 1988 appealling for help? After the ceasefire in the Gulf War, did any government lift a finger to save the Kurds from destruction? We Kurds have a saying, that we have no friends in the world except our mountains. Please prove us wrong. ----------------------------------------------------------- COUPON I want to help the Kurdish refugees. I would like to donate #10 [ ] #25 [ ] #50 [ ] #100 [ ] #500 [ ] #1,000 [ ] #10,000 [ ] #100,000 [ ] Please tick appropriate box. Name.................................................. Address............................................... ...................................................... ...................................................... I enclose a cheque made payable to 'Kurdish Cultural Centre'/Please debit my credit card Type of Card [Access/Visa/Other, please specify]............. Expiry Date............. Card number [ | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | ] Please post your completed coupon to: Kurdish Cultural Centre, 14 Stannary Street, London SE11 4AA. Registered Charity number: XXXXXXX ------------------------------------------------------------ THIS IS NOT JUST FOR YOUR INFORMATION BUT FOR YOUR ACTION! PLEASE GET THIS APPEAL IN FRONT OF AS MANY PEOPLE AS YOU CAN. DOWNLOAD IT, PRINT IT OUT, FILL IN THOSE COUPONS. THE KURDISH PEOPLE NEED A MIRACLE. PLEASE BE OUR MIRACLE. From kurds at gn.apc.org Sat Apr 6 21:46:01 1991 From: kurds at gn.apc.org (kurds at gn.apc.org) Date: 06 Apr 1991 20:46:01 +0000 (GMT) Subject: URGENT APPEAL BY KURDS References: Message-ID: The foregoing is the text of an appeal to be published in the OBSERVER newspaper in Britain on Sunday 7th April 1991. The appeal was written and produced by us at the Kurdish Cultural Centre with the help of our friends. The interviews used in the text were taped here at the Kurdish Cultural Centre. We publish the appeal here not simply for your information, but for your action. Please download the text, copy it and share it with as many people as possible. Please get as many people as possible to respond, using the coupon. For your help and support in this time of our tragedy, thank you from our hearts. From aldopacific at gn.apc.org Sun Apr 7 23:53:20 1991 From: aldopacific at gn.apc.org (aldopacific at gn.apc.org) Date: 07 Apr 1991 22:53:20 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Kurdistan on Tearful Map Message-ID: At our Quaker meeting today a Pakistani Moslem academic spoke movingly about how he'd found an old map from the last century in his files, and Kurdistan was there as an almost complete nation. Placing it up on his wall moved him to tears. He spoke of how our difficulty in taking on Kurdish issues has so much to do with it having been our British empire which carved up the map into what it looks like now. At the end of the meeting one of our peace group people gave out the address where money can be sent for relief. The kurds were entirely in our hearts during that Quaker "meeting for worship". Our thoughts remain with you and, I hope, some of our money too. Alastair McIntosh. From kurds at gn.apc.org Wed Apr 10 03:36:16 1991 From: kurds at gn.apc.org (kurds at gn.apc.org) Date: 10 Apr 1991 02:36:16 +0000 (GMT) Subject: How to donate by e-mail Message-ID: Anyone wanting to make an urgent credit card donation to the Kurdish Disaster Fund can do so by e-mailing us with the following information: 1. Your name, address, postcode. 2. The amount you wish to donate. 3. The type of credit/charge card you wish to use. 4. Its expiry date. 5. Last but not least, your card number. If you wish to be registered as a member of the Kurdish Cultural Centre, please add 15 pounds sterling (or equivalent in other currency) to your donation. We would like deeply and sincerely to thank those who have already responded to our appeal on GreenNet. From tsponheim at igc.apc.org Wed Apr 10 07:32:55 1991 From: tsponheim at igc.apc.org (tsponheim at igc.apc.org) Date: Tue, 09 Apr 1991 23:32:55 -0700 (PDT) Subject: $1 solar pasteurizer plans Message-ID: I have some urgent information that I need to get to the suffering people of Iraq: It was not known until very recently that water can be pasteurized in a cardboard box. This could immediately provide a great deal of safe water for as little as US$1 per solar pasteurizer. Construction time is about 1 hour. Materials needed: one cardboard box and some extra cardboard pieces, 3-4 meters of aluminum foil, glue or tape, plastic wrap. Tools needed: a knife. 1) Find a cardboard box, the larger the better. 2) Cover the inside of the box with aluminum foil. It can be glued (with carpenter's glue or wheat paste) or taped into place. 3) Fold the flaps into the box to form a double wall. 5) Foil the exposed side of the flaps in this position. 6) Cut a piece of cardboard just big enough to fit down into the opening of the box. Foil it. Then paint the foil black with any black paint (ashes will work if no foil is applied). This piece will act as a false bottom. 7) Cut a few strips of cardboard and glue their ends together forming a hoop. These hoops should be just tall enough to support the false bottom at about the height of the end of the flaps. 8) Place the hoops into the box and insert the false bottom piece. 9) Cut a piece of plastic wrap big enough to fit over the opening of the box with a 5 cm or so overlap. 10) Tape this piece down to form a tight seal on top. You will be removing two sides of this plastic in order to put water containers into the oven so before you tape it down, apply a layer of tape onto the outside of the box so that the tape that attaches the plastic will adhere to tape and not to cardboard. In this way, it can be removed and retaped many times. 11) Make a reflector by cutting a large rectangular piece of cardboard to the size of the top of the box, but longer by 10-20 cm in one direction. Foil this piece on one side. Lay it on top of the box with the foiled side down. Fold the overlap down and glue the overlap to the side of the box. 12) To pasteurize water, place a few liters of water in dark covered pots or jars painted black with lids. Water is pasteurized and safe to drink after it has reached 65 C for 1/2 hour. If no thermometer is available, signs of boiling can be ascertained to determine that the water has neared 100 C. A pictorial version is available through Solar Box Cookers Northwest. Contact me through one of the following means and I will mail or fax them to you: Tom Sponheim Solar Box Cookers Northwest 7036 18th Ave NE. Seattle, WA 98115 USA Voice/Fax: 206/525-1418 (auto-switcher) Telex: 1503097451 Econet:tsponheim From kurds at gn.apc.org Wed Apr 10 13:53:26 1991 From: kurds at gn.apc.org (kurds at gn.apc.org) Date: 10 Apr 1991 12:53:26 +0000 (GMT) Subject: $1 solar pasteurizer plans References: Message-ID: Thank you very much for this information. It has been passed on immediately to those working on the ground with the refugees. From aldopacific at gn.apc.org Wed Apr 10 18:53:16 1991 From: aldopacific at gn.apc.org (aldopacific at gn.apc.org) Date: 10 Apr 1991 17:53:16 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Scots Clergy Endorse Kurds Appeal Message-ID: Today I faxed out the kurds Observer advert, and so far their appeal has received the endorsement of: Rev James Weatherhead on behalf of the Moderator of the General Assembly of the Church of Scotland (Prof. Davidson himself is in USA, but his staff said he'd want to be counted in showing support). Rev John Harvey, Leader of the Iona Community, Iona Abbey. Bishop Michael Hare Duke, St Andrews, Scottish Episcopal Church. Rt Rev Richard Holloway, Bishop of Edinburgh, Scottish Episcopal Church. One of the people contacted has arranged for a donation of UKP 500 ($US1,000) to go to the Kurdish Cultural Centre! Alastair McIntosh. From aldopacific at gn.apc.org Thu Apr 11 00:25:25 1991 From: aldopacific at gn.apc.org (aldopacific at gn.apc.org) Date: 10 Apr 1991 23:25:25 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Scots Clergy Endorse Kurds Appeal References: Message-ID: Was rushing earlier - forgot to say that when I asked the person who wanted to make the large donation if he could really afford it, he replied, "How could I not?". A.I.M. From aldopacific at gn.apc.org Thu Apr 11 00:22:54 1991 From: aldopacific at gn.apc.org (aldopacific at gn.apc.org) Date: 10 Apr 1991 23:22:54 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Creeping Catastrophe - Church Scot Message-ID: --HDR1.0-- 35 TX; BBC 1 TV: Reporting Scotland, 1740 GMT 10th April 1990. The Board of World Mission and Unity of the Church of Scotland today severely criticised political leaders for disregarding their warning that war in the Gulf would lead to a "creeping catastrophe" of refugee suffering. Secretary of the Board, Rev Chris Wigglesworth, said the Church had warned politicians against the "quick fix" approach of war, and that the consequence of what has happend is now manifest in the Kurdish situation. He added that the Church took no pleasure in being proven right, and that the West must learn to LISTEN more to the voice of peoples in Africa and the Middle East. Commenting further on the Report on World Poverty to be presented next month at the General Assembly of the Church of Scotland, Rev Norman Shanks, Convenor of the Church and Nation Committee, expressed the hope that while the eyes of the world are rightly on the Kurds, people would not forget about the suffering continuing in Africa. {Nb. The C of S is the largest denomination in Scotland. It has a status equivalent to that of the Church of England south of the border, but it is not a part of the Anglican Communion, being a presbyterian rather than an episcopal church (ie. it has something akin to grass roots government rather than Bishops, and the Prime Minister and Queen do not have significant roles in running its affairs.} Alastair McIntosh. / RaC2 border=2 RaC4 pgdepth=58 RaC8 curline=34 RaC9 curpos=1 RaC10 windline=19 RaC24 limitright=65 From aldopacific at gn.apc.org Thu Apr 11 00:23:49 1991 From: aldopacific at gn.apc.org (aldopacific at gn.apc.org) Date: 10 Apr 1991 23:23:49 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Sortie and Tonnage Comparisons Message-ID: --HDR1.0-- 37 TX; BBC 1 TV News at 1700 GMT today, 10th April, reported that the weather over Northern Iraq etc. had sufficiently improved for the RAF to be able to carry out its air drops of relief supplies. These comprised 40 tons of food and blankets - enough food in the form of army rations to feed 2,500 people for one day. Apparently the Americans also dropped 4 Hercules loads of supplies. Very nice. Compare this number of sorties, countable on the fingers of one's hands, with the following GreenPeace Situation Report of 31st January, which I have here because we used in in issue 15 of GulfWatch: "Over 10,000 sorties of all sorts had been flown during the first week of the war. The number of sorties flown to date is now over 32,000, with 2,600 flown on 31st January..... This includes 300 sorties per day flown against Republican Guard ground units.... 27 B-52s dropped 455 tons of explosives.... etc etc etc." If we can land thousands of tons of bombs a day, why can we manage only 40 tons of relief supplies? If we can parachute SAS intelligence experts behind lines to help locate SCUD launching sites, why in poor weather cannot we find thousands of refugees using known routes? If we can lazer direct or cruise missile target high explosives with supreme precision...... does one need to say any more? Alastair McIntosh. / RaC2 border=2 RaC4 pgdepth=58 RaC8 curline=37 RaC10 windline=22 RaC24 limitright=65 From kurds at gn.apc.org Fri Apr 12 00:05:41 1991 From: kurds at gn.apc.org (kurds at gn.apc.org) Date: 11 Apr 1991 23:05:41 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Kurdish Appeal Progress Report Message-ID: It's good to be able to report that response to our Appeal has been warm and generous. A lot of people were already telephoning the Centre and some newspapers included the number, which also helped. The advertisement appeal in the Observer has brought a heavy response and another advertisement ran today in the Independent. We are hoping to get more space - but it is difficult to obtain free space and of course we are reluctant to have to divert funds into paid advertising, if it can possibly be avoided. This afternoon, we recorded a sixty-second message which we will circulate to radio stations in the hopes that they will run it for us. Actor Joss Ackland kindly donated his time and thanks too to Sounds Effective and its proprietor Chris Timpson, who produced the script for nothing. Our advertisement in the Observer was produced free of charge by advertising agency Collett Dickenson Pearce. Antennae Communication helped us to research and write it. Thank you also to the church leaders in Scotland who have generously allowed us to quote them as supporters of our Appeal, and to the Bishop who donated 500 pounds to the Kurdish Disaster Fund. It is truly heartwarming to experience such generosity and friendship, often from the most unexpected quarters. Thank you all. From aldopacific at gn.apc.org Fri Apr 12 11:13:36 1991 From: aldopacific at gn.apc.org (aldopacific at gn.apc.org) Date: 12 Apr 1991 10:13:36 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Barefoot and Starving Message-ID: I am about to set off by bus to my work at the University of Edinburgh, where I am development director of the Centre for Human Ecology. Unusually, I am wearing my three piece suit, representative of conventionality, conformity, and the appearance of normality being maintained in the face of wider reality. I shall not, however, be wearing my shoes or socks. I shall be carrying a small placard saying: The Kurds Barefoot Starving Alastair McIntosh. From kurds at gn.apc.org Fri Apr 12 22:18:33 1991 From: kurds at gn.apc.org (kurds at gn.apc.org) Date: 12 Apr 1991 21:18:33 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Barefoot and Starving References: Message-ID: Alastair, you have done so much already. We are deeply grateful to you for your help. pp Sarbast Aram, Handren Marouf and all at the Kurdish Cultural Centre in London From aldopacific at gn.apc.org Fri Apr 12 23:56:54 1991 From: aldopacific at gn.apc.org (aldopacific at gn.apc.org) Date: 12 Apr 1991 22:56:54 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Pork Sausages and Clouds Message-ID: My secretary who reads the Daily Telegraph tells me there was a report today saying that amongst the food dropped by the RAF the other day was a considerable quantity of PORK sausages! Is this true? Is there any end to the depths of our ignorance? Also, how true is it that bad weather is hampering air drops? When we can guide thousands of tons of high explosive with supreme precision, is it beyond our SAS to scout out refugee groups and set up radio beacons for air drops through cloud? Alastair. From kurds at gn.apc.org Sat Apr 13 01:46:00 1991 From: kurds at gn.apc.org (kurds at gn.apc.org) Date: 13 Apr 1991 00:46:00 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Pork Sausages and Clouds References: Message-ID: I was also incredulous to hear something of this sort. Apparently when it was pointed out to the man from the ministry, he said something like 'If they're hungry enough they'll eat anything'. Grin. Indra From aldopacific at gn.apc.org Sun Apr 14 10:26:05 1991 From: aldopacific at gn.apc.org (aldopacific at gn.apc.org) Date: 14 Apr 1991 09:26:05 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Pork Sausages and Clouds References: Message-ID: yes, today I'm looking after the kids of an army officer friend (see Sweet Smell of Death in mideast.gulf). He was just round talking - we were talking - about our respective war efforts. He says the army people all felt very cheated not to have been allowed to finish off Saddam's army which, they believe, would have stopped the Kurdish situation from happening. He says they all wanted to do reconstruction work in Iraq, but weren't allowed. He says pork was fed to the POWs, but that this was quite OK because you have to accept the ways of the country you're captured by, and Allah's not going to strike you down for eating what's available when you're hungry. He fought in 9 battles; there was no resistance in only 2: in some it was a bayonets and grenades job, but their training and weaponry was so good they lost only one man. He accepts that the war was about oil, but considers that oil is worth fighting for. He feels very frustrated by the politicians, and points out that much of the war equipment that might be used for relief is already out of the Gulf. He says that most of the planes couldn't be used for dropping relief supplies because they're equipped to release bombs; not to drop pallets of food out the back. Britain, for instance, has only 17 Chinook helicopters and they're the sort of stuff needed for relief. He says that dropping stuff in bad weather is more difficult that I think it might be - they actually had to stop bombing because of bad weather some days, but he conceded that radio beacons could probably be set up to target drops. But he points out that the scale of the humanitarian problem is just so great that air drops aren't the answer anyway, and the roads are too poor to do it by land. He says that anyone who knows the Turks knows they won't do much to help the Kurds. He says the .... that's enough - you get the idea. Another poor soldier on the edge of being fucked up by this fucking war. Alastair McIntosh. From antennae at gn.apc.org Sat Apr 13 03:22:00 1991 From: antennae at gn.apc.org (antennae at gn.apc.org) Date: 13 Apr 1991 02:22:00 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Let's get rid of these hypocrites Message-ID: I was talking today to someone who said they had seen Mr David Mellor on the television talking about how concerned the British Government are for the safety and well-being of the Kurdish refugees. In early 1988 Mr Mellor was a junior minister at the Foreign Office. On March 16th 1988, Saddam Hussein's air force bombed the Kurdish town of Halabja with chemicals. 5,000 men, women and children died hideous deaths. The newspaper and TV coverage of this slaughter was worldwide. We saw pictures of dead parents clutching little dead children, they had been trying in vain to save them from the gas. As a parent myself, when I saw these pictures I cried. What has this to do with Mr Mellor? Well, not even one month after the Halabja massacre, he was busy forecasting a bright future for British industry in Iraq. This must have been when, according to one news report I have seen, he shook Saddam Hussein's hand in Baghdad. I've never been able to understand how anyone - even a politician - could look at pictures of dead women and babies one week and conduct 'business as usual' with their murderer the next. To find now that this same politician is on television talking about the plight of the Kurds fills me with more than disgust. It is a sort of horror that we tolerate such people and indeed allow them to rule us. I would very much like some professional journalist to examine the record and to bring out into the open the hypocrisy that shames us all. From aldopacific at gn.apc.org Thu Apr 18 23:57:29 1991 From: aldopacific at gn.apc.org (aldopacific at gn.apc.org) Date: 18 Apr 1991 22:57:29 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Let's get rid of these hypocrites References: Message-ID: Why don't you get John Pilger onto it - or at least, ask his advise on who would be good to investigate. From antennae at gn.apc.org Sat Apr 13 03:44:49 1991 From: antennae at gn.apc.org (antennae at gn.apc.org) Date: 13 Apr 1991 02:44:49 +0000 (GMT) Subject: "There is another way" Message-ID: There's more to this sordid tale. Doubtless encouraged (cf James Adams of the Sunday Times in his book about the arms trade, 'Trading in Death') by the supine western response to his Halabja massacre, Saddam set about the Kurds with a new fury in August 1988. One after another, Kurdish villages were wiped out in chemical attacks. Gases used included cyanide, which simply chokes people to death, and mustard gas, which strips away the lining of the lungs, so that those who breathe it in drown in their own blood. There were also nerve gases, some of which were so deadly that a drop the size of a pinhead could kill you. >From the TV pictures of today's Kurdish refugees you can see exactly what sort of people they were that Saddam bombed with chemicals in August 1988. Then as now, hundreds of thousands fled across the mountains (in August at least it was not so cold at night) to Iran and Turkey. There the families still languish, in camps that for sheer squalor defy description. They are not even accorded refugee status, but are referred to as 'guests'. The point is that in September 1988, the Kurdish leader Jalal Talabani sent an urgent and desperate appeal to the British Government. It spoke of how the United Nations Security Council had not even bothered to acknowledge, much less reply to, the letters and memoranda the Kurds had sent them asking for their help in stopping the massacre. Talabani told the British that he was turning to them because they were champions of freedom, justice and democracy. Would they please raise the matter of the Kurdish massacres in the Security Council? What was the British response? You may draw your own conclusions from the fact that not long after Talabani wrote his desperate appeal, a British trade delegation led by a minister arrived in Baghdad and DOUBLED Saddam's lines of credit. I have used these facts already in an advertisement I wrote for Amnesty International entitled 'With allies like these, who needs enemies?' Amnesty, under the terms of its charter, is not allowed to enter into political debate, so was unable to pursue the argument. I am under no such restriction. So I will simply ask this. Why do we allow politicians to behave abroad in ways they would never dream of behaving at home? Why don't we insist that our governments behave morally? With the tide of hopeless refugees flowing across the mountain passes there is another tide - a rolling wave of realisation that our system of international relations is immoral and sick. 'Realpolitik' demands that governments close their eyes to the suffering and misery their selfish actions cause. 'Realpolitik' goes fishing while Kurds starve and freeze to death and are slaughtered by psychopaths like Saddam. But there is another way. If the people of the west take matters into their own hands and force their immoral leaders to step aside. Ring any bells? Luckily for us, we can throw out our leaders by the power of the ballot rather than the bullet. And we probably won't get attacked by chemical weapons and helicopter gunships. But you never know. Do you? From kurds at gn.apc.org Sat Apr 13 04:18:02 1991 From: kurds at gn.apc.org (kurds at gn.apc.org) Date: 13 Apr 1991 03:18:02 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Surprise! Turkey is nice to Kurds Message-ID: This article is imported from mideast.general where it was posted by igc:lgsax mideast.general 10:04 pm Feb 28, 1991 It was originally posted 4:57 pm Feb 24, 1991 by cc433336 in cdp:soc.culture.greek * ---------- "TURKEY: A CHANCE TO BE NICE" ---------- From our Turkey correspondent The following article appeared in the 9 February 1991 issue of The Economist. I thought you might find it interesting. The fog of war can be used to distract as well as to obscure. The Soviet Union has found in the world's obsession with the Gulf an opportunity to get tough with its fractious republics. Turkey too is learning to use external diversions to deal with internal controversies. The difference is that Turkey is not cracking down, but looseing up. The government has decided that now is the time to try to free itself from a swathe of objectionable and embarrassing legislation. Up to now, it has been an offense in Turkey to mumble in a tongue other than "the official, primary languages of countries recognised by Turkey". The intention of this measure, passed when Turkey was emerging from martial law in 1983, was not to encourage police raids on classes in Esperanto, or to stop Gaelic recitations at some local ceilidh; it was to prevent Turkey's Kurds from expressing a separate cultural and ultimately political identity. >From now on Turkey's Kurds are to be allowed at least a private voice. There will still be no place for Kurdish in public meetings, schools, or even the written page. But people will no longer be committing a crime when they speak Kurdish at home, sing in Kurdish at weddings or listen to Kurdish music cassettes in their cars. "it is a warm gesture to Turkey's Kurds," says Nurettin Yilmaz, a deputy from the ruling Motherland Party and himself an unintimidated Kurdish speaker. Others believe that the reform was the least Turkey had to do if it were to present itself as a credible guarantor of a future Iraqi federation. Even Saddam Hussein, who tested his chemical weapons on the Kurds of northern Iraq, allows Kurdish universities, television and printing presses. The Turkish government has, in addition, promised to do something about Articles 141 and 142 of the country's penal code -- regarded be democrats in Turkey with as much enthusiasm as East Germans once summoned up for the Berlin Wall. Contemporary with the criminal laws of fascist Italy, the articles have been used to prosecute those who propagate class-based ideologies. Human-rights activists maintain that the laws are used to interrogate, detain and occasionally sentence people guilty of "crimes" of thought and conscience. Although no one bothers to arrest Stalinists any more, there is still no official registered Turkish communist party. The government is also to amend Article 163, which keeps religion out of politics. But just as the Turkish right worries about giving rein to communist and Kurdish enemies of the state, so some of Turkey's armchair liberals are reluctant to give their blessing to religious fundamentalists. At the moment, however, the left and the religious right are in temporary alliance in their opposition to Turkey's support of the war. That Turkey waited for the war before it acted is an indication that the push for a more liberal society still requires hard work. (To reassure hardline critics, the government is promising a new law on anarchy and terror.) Turkey believes that, when the war is over, it will by virtue of its democracy be the one credible and stable power in the region. Yet it is still unsure whether it has confidence in the democratic instincts of its people. That hardly convinces others to be more trusting. -*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*- Constantinos A. Caroutas _________________________________________________________________ From kurds at gn.apc.org Sat Apr 13 04:21:10 1991 From: kurds at gn.apc.org (kurds at gn.apc.org) Date: 13 Apr 1991 03:21:10 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Oops! Not so nice after all. Message-ID: This article is imported from mideast.general where it was posted by igc:pnmideast 10:14 pm Mar 14, 1991 Originally written 7:14 am Mar 13, 1991 by branis in cdp:soc.culture.turkish ---------- "NYT article 12/3/1991" ---------- A TURKISH GESTURE TO KURDS FALTERS Proposal to Ease Restrictions Over Language Flounders. By Clyde Haberman ANKARA, Turkey, March 9 - A Goverment plan to soften language restriction long imposed on Turkey's Kurdish minority has stumbled in Parliament and may die there, a victim of nationalist fears and political maneuvering. With some fanfare and with hopes of improving their SHAKY HUMAN-RIGHTS image abroad, turkish leaders announced in late January that they would lift a ban that had made it a crime for Kurds to speak their language in public or to listen to their traditional songs. The prohibition denounced as "stupid" even by some Cabinet ministers, had been ordered in 1983 while Turkey was under military rule. Even before then, Kurds had been subjected for decades to a harsh campaign of assimilation that had denied tham official minority status accorded to much smaller groups like Greeks, Armenians and Jews. Instead, they were referred to as "mountain Turks". In Turkey's population of around 56 million, there are about 8 million to 10 million Turkish Kurds, tribal Muslims of Indo-European stock who dominate the country'd vast southeast and who rank among its poorest people. Separatists Fighting 7 Years The Goverment has tried to ease its "Kurdish problem" with big development projects. But it has run into strong local resistance and growing sympathy for separatist guerrillas who have battled the Turkish Army for the last 7 years - with ample viciousness displayed by both sides- in a campaign to create an independent Kurdish state in the southeast. Theoretically, the January proposal to give the Kurds back some of their cultural rights should have won the necessary parliamentary approval with ease. The governing Motherland Party has a solid majority, and its lawmakers have an acquired habit of rubber-stamping whatever Pr. T. Ozal wants. Moreover, by modifying the language ban, the Turks, would have eliminated measures that in practice were already largely ignored. They would also have scored public-relations points in the West, including the US, where the State Dept. last month listed cultural restrictions, along with torture and prison overcrowding, among persistent human rights abuses in Turkey. But the Goverment bill has been held hostage in the National Assembly, partly because deep rifts have developed in the goverment camp and partly because many Motherland deputies have serious doubts about the proposal. Theirs is a strongly nationalist view, born not so much of racism as a foot-in-the-door fear that yielding language rights today will lead inexorably to demands for independence tommorrow. In a country still seared by memories of the Ottoman Empire's dismantlement after WWI, that worry is not regarded here as mere paranoia. No easing of Teaching Ban Underlining the issue's sensitivity is the fact that there is no mention of the word "Kurdish" in the bill. In addition, the proposal does nothing to amend rigid restrictions against teaching Kurdish in schools or publishing books or newspapres in Kurdish. As a result, many Kurds are unimpressed. "The contents of this bill are nothing," said Prof. Ismail Besikci, a proseparatist sympathizer who used to teach Kurdish affairs at Erzerum University in Eastern turkey. "They do not bring anywhere near enough innovations". ====================================== Spiros ====================================== From kurds at gn.apc.org Sat Apr 13 14:50:26 1991 From: kurds at gn.apc.org (kurds at gn.apc.org) Date: 13 Apr 1991 13:50:26 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Write a letter to George Bush Message-ID: PLEASE ADD YOUR OWN NAME AND ADDRESS TO THIS LETTER AND JOIN US IN INUNDATING PRESIDENT BUSH WITH APPEALS TO HELP THE KURDS.. The President of the United States of America The White House Pennsylvania Avenue Washington DC USA Dear Mr President I do not remember having to write a letter fuelled by as much anger, frustration and sadness as this one. The United Nations, backed by many countries, under the leadership of the United States of America, took steps to crush the petty territorial ambitions of a vicious and barbaric dictator. At last we could smell the winds of change and we were promised 'a new world order'. But for the Kurds, it seems that this 'new world order' is not only as bad but even worse than the old world order. Kurdish mothers and children are dying of cold and starvation, huddled together fearing constant attack by the Iraqi forces with helicopter gunships closing in behind them intent on carrying out Saddam Hussein's policy of genocide against the Kurdish people. I join my voice to the hundreds of thousands, nay, millions, of others who wish Your Excellency to take as appropriate the necessary measures to stop Saddam Hussein from committing further massacres against the Kurdish people in Iraq and to reverse his merciless aggression against them. Yours sincerely, From kurds at gn.apc.org Sat Apr 13 14:52:17 1991 From: kurds at gn.apc.org (kurds at gn.apc.org) Date: 13 Apr 1991 13:52:17 +0000 (GMT) Subject: KURDISH RADIO APPEAL TEXT Message-ID: =====URGENT APPEAL BROADCAST BY KURDISH CULTURAL CENTRE==== As I speak to you, up to two million women, children and old people are trapped without food and shelter in the freezing mountains of Kurdistan. Some have not eaten for days. At night the temperature drops to minus ten degrees. Many kids are barefoot in the snow. With each hour that passes, they're growing weaker. Despite the great efforts now being made to drop food and warm clothing, it's still not nearly enough. Right now, these kids need a miracle. Will you be that miracle? Please make a credit card donation by ringing the Kurdish Cultural Centre now on 071-820 9999. Please, be their miracle. == Joss Ackland == You can also donate to the Kurdish Disaster Fund by e-mail, fax or regular post/mail. Details below. From eeames at igc.apc.org Mon Apr 29 17:21:53 1991 From: eeames at igc.apc.org (eeames at igc.apc.org) Date: Mon, 29 Apr 1991 09:21:53 -0700 (PDT) Subject: KURDISH RADIO APPEAL TEXT References: Message-ID: ion Committee, Newporty_ , Rhode Island, USA7j. From kurds at gn.apc.org Sat Apr 13 14:53:47 1991 From: kurds at gn.apc.org (kurds at gn.apc.org) Date: 13 Apr 1991 13:53:47 +0000 (GMT) Subject: 3 ways to donate to Kurdish Appeal Message-ID: THREE WAYS TO DONATE TO THE KURDISH DISASTER FUND APPEAL Please feel free to verify any of the details that follow by writing or phoning us. Thank you for your generosity. Kurdish Cultural Centre 14 Stannary Street Tel: 071-735 0918 Fax: 071 -582 8894 E-MAIL YOUR DONATION TO US Simplicity itself. Please supply the following information: 1) The amount you wish to donate. 2) Type of credit card you wish to use (Access/Visa etc) 3) Expiry Date 4) Your card number 5) Your name and address as held by the credit card company. If you are on GreenNet, EcoNet, PeaceNet, Web, Pegasus or any other nets they are linked to please e-mail the information to us at gn:kurds. (GreenNet users simply send to KURDS.) If this message reaches you on JANET or a connected net, we are trying to set up a mbx. Please contact us by phone for details. FAX YOUR DONATION TO US Just as easy as e-mailing us. On a sheet of paper, please enter the following information: 1) The amount you wish to donate. 2) Type of credit card you wish to use (Access/Visa etc) 3) Expiry Date 4) Your card number 5) Your name and address as held by the credit card company. Now fax your sheet to us on 071-582 8894. [If dialling from outside the UK you need to dial your international exchange number followed by 44 for the UK, followed by our number, omitting the initial 0.] POST/MAIL YOUR DONATION TO US 'Post' if you're English, 'mail' if you're American. Other nationalities, take your pick. Just as easy as e-mailing or faxing us. Please put the following information on a sheet of paper: 1) The amount you wish to donate. 2) Type of credit card you wish to use (Access/Visa etc) 3) Expiry Date 4) Your card number 5) Your name and address as held by the credit card company. Simply post the completed sheet to us at: Kurdish Cultural Centre 14 Stannary Street, London SW11 4AA, UK. From kurds at gn.apc.org Sat Apr 13 14:57:17 1991 From: kurds at gn.apc.org (kurds at gn.apc.org) Date: 13 Apr 1991 13:57:17 +0000 (GMT) Subject: How to donate in France and USA Message-ID: KURDISH CONTACTS ABROAD FRANCE Kendal Nezan Institute Kurde de Paris 106, rue La Fayette 75010 Paris Tel: +33 1 48 246464 Fax: +33 1 47 709904 USA Doctor Najmeddin Omer Kurdish National Congress (KNC) PO Box 15498 Ann Arbor MI 48106, Michigan USA You can send your donations to the Kurdish Disaster Fund to either of these address with complete confidence. We wish to stress that any money we receive will go directly and immediately to Kurdistan. From kurds at gn.apc.org Sat Apr 13 15:56:32 1991 From: kurds at gn.apc.org (kurds at gn.apc.org) Date: 13 Apr 1991 14:56:32 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Kurdish Hunger Strike Goes On Message-ID: Kurdish Hunger Strike Committee Grosvenor Square, London W1 ===PRESS RELEASE No. 2=== 8/4/91 12 noon The hunger strike began on Wednesday 3rd April 1991 at 2pm. There were 40 people in the strike at that initial stage. The strike is now in its seventh day and there are 35 of us who are still carrying on. So far ten strikers have been taken to hospital and among those, five have ended their strike under medical advice, while the other five rejoined. However, it should be noted that it is still our intention to hold a hunger strike until our demands are met. On the third day of the strike a letter was sent to President Bush through the USA Embassy and a request was made for a meeting with the Ambassador. So far we have not had any response. Today, the seventh day of the strike, another letter was sent to President Bush through the USA Embassy and the previously made request for a meeting with the Ambassador was reaffirmed. Yet again we haven't had any response. The following demands were included in the letter: 1 - The establishment of the proposed UN controlled zone to give minimum protection to the Kurds in southern (Iraqi) Kurdistan against the Iraqi army. 2 - Prompt measures to be taken to assure effective delivery and distribution of aid. 3 - Action to prevent Saddam Hussein and his regime from using his weapons against the Kurds in Iraq, especially in view of Iraq's acceptance of UN resolution 688. We have been greeted frequently by passers-by and the public. In particular we have been visited by some personalities and representatives of various organisations such as: Dale Campbell-Saver MP, Ann Clwyd MP, Jeremy Corbyn MP, Kenneth Livingstone MP, Simon Hughes MP, George Robertson MP, and Mr. John Swanwick, Vice-Chairman of National Young Conservatives. We were also visited by a representative of CND. From peacenet at igc.apc.org Sun Apr 14 19:47:50 1991 From: peacenet at igc.apc.org (PeaceNet * IGC * APC) Date: Sun, 14 Apr 1991 11:47:50 -0700 (PDT) Subject: KURDISTAN: WHERE THE UNITED STATES Message-ID: Subject: KURDISTAN: WHERE THE UNITED STATES /* Written 2:54 am Apr 14, 1991 by newsdesk in cdp:ips.englibrary */ /* ---------- "KURDISTAN: WHERE THE UNITED STATES " ---------- */ Copyright Inter Press Service 1991, all rights reserved. Permission to re- print within 7 days of original date only with permission from 'newsdesk'. Area: North America Title: KURDISTAN: WHERE THE UNITED STATES FEARS TO TREAD an inter press service feature by frank a. campbell new york apr 11 (ips) -- in the drama over the kurdish question being played out at the united nations, the security council and some of its member countries are going, if somewhat cautiously, where the united states fears to tread. u.s. president george bush, resisting growing pressure from the media, the political opposition and the u.s. public, preferred to go fishing in florida to getting pulled into the troubled waters of kurdistan. ignoring the taunts that he misled the kurds into believing he would help them overthrow saddam hussein, bush followed the advice of his closest advisers to get out of iraq while the u.s. military's reputation was still ''spotless'' and avoid getting his country into a ''vietnam-like folly''. for a president who has declared victory in the second gulf war as the final interment of the 'vietnam syndrome', this kind of advice must be easy to take. the idea of a u.n. resolution denouncing the iraqi government's mistreatment of the kurds got a lukewarm response from the united states leading some observers to agree with how some kurdish leaders characterised their meeting with state department officials last week -- a ''sop to cerberus''. the united states has been even more cautious about the european community (ec) idea to establish for the kurds in iraq what has been variously called an ''enclave'', a ''safe haven'' and a ''zone of tranquility''. one state department official said the united states would hate to see a ''u.n. protectorate'' in the gulf. even britain, the sponsor of the safe haven idea, has shown caution and inconsistency in promoting it. prime minister john major had sold to his colleagues the idea of an enclave which might be backed by force if iraq did not cooperate. but major's normally hardline permanent representative david hannay took pains to point out that ''this is not to be seen as a political concept or a juridical concept, but as a humanitarian concept''. this caution should not come as a surprise. recalling the lamentation of a british colonial official in iraq earlier this century that iraq was ''a very hard country to govern'', an iraqi journalist told ips: ''the u.s. authorities know that if they open that pandora's box they could stay in there forever.'' (more/ips) kurdistan: where (2) he was referring to iraq's ethnic and religious complexity -- the mixture of muslims and christians and turks, the distinction between the majority shi'ite muslims and the minority but governing sunnis, the fact that the kurds themselves are sunnis and the continued intermarriages taking place among these groups. kurdistan stretches over five countries -- iraq (with about four million kurds), turkey (12 million), syria (one million), iran (eight million) and the soviet union (600,000). even when most of these other countries are in a state of hostilities with iraq, they share an underlying apprehension that the kurds' aspirations for autonomy could grow into agitation for a separate and independent kurdistan. from the point of the view of the kurds and of many scholars, this fear accounts for the fact that iraq is not alone in trying to keep the kurdish people in their place. in a letter published recently in the 'new york times', lois whitman, deputy director of the human rights organisation, 'helsinki watch', related how lawyers and defendants were prosecuted for speaking kurdish during court proceedings in turkey. ''kurds,'' added whitman, ''are not permitted to give their children kurdish names. singers who sing kurdish songs are prosecuted.'' depending on how far back one wishes to go, the the plight of the kurds in iraq today could be traced to the early 1970's when saddam hussein, then assistant general secretary of the ba'ath party of iraq, reneged after signing an autonomy agreement with kurdish freedom fighters. or the 1920's when britain ruled the area and allied powers reneged on a promise of a separate kurdish state. or to centuries gone by when ottoman rulers granted the kurds a measure of autonomy for help in defeating the shah of persia in 1514, then increasingly circumscribed that autonomy. one of the more memorable examples of the plight of the troubled kurds in recent times took place in 1988 when saddam's government was widely reported to have used chemical weapons against them and up to 100,000 fled to turkey. today, by some estimates, millions are fleeing. according to one turkish national living in the united states, turkey once again is left with the burden while countries like the united states, with money, might and land, wash their hands of the problem. why? ''because they are muslims,'' he says. ''and everybody thinks muslims like to make rebellion, and because, unlike the kuwaitis, they are poor.'' (end/ips/ip/fc/lm) From inoc at gn.apc.org Mon Apr 15 00:13:41 1991 From: inoc at gn.apc.org (inoc at gn.apc.org) Date: 14 Apr 1991 23:13:41 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Cornwall Kurdish Medical Aid Message-ID: CORNWALL KURDISH MEDICAL AID Landfall, Tregullon, Bodmin, Cornwall PL30 5BH Tel: 0208 831401 or 831508 Fax: 0208 831678 Several people have come together to try to provide a focussed effort for relief in Kurdistan. Cornwall Kurdish Medical Aid was set up on Tuesday 9 April 1991 under the auspices of the Gaia Trust for Cornwall to provide the first Medical Reception Station under the guidance of a doctor who was the Senior Medical Officer at a Gulf POW camp in Saudi Arabia. Also coordinating the initiative are Elizabeth Sigmund, who has worked with the Kurdish people since 1988 and Chris Kinder, recent Chairman of St Agnes Support Group to Gulf Forces. Our target is to raise 100,000 immediately for the first of our emergency Medical Reception Stations. We plan to locate our MRS as soon as possible on the border of Iraq with an experienced team of doctors and paramedics. With relatively simple treatment we could prevent the death of many Kurds. Since we started we've had a very good response to our request for experienced medical personnel, but we need to be able to relieve the first team that travels to Kurdistan. We need registered experienced doctors and paramedics, together with local (probably Cornwall) support staff, for the supervision of administration and the coordination of despatch of personnel and medical supplies. Of course, we also need money. We have been promised support from one of the aid agencies. We don't want to divert resources away from the Kurdish Cultural Centre, but we feel that this project could be an important part of the relief effort; hence the appearance of this appeal in this conference. If you want to make a donation send whatever you can to our "Cornwall Kurdish Medical Aid" account at NatWest Bank, Fore Street, Bodmin, Cornwall. Our account number is 68170440, sort code 60-03-54. If you want to volunteer, or find out more information, post a response. If you want to reply privately to this, please direct your reply to my Greennet mailbox gn:inoc. Thank you. William Sigmund From kurds at gn.apc.org Mon Apr 15 11:52:11 1991 From: kurds at gn.apc.org (kurds at gn.apc.org) Date: 15 Apr 1991 10:52:11 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Cornwall Kurdish Medical Aid References: Message-ID: Of course everyone at the Kurdish Cultural Centre wholeheartedly supports your excellent initiative. Please contact us via mbx in order that we may mail out details to our membership. We will post another update to the Kurdish Disaster Fund appeal shortly, meanwhile our advertisement is appearing today in the Guardian - the space has been donated free. Thanks for their generosity. From tgray at igc.apc.org Mon Apr 15 00:53:57 1991 From: tgray at igc.apc.org (Tom Gray) Date: Sun, 14 Apr 1991 16:53:57 -0700 (PDT) Subject: Democracy for the Kurds Message-ID: [reprinted without permission] [from the New York _Times_, April 14, 1991, p. E19] VICTORY, ELATION; REFUGEES, DESPAIR By Danielle Mitterrand PARIS -- While in Washington on Feb. 28 -- only a month and a half ago -- we heard the good news: the Persian Gulf War was over. And we started dreaming about the future. I say "we" because I was gathered with my Kurdish friends and defending their cause at a meeting on Capitol Hill jointly sponsored by the Senate Foreign Relations Committee and the Congressional Human Rights Foundation. It was the third time that I spoke in the U.S. on the tragedy of the Kurdish people -- once in New York City at an event sponsored by the Elie Wiesel Foundation and twice on Capitol Hill. On Feb. 28, at the end of the war waged for the rule of law in the Persian Gulf, we were full of hope. Today, I cannot hide my disappointment. In so short a time, we have descended from elation, from the hope of seeing the victory of the rule of law, to deep feelings of bitterness. We are brought to despair by witnessing, powerless, the exodus of a whole population -- women, children, men, old people -- fleeing again from massacres and the destruction of their towns and villages. When we learned about America's vastly expanded relief effort to rescue them, announced yesterday, we felt somewhat heartened. The massive program being mounted by the U.S. military to feed hundreds of thousands of people a day and to provide temporary settlements in northern Iraq is good news. Yet, while that's fine for the time being, we can only ask ourselves what will happen to the Kurds as time passes. Will they be permitted to return to their homes and to live there safely, and how soon? Imagine the situation today: perhaps more than 500,000 Iraqi Kurds clinging to harsh mountain slopes on the border of Turkey and Iraq, far from their villages and land -- and more than a million in the vicinity of the Iran-Iraq border. I well remember what I saw two and one-half years ago, after the Halabja massacre in Iraq, when I visited the Iraqi Kurds' refugee camps in Turkey near Mardin, Dyarbarkir and Mus. I saw the tragic circumstances in which the Kurds found themselves -- parked behind barbed wire, under armed military guard and in a country where it was forbidden to speak Kurdish and to claim Kurdish identity and culture. My ever-growing interest in the Kurdish people -- some call it an obsession -- was kindled the day in 1983 I received a letter from a young Kurdish woman whose husband, the mayor of their town in Turkey, was on trial for having allowed Kurdish to be spoken in city hall. With the Paris-based International Federation for Human Rights, we were able to send a lawyer and an observer to the trial; we hoped their presence would awaken people's consciences. The mayor was given a 35-year prison sentence -- a terrible decision. And yet this was quite an achievement. He was not condemned to death, as he might have been. But he is still in jail. Today, thanks to a U.N. Security Council resolution, the Iraqis' right to receive humanitarian aid has at last been internationally recognized -- and is now being implemented on a large scale. One can therefore say that, in human rights matters, interference in what is known as the internal affairs of a state should now not only be a right but also a duty -- especially when it is a matter of not leaving the weakest to face the strongest without doing anything. Today, the priority need to bring the Iraqi Kurds emergency humanitarian aid is being more fully met. But, beyond that, as free men and women we have an obligation to do our utmost to enable them to return to their land, their villages, their homes, their cattle. They must be able to return to a life of honorable citizens in their own country, which they want to be democratic and prosperous. When I speak of democracy, I have in mind rights that are inseparable -- that is (in addition to a state's lawful rights) human rights, economic rights and cultural rights. Such an indivisibility of law for everyone would help this fragmented world move toward the broad goals that the war in the Persian Gulf was fought to realize. ----------- Danielle Mitterrand is president of France Liberte's, an international human rights organization. From guest3 at gn.apc.org Thu Apr 18 16:28:12 1991 From: guest3 at gn.apc.org (guest3 at gn.apc.org) Date: 18 Apr 1991 15:28:12 +0000 (GMT) Subject: KURDISH DONATIONS & SAMPLE APPEAL Message-ID: TITLE: KURDISH DONATIONS & SAMPLE APPEAL LETTER (PLEASE FORWARD!!) (This message has now appeared widely on a variety of networks and bulletin boards, including JANET, BIX, and others. Please feel free to forward it as appropriate. The arrival of troops to help the refugees happened after this message appeared, although indeed the message anticipates their imminent arrival anyway. More help is still needed, and politicians can still be lobbied to help provide unfaltering support for the "Safe Haven" concept). WARNING: IF YOU THINK THIS VIOLATES THE CONVENTIONS OF NORMAL EMAIL USAGE, THEN CONSIDER THIS: SOME PEOPLE ARGUE ANALOGOUSLY THAT HELPING THE KURDS (E.G. BY SETTING UP SAFE HAVENS IN IRAQ) MAY VIOLATE THE CONVENTIONS OF NORMAL INTERNATIONAL LAW. WE ARGUE BELOW THAT 'NORMAL CONVENTIONS' DO NOT APPLY IN EXTRAORDINARY CIRCUMSTANCES SUCH AS THIS, AND APPEAL TO A HIGHER MORAL PRINCIPLE. WHO IS THE JUDGE? IN THIS CASE, IT IS YOU. FAILING THAT, WE APPEAL TO A GUT- LEVEL REACTION: TRY EXPLAINING THE NUANCES OF THIS DEBATE TO YOUR KURDISH PROFESSIONAL COLLEAGUE WHO HAS JUST BURIED HIS KIDS IN AN UNMARKED GRAVE ON THE TURKISH BORDER. EVERY MINUTE COUNTS, EVERY PENNY HELPS. FORWARDING THIS MESSAGE WIDELY IS A RELATIVELY PAINLESS STEP, AND IT MAY DO SOME GOOD. WE HAVE TRIED TO WORD THE MESSAGE IN A WAY WHICH APPEALS TO HUMANITARIAN GOOD SENSE (AS OPPOSED TO, SAY, GUERILLA ORGANIZATIONS), AND TRUST THAT YOU WILL FIND IT SUITABLE FOR FORWARDING TO ALL COLLEAGUES AND BBOARD SYSTEMS YOU CAN REACH. THIS VERSION IS GEARED TOWARDS THE U.K. IF YOU ARE OUTSIDE THE U.K., YOU MAY BE THE FIRST RECIPIENT. IF SO, PLEASE CONSIDER USING THIS ENTIRE MESSAGE AS A MODEL FOR ANALOGOUS ACTIVITY IN YOUR OWN COUNTRY. YOU MAY BE ABLE TO PLAY AN IMPORTANT ROLE. EMERGENCY AID IS WELL UNDER WAY, AND SUPPORT TROOPS FROM THE U.S. (AND POSSIBLY U.K.) ARE STARTING TO ASSIST THE RELIEF OPERATION ALREADY. EVEN SO, MORE ASSISTANCE IS NEEDED, AND MORE LETTERS OF APPEAL CAN ONLY HELP. ===== URGENT APPEAL BROADCAST BY THE KURDISH CULTURAL CENTRE, LONDON ===== As I speak to you, up to two million women, children and old people are trapped without food and shelter in the freezing mountains of Kurdistan. Some have not eaten for days. At night the temperature drops to minus ten degrees. Many kids are barefoot in the snow. With each hour that passes, they're growing weaker. Despite the great efforts now being made to drop food and warm clothing, it's still not nearly enough. Right now, these kids need a miracle. Will you be that miracle? Pleas make a credit card donation by ringing the Kurdish Cultural Centre now on 071-820 9999. Please, be their miracle. == Joss Ackland == [The Kurdish Cultural Centre is a registered charity, No. 800883.] You can also donate to the Kurdish Disaster Fund by e-mail, fax or regular post/mail. Details below, followed by a sample letter of appeal directed at the U.S. and U.K. governments, which we urge you to send. THREE WAYS TO DONATE TO THE KURDISH DISASTER FUND APPEAL Please feel free to verify any of the details that follow by writing or phoning us. Thank you for your generosity. Kurdish Cultural Centre 14 Stannary Street, London SW11 4AA, UK Tel: 071-735 0918 Fax: 071-582 8894 E-MAIL YOUR DONATION TO US Simplicity itself. Please supply the following information: 1) The amount you wish to donate. 2) Type of credit card you wish to use (Access/Visa etc) 3) Expiry Date 4) Your card number 5) Your name and address as held by the credit card company. If you are on GreenNet, EcoNet, PeaceNet, Web, Pegasus or any other nets they are linked to please e-mail the information to us at gn:kurds. (GreenNet users simply send to KURDS.) If you are on JANET (itself reachable from INTERNET, BITNET, EARN, UUCP) you can direct your e-mail to either of the following addresses: kurds at gn.uucp UUCP-RELAY"kurds at gn" GreenNet is itself accessible by PSS/NUA/DTE number: 234212301371 The GreenNet operators may be reached for advice/enquiries on: 071-923 2624 FAX YOUR DONATION TO US Just as easy as e-mailing to us. On a sheet of paper, please enter the followin inforamtion: 1) The amount you wish to donate. 2) Type of credit card you wish to use (Access/Visa etc) 3) Expiry Date 4) Your card number 5) Your name and address as held by the credit card company. Now fax your sheet to us on 071-582 8894. [If dialling from outside the UK you need to dial your international exchange number followed by 44 for the UK, followed by our number, omitting the initial 0.] POST/MAIL YOUR DONATION TO US 'Post' if you're English, 'mail' if you're American. Other nationalities, take your pick. Just as easy as e-mailing or faxing us. Please put the following information on a sheet of paper: 1) The amount you wish to donate. 2) Type of credit card you wish to use (Access/Visa etc) 3) Expiry Date 4) Your card number 5) Your name and address as held by the credit card company. Simply post the completed sheet to us at: Kurdish Cultural Centre 14 Stannary Street, London SW11 4AA, UK KURDISH CONTACTS OUTSIDE THE U.K. FRANCE Kendal Nazan Institute Kurde de Paris 106, rue La Fayette 75010 Paris Tel: +33 1 48 246464 Fax: +33 1 47 709904 USA Doctor Najmeddin Omer Kurdish National Congress (KNC) PO Box 15498 Ann Arbor, MI 48106 USA PLEASE ADD YOUR OWN NAME AND ADDRESS TO A COPY OF THE LETTER WHICH FOLLOWS (OR YOUR OWN PERSONALIZED VARIATION OF IT) AND JOIN US IN INUNDATING PRESIDENT BUSH, PRIME MINISTER MAJOR AND LOCAL GOVERNMENT REPRESENTATIVES WITH APPEALS TO HELP THE KURDS. ---------------------8-<-------CUT HERE-------->-8---------------------------- The President of The United States of America The White House Pennsylvania Avenue Washington DC, USA The Right Honourable John Major 10 Downing Street London, UK Dear Sirs, I do not remember having to write a letter fuelled by as much anger, frustration and sadness as this one. The United Nations, backed by many countries, under the leadership of the United States of America, took steps to crush the unlawful ambitions of a ruthless dictator. At last we could smell the winds of change and we were promised 'a new world order'. But for the Kurds, it seems that this 'new world order' is not only as bad as but even worse than the old world order. Kurdish mothers and children are dying of cold and starvation, huddled together fearing constant attack by Iraqi forces. Nightly, the evening news shows us people who last month were farmers, doctors, lawyers, politicians like yourselves-- who are now forced to compete for a damp blanket or a muddy loaf. In the face of such a human tragedy, I simply cannot understand, nor condone, the morality of a 'non-interventionist' policy. In particular, why is an 'international border' more precious than an entire people? I CAN understand the legal principle, but when we go to bed each night, it is not a law book but our consciences that we must face. The fact that there IS an Iraq-Kuwait border but there IS NOT an Iraq-Kurdistan border reflects the subtleties of history (and indeed of US and UK policy) going back more than 70 years. Iraq's violation of the Iraq-Kuwait border entitled the allies to bomb Baghdad relentlessly in pursuit of military goals, but the apparent violation of the Kurdish people, because it doesn't involve a recognized international border, condemns the Kurds to a horrendous fate. Surely there is a straightforward solution which a strong leader could pursue. One is reminded of the ironies of the American Civil Rights movement in the 1960's, when racially-motivated murderers were brought to justice NOT because they had killed (the Federal Government could not meddle with local State jurisdiction in homicide cases) but rather because they violated their victim's civil rights (enabling the Federal Government to intervene and invoke a higher moral authority)! I appeal to your common sense to invoke just such a higher moral authority and help save these people. The US government has forbidden the Iraqi government to conduct military operations in the areas where the Kurdish refugees are gathered, yet Iraq openly and contemptuously flouts that order. UN Security Council Resoultion 688 gives you the moral authority you need to implement an acceptable variant of the "John Major safe haven plan" and thereby put an end to the Kurdish suffering. I understand that you don't want your young soldiers tied down in an endless civil war. But you can't wash your hands of international events in which you have played such a leading role. I join my voice to the hundreds of thousands, nay, millions, of others who wish the US and UK to act strongly and decisively to alleviate the suffering of the Kurdish people by helping guarantee a safe haven for them in what after all is, and has been for thousands of years, their own native homeland. Yours sincerely, From aldopacific at gn.apc.org Thu Apr 18 23:55:51 1991 From: aldopacific at gn.apc.org (aldopacific at gn.apc.org) Date: 18 Apr 1991 22:55:51 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Catholic Endorsement of Kurds Message-ID: Further church leader endorsements for the Kurdish Cultural Centre appeal (4/10/91) have come in from: Archbishop Thomas Winning, RC A/bishop of Glasgow. Maryanne Ure, General Secretary, Catholic Justice and Peace Commission for Scotland. From kurds at gn.apc.org Fri Apr 19 00:12:32 1991 From: kurds at gn.apc.org (kurds at gn.apc.org) Date: 18 Apr 1991 23:12:32 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Thank you, appeal donors Message-ID: Thank you, everyone who has responded to the Kurdish Disaster Fund appeal via GreenNet and the other networks. Your contributions are received with real gratitude. New offers of help come in every day. The situation is altering in that our message henceforth must be that despite the troops going in, the airlifts and the involvement of the big international charities, the situation is still desperate and for many people is getting worse not better. Please continue to do all you can to spread the message of the appeal. There are many ways to do so - from 'fax chains' to e-mail - and there are as many different ways to make a donation. (Please see previous topics.) We will shortly be publishing a major update on the progress of the whole appeal - from the media coverage, press and radio advertisements, special collections and computer networks. From hfrederick at igc.apc.org Fri Apr 19 03:08:44 1991 From: hfrederick at igc.apc.org (Howard Frederick) Date: Thu, 18 Apr 1991 19:08:44 -0700 (PDT) Subject: TURKEY: ''DO NOT FORGET US'' Message-ID: Subject: TURKEY: ''DO NOT FORGET US'' /* Written 11:59 am Apr 18, 1991 by newsdesk in cdp:ips.englibrary */ /* ---------- "TURKEY: ''DO NOT FORGET US''" ---------- */ Copyright Inter Press Service 1991, all rights reserved. Permission to re- print within 7 days of original date only with permission from 'newsdesk'. Area: Middle East Title: TURKEY: ''DO NOT FORGET US'' an inter press service feature by daniel gatti cukurca, turkey-iraq border apr 15 (ips) -- amid their intense suffering, the kurds massed along this frontier, part of a pitiful wave of human suffering, are determined not to lose self-respect. time and again, the refugees are at pains to point out to visiting journalists that they do not want to be treated -- or described -- as wretched souls deserving pity. they are simply claiming their rights, and hope that after the focus of media attention moves elsewhere, the world community will still remember their plight. approaching a group of foreign correspondents, ibrahim raised his arms to heaven and said almost with a sob, ''do not forget us, now we need aid, but afterwards we want to be free''. about 40 years old, ibrahim appears older because he is dirty. soaked to the skin from the rain and sleet, sick and trembling with cold from the sleepless night, he still holds his head high. tall, with his beard stuck to his face by the mud, ibrahim is one more of the 150,000 kurds who have managed to reach this camp, which extends for almost three kilometres along the turkish-iraqi frontier in the mountais which dominate cukurca. although humanitarian aid has been flowing with more consistency in the last few days, children and adults are continuing to die of hunger, cold, and dysentry, living amidst the mud and excrement in this refugee camp. the displaced people are trying to protect themselves from the sleet, which never stops falling, with the little means they have. but aid workers say their position continues to be desperate because of the chronic scarcity of food. in other frontier camps scattered along the border for some 300 kilometres, a few kurds are reportedly trickling back to the cities, towns and villages from which they fled when iraqi government troops crushed the kurdish rebellion. ''we prefer dying under saddam's bullets to falling victims of hunger and turkish brutality,'' one refugee said. (more/ips) turkey: ''do not'' (2) however, the situation in this frontier zone indicates that for the moment the majority refuse to place any trust in saddam's promises. the 450,000 kurds who are knocking on the doors of turkey ''are not fleeing from misery, but from saddam's oppression, and are seeking their liberty'', ibrahim assured us. another refugee, haji, 25, who until a short time ago was working as a mechanic in the northern iraqi city of arbil, declared ''above everything else we want our freedom''. ''we are fed up with believing in anybody's promises, we want a future without oppression to be possible also for us. at present we are the largest outcast population in the world,'' he added. he said the 23 million kurds who are living in iraq, turkey and iran lack any rights and face continuous repression. in refugee camps like cukurca, resentment against turkish soldiers runs deep. there reports of turkish soldiers carrying out brutal action against refugees. some kurds say beatings, insults and even shootings are the order of the day. they say turkish soldiers rob refugees of food, tents and even blankets, which are then sold in the black marekt that already flourishes in the frontier zone. ''the turks want us at all cost to leave here. they are afraid we might settle down here and be a danger for turkey's territorial integrity,'' said abdul, who until february was a teacher of french in the iraqi city of altun-kupri. with some 12 million people, the kurds constitute around 20 percent of the turkish population. kurds are part of the populations in iraq, iran and even syria and the soviet union. ''we kurds have already said that we renounce separatism and only want to live in a free, democratic, secular and pluralist iraq, because it is the only country where under these conditions our rights can be respected,'' abdul emphasised. (more/ips) turkey: ''do not'' (3) ''but while saddam hussein continues in power this is not possible, and no one, but no one, can convince us of the contrary, because we have still too fresh in our minds the massacres of last month and those of eight years ago.'' western countries, especially the united states, are also the target of criticism from the kurds of cukurca. a 20-year-old youth on seeing us cried out ''and now george bush has betrayed us'' waving his arms, he said that during the gulf war ''bush called on the people to rise against saddam hussein, so we naturally believed he was going to support us when we kurds actually did rise up in arms, but we got no support''. the young man lamented that the kurds ''simply served as puppets and then were abandoned as soon as the united states achieved its war aims''. ''in 70 years of uprisings to gain our rights we have always been defeated, and we cannot count on the support of anyone,'' declared haji, leaning against a tractor bogged down in the mud. like ibrahim and abdul, haji clutches on to the memory of those 15 days of the ''kurdish spring'' in march, when the ''peshmergas'' (literally, those who face death) fighters believed for a moment that they had actually liberated iraqi kurdistan. then came the iraqi army counter-attack. while some kurds think about migration to a western country, others would prefer to return to iraq provided there were guarantees that there will be no more massacres. haji got off his haunches and rose to his feet saying, ''when all this is over, and you journalists leave the camps, perhaps you will not speak about us anymore, and once more we shall be forgotten''. (end/trd/dg/ego/ip-pr/tt) From aldopacific at gn.apc.org Fri Apr 19 13:34:44 1991 From: aldopacific at gn.apc.org (aldopacific at gn.apc.org) Date: 19 Apr 1991 12:34:44 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Beseechment for the Kurds Message-ID: --HDR1.0-- 117 TX; Beseechment for the Kurds We beseech Iran, Iraq, Syria, Turkey and the USSR to accede the right of self-determination for the Kurds. Such a supreme gesture towards world peace would offer new hope and courageous direction in this specific situation, which is only part of a much wider global problem facing humankind. We respectfully ask Moslem nations in particular to respond to the present plight of the Kurds in the light of their undertaking contained in the Charter of the Islamic Conference, Article II, Paragraph 6: "To strengthen the struggle of all Moslem peoples with a view to safeguarding their dignity, independence and national rights." We plead with the nations of the world to support and provide resources for the establishment of Kurdish autonomy. The United Kingdom and other western nations played a major role in drawing up the current political map of the Middle East. This has had considerable bearing on present suffering. It is therefore appropriate for this statement to originate mainly from British citizens. However, we hope it might be taken up and signed as a petition by peoples elsewhere in the world and sent to national United Nations representatives. Signatories in Alphabetical Order Rev Kathy Galloway, Convenor, Scottish Churches Action for World Development. Bishop Michael Hare Duke, Bishop of St. Andrews, Scottish Episcopal Church. Rev John Harvey, Leader, The Iona Community, Iona Abbey. The Rt Rev Richard Holloway, Bishop of Edinburgh, Scottish Episcopal Church. Dr Kabir R Khan, Head of the Department of Public International Law, University of Edinburgh. Dr Ulrich E Loening, Director of the Centre for Human Ecology, University of Edinburgh. Professor Aubrey Manning, Division of Biological Sciences, University of Edinburgh. Duncan MacLaren, Director, Scottish Catholic International Aid Fund. Archbishop Keith O'Brien, Roman Catholic Archbishop of St Andrews and Edinburgh. Jonathon Porritt, Special Advisor to Friends of the Earth. Dr Reza Sabri-Tabrizi, Department of Islamic and Middle East Studies, University of Edinburgh. Sir David Smith, Principal, University of Edinburgh. Maryanne Ure, National Secretary, Catholic Justice and Peace Commission for Scotland. Rev Robert Waters, General Secretary, Congregational Union of Scotland. Canon Kenyon E Wright, Director of the KAIROS Ecumenical Agency for Society and Environment. NEWS RELEASE Beseechment for the Kurds Fifteen senior academics and church leaders, mainly from Scotland, have beseeched countries where there are significant Kurdish populations to permit self-determination as "a supreme gesture towards world peace". The signatories, include the Archbishop of St Andrews and Edinburgh, the Principal of Edinburgh University, Jonathon Porritt erstwhile of Friends of the Earth and Moslem international lawyer, Kabir Khan. They call for international provision of resources to help establish Kurdish autonomy. The statement was inspired by discussion at Edinburgh University's Centre for Human Ecology and coordinated by Alastair McIntosh, its development director, who for five days over the past week walked besuited but barefoot in witness with fleeing Kurdish refugees. One of the signatories, Dr Reza Sabri-Tabrizi, arrived back from Azarbaijan just 36 hours ago and is willing to respond to media enquiries about the plight of the Kurds and what he saw in refugee areas. Dr Sabri-Tabrizi is an expert at Edinburgh University's Department of Islamic and Middle East Studies. Contact: Alastair McIntosh, 031 445 5010 or 031 650 3469 Dr Sabri-Tabrizi, 031 650 4180 or 031 229 4363 (home) (Statement Attached) 19th April 1991. RaC2 border=2 RaC3 pgwidth=78 RaC4 pgdepth=64 RaC7 page=1 RaC8 curline=116 RaC10 windline=109 RaC24 limitright=78 From aldopacific at gn.apc.org Fri Apr 19 19:40:58 1991 From: aldopacific at gn.apc.org (aldopacific at gn.apc.org) Date: 19 Apr 1991 18:40:58 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Did US Renege on ?Deals with Kurds Message-ID: A senior Middle East academic today asked me to put out on the network an enquiry for any information people have regarding whether or not, in the secret negotiations the US State Dept or the allies had with Kurdish groups, a promise was made to support their insurrection. Please conference or e-mail if confidential. Thanks, Alastair. From hfrederick at igc.apc.org Sat Apr 20 02:26:49 1991 From: hfrederick at igc.apc.org (Howard Frederick) Date: Fri, 19 Apr 1991 18:26:49 -0700 (PDT) Subject: KURDISTAN: BUSH ANNOUNCES 'GREATLY Message-ID: Subject: KURDISTAN: BUSH ANNOUNCES 'GREATLY /* Written 5:55 pm Apr 19, 1991 by newsdesk in cdp:ips.englibrary */ /* ---------- "KURDISTAN: BUSH ANNOUNCES 'GREATLY " ---------- */ Copyright Inter Press Service 1991, all rights reserved. Permission to re- print within 7 days of original date only with permission from 'newsdesk'. Area: North America Reference: Middle East; Population Title: KURDISTAN: BUSH ANNOUNCES 'GREATLY EXPANDED' RELIEF EFFORT washington apr 16 (ips) -- u.s. president george bush announced tuesday ''a greatly expanded'' relief effort by the united states and its european allies in northern iraq, in which the u.s. military would immediately set up ''several encampments'' for kurdish refugees. he said the u.s. deployment into northern iraq will be taken pursuant to u.n. security council resolution 688 approved 10 days ago to authorise humanitarian assistance for iraqi refugees and that it was being undertaken for ''humanitarian concerns'' only. bush did not specify how many u.s. troops will be engaged in the operation or how long they, french, british, and turkish forces will ensure security for the camps. he added that washington expects the iraqi government not to interfere ''in any way'' with the new operation and that washington's threats to take action against iraqi military operations threatening refugees north of the 36th parallel remain in effect. but he insisted the new operation represents ''an interim measure'' only and that washington's long-term objective is for all iraqi refugees to return home. ''i have said that the united states is not going to intervene militarily in iraq's internal affairs and risk being drawn into a vietnam-style quagmire. this remains the case,'' said bush. ''nor will we become an occupying power with u.s. troops patrolling the streets of baghdad.'' he also stressed that the administration of and security for the new encampments should be turned over to the united nations as soon as possible -- an action which he conceded may require a new resolution from the security council. u.n. peacekeeping troops are moving this week into positions in southern iraq previously occupied by u.s. troops. bush admitted that he had not foreseen the size of the refugee problem before the end of the gulf war feb 28, and he repeated his controversial calls for the iraqis ''to take matters into their own hands and kick (president) (more) kurdistan: bush announces 'greatly expanded' relief effort(2-end) the u.s. leader rejected the notion that ''the united states should bear guilt because of suggesting that the iraqi people'' overthrow hussein. he denied there was ever any implication from washington that it would support them militarily. while bush said he believed hussein should be tried for war crimes, he suggested that the united states would consider dropping charges ''to get him out'' of iraq. ''we want him out of there so badly...'' he said. bush said he decided to expand the relief effort after talking tuesday afternoon with british prime minister john major, french president francois mitterand, turkish president turgut ozal, german chancellor helmut kohl, and u.n. secretary-general javier perez de cuellar. he indicated that a primary purpose was to persuade refugees who are currently moving toward turkey and iran to come down from the mountains that form the border areas, back into lower and warmer areas inside iraq in order to facilitate relief efforts. ''we must encourage the kurds to move to areas in northern iraq where the geography faciliates, rather than frustrates, such a large-scale relief effort.'' bush's announcement came amid steadily rising criticism that his administration has not done enough for the kurds and reports that some 1,000 refugees may be dying each day from hunger, disease, and exposure. some two million kurds are believed to have left their homes to seek refuge in turkey and iran. relief services in both countries have reportedly been overwhelmed by the influx. (ends/ips/ip/jl/yjc)  From antennae at gn.apc.org Sun Apr 21 04:28:02 1991 From: antennae at gn.apc.org (antennae at gn.apc.org) Date: 21 Apr 1991 03:28:02 +0000 (GMT) Subject: EUNOMIA: A revolution in the mind Message-ID: "The people of the world have been herded like cattle into states. By sword and rifle and whip and truncheon and boot and fist, they have been forced to choose the rule of those with power to rule them or to choose death. And, coralled here, they have seen other herdsmen come...to destroy their home, to divide their family, to silence their language, to suppress their religion, to stamp out their identity. ...They wait with the patience of those who know that their own society will outlast any usurping state. They wait with the tears of those who must, in the meantime, live in fear for the well-being of their children and of their children's children, knowing that they can rely on receiving nothing from society but the prolongation of suffering." (Philip Allott, 'Eunomia') As we think of the Kurds, huddled freezing and hungry, in the Zagros mountains, how poignant these words seem. They come from a remarkable book - its Greek name, 'EUNOMIA', means 'good self-ordering' - which attempts nothing less than to lay down the moral and philosophical basis of a new vision of society and law. I'd like to share with you some of its ideas. Philip Allott, who wrote the book, is no armchair philosopher. As a legal adviser to the British Government, he was involved in some of the most crucial decision-making of the post-war world. He worked in the early 1960s with the United Nations, including the establishment of UNCTAD and various UN committees. From 1965 to 1968 he was Legal Adviser to the British Military Government in Berlin. He advised the Arabian Department of the Foreign Office during the period of British withdrawal from the Gulf (1969-1971). In 1972-3, when the UK joined the European Community, he was the first British Legal Counsellor in the Office of the British Permanent Representative. Between 1976 and 1980 he was a member of the UK delegation to the Third United Nations Conference on the Law of the Sea. Philip writes: 'The disorder of the old world order and the possibility of a new world order were ideas which formed themselves throughout my time in the Foreign Office... The conclusion I came to was that the old international order was neither a natural phenomenon, nor a fortuitous aggregation of countless past events... But the international system itself is nothing more than a structure of ideas; and it has been made nowhere else than in the human mind... The masters of the world of tomorrow are the slaves of yesterday's ideas.' * * * * I had the pleasure, together with another Antennae colleague, of meeting Philip Allott some weeks ago when we consulted him about a campaign that we were developing for Amnesty International and The Body Shop. The campaign (which runs next month in Body Shops in 47 nations) was designed to draw attention to the scale of human rights abuse around the world and to enable people to make themselves personally responsible for stopping it. Prison without trial, torture, disappearances, unlawful executions - of all these things, we wanted the individual to say 'I will no longer allow this to happen'. Joining Amnesty (and thus helping lobby governments, both those committing the abuses and home governments) was one simple step an individual could take. But the events of the time seemed to offer a larger, additional, possibility. The Gulf War was underway. It was possible that chemical weapons would be used against Allied troops. We felt that when western publics realised how deeply their own countries were implicated in Saddam Hussein's military build-up, including his acquisition of chemicals - and when they realised how their governments had in 1988 turned a blind eye to his mass chemical murder of Kurdish civilians - there would be an outcry of revulsion against the cynicism of politicians. (see earlier items in this conference) We liked the idea of a massive petition - 3 to 5 million people reminding the government that it acts in their name and insisting that it behave morally abroad in future. Such a petition could grow naturally out of the Amnesty/Body Shop campaign, but it would need a sharper legal focus than a broad appeal for morality, so we turned to friends for advice. It was James Cameron of CIEL, the Centre for International Environmental Law, at King's College, London, who suggested that we read 'EUNOMIA' and go to meet Philip Allott. We did. We asked him to help us define a tangible objective for the petition - a goal that would be a real achievement, yet within possibility. After some thought he surprised us by saying that the first moral act of a new world order would be --- a Kurdistan for the Kurds * * * * Antennae Communication is still interested in launching a large scale campaign to focus public awareness on the need for morality in international dealings. The Kurdish tragedy has made this only too clear. International law protects the rights of murderous regimes, but not of the innocents being slaughtered. We believe there is an opportunity for large scale public action to change this. We think also that such action can be extended into the environmental sphere. Human rights and the environment are inseparable. The great environmentalist Felipe Benavides said that human rights had to be grounded in a respect for nature. One can put it the other way round - unless we begin to respect human rights, we have little hope of making any real environmental progress. How are we to persuade the Brazilian government to stop killing trees in the rainforest when it apparently cannot stop the killing of its own street children? (cf Amnesty reports and campaigns) Would the Gulf War and its resultant massive environmental damage ever have happened if western nations had reacted powerfully to Saddam Hussein's mass murder of Kurds back in 1988? A campaign for moral government is urgently needed. If anyone reading this would like to offer help, advice, or funding, please contact us by e-mail. This is what 'Eunomia' says: "Governments, and the human beings who compose them, are able to will and act internationally in ways that they would be morally restrained from willing and acting internally, murdering human beings by the million in wars, tolerating oppression and starvation and disease and poverty, human cruelty and suffering, human misery and human indignity, of kinds, and on a scale, that they could not tolerate within their internal societies." 13.105.[16] "It is more than an interesting thought-experiment to consider how the people of the world would conceive of the human world if they could express their anguish and their aspirations. We may speak hypothetically for the people of the world who cannot speak for themselves... 13.111 "The people of the world feel a loving sympathy with their fellow human beings in their individuality, in their family life, in all the striving of their personal lives. And they feel a loving sympathy with their fellow human beings in all their suffering, the suffering at the hands of social power and of natural forces. And they feel their love distorted by an international system which demands from them perverted ideas and values, other forms of loyalty. ...(1c) "The peoples of the world are represented externally by their state-systems and by the governments which speak for them. But the idea and the ideal of democracy has evolved and the people have matured with it. They demand not merely to be represented but to participate in the willing and acting which is the willing and acting of their lives, their survival and prospering, their well being. ...(1d) "The people of the world feel that the system, for all its remarkable achievements, is not making full use of its potentiality to generate human well-being, and yet is imposing substantial burdens and costs on the physical world of the planet and on the moral world of humanity..." ...(2c) "The task of humanity now is to take possession of the waste-land of international society in the name of the people and in the name of justice." 14.1 "In international law the society of the whole human race may will and act not only the survival but also the prospering of the whole human race..." 14.5 "Humanity may find a means to choose its own future well-being. Nothing more or less is required than a self-willed change in human consciousness. A revolution, not in the streets but in the mind." 14.9 "The idea of human rights, present in the pure theory of society, provides a model or formula or pattern for all law-making." 15.64 "In all societies governments have been reassured in their arrogance by the idea that, if they are not proved actually to be violating the substance of particularized human rights, if they can bring their willing and acting within the wording of this or that formula with its lawyerly qualifications and exceptions, then they are doing well enough." 15.67 "The idea of human rights should intimidate governments or it is worth nothing. If the idea of human rights reassures governments it is worse than nothing." 15.67 "1) The idea of human rights having been thought, it cannot be unthought. 2) There are tenacious individuals and non-statal organisations whose activity on behalf of the idea of human rights is not part of international relations but is part of a new process of international reality-forming." 15.68 "More and more, the people of the world are singing the same song. And it is a song that they have not learned at their mother's knee or in the class-room. Imagination and reason, the common inheritance of all human beings, are generating a common experience of all human beings, an international consciousness." 15.79 "It is a consciousness which is acquiring distinctive features. It perceives the world as a unified environment, the shared arena of all human willing and acting, and an arena shared with all other living things. It perceives the humanity of human beings everywhere, responding with spontaneous human feeling to to the experience of other human beings which it can recognize and understand, recognizing also wants and needs - physical, psychological, spiritual - shared by all human beings everywhere. It is beginning to conceive of standards, purposes, ideals which transcend the ideas of any particular society, but which are an amplification and a completion of the ideas which are the foundation of familiar, everyday values." 15.80 "It is possible already to discern a relative decline in the power of governmental systems, at least in relation to other forms of statally organising society, especially industrial and commercial and financial corporations. It is possible, too, that politics in the form which has become familiar in recent centuries is in relative decline... Politics is apparently being assimilated to other forms of mass communication, with the mass of the people forming a political will to approve or disapprove potential power-holders and their programmes... 15.81 A revolution, not in the streets, but in the mind. From rjtechne at gn.apc.org Sun Apr 21 17:44:29 1991 From: rjtechne at gn.apc.org (rjtechne at gn.apc.org) Date: 21 Apr 1991 16:44:29 +0000 (GMT) Subject: EUNOMIA: A revolution in the mind References: Message-ID: please include me in any mailing list or conference which arises out of this excepllemnt sorry excellent initiative. roy johnston From harryvm at peg.pegasus.oz.au Mon Apr 22 12:19:11 1991 From: harryvm at peg.pegasus.oz.au (harryvm at peg.pegasus.oz.au) Date: 22 Apr 1991 21:19:11 +1000 Subject: WE MUST ACT ON KURDS - HERBFIETH Message-ID: The Kurds : Towards a Political Solution The Kurds of Iraq need more than humanitarian help, desperately urgent as that is. They need a breakthrough on political formulas. They need what most of their leaders have sought in recent years, genuine autonomy within Iraq, guaranteed by UN presences and enshrined in international law. The massive exodus of Kurds from Iraq since late March has highlighted a problem to which the UN High Commission for Refugees has persistently called attention. Refugee authorities have stressed for years that it is unrealistic for most of the world's 18 million or so refugees to hope for permanent resettlement either in the countries to which they have fled or in faraway places like Australia, Canada, the US or Western Europe. Their best hope, these authorities contend, lies in voluntary repatriation to the countries they left, which requires the unmaking of the processes of ethnic, political and other repression which caused them to flee. Refugee specialists have taken a similar view. The UN, they argue, must stop treating refugee problems by bandaid methods which are obviously inadequate to the scale of the problem. It must begin to tackle refugee problems with a concern for "root causes" and seek "durable solutions". Frustrated claims to self-determination What is needed is a breakthrough in the capacity of the UN system to deal with frustrated claims to self-determination. It is thwarted claims of this kind which lead people to join what they see as patriotic movements of resistance to oppression, to cross borders en masse when their resistance is suppressed, and then to languish in refugee camps for years and decades while the rest of the world forgets them. Why then have the world's major powers been reluctant to listen, either to the Kurdish leaders or to the UN High Commissioner for Refugees? Basically, it seems, for reasons of oldthink, because few of them see any way of conceding self-determination to the Kurds of Iraq without breaking up Iraq. President Bush and the other main leaders of the concert of powers are understandably frightened of Iraq's disintegration. They are committed to the present system of borders world- wide because they are worried that a change in one multi- ethnic state would set off falling dominoes in many others, including some already very unstable ones like the USSR and Yugoslavia. No need to break up Iraq But the leaders of the Iraqi Kurds, or the great majority of them, have not been asking for the breakup of Iraq. All the major Kurdish parties are committed to a federal Iraq, as are the other major opposition groups, the Shiite parties, the Sunni Arab ones and the Communists. All of these are members of the Democratic Opposition Front of Iraq which wants the Saddam Hussein regime replaced by a federal state. A second generation of claims to self-determination The UN system was rather successful in mediating claims to self-determination with regard to the decolonization of Asian, African and Pacific colonies in the decades after 1945. But it has been far less adequate to the task of processing the more recent claims to self-determination, especially those which have nothing to do with the colonies of Western European states. It was war rather than UN conflict resolution which settled the claims of the would-be secessionist Biafrans against Nigeria in 1967-70. And war was a major part of the process by which the Bengali nationalists of the province of East Pakistan created the state of Bangladesh in 1971. The second generation of claims to self-determination, of which Biafra and Bangladesh were early representatives, has grown powerfully in the last 5-10 years, and now constitutes a major world order problem. Witness the increasingly clamorous demands of the Lithuanians, Latvians and Estonians, of the Georgians and other Soviet peoples, of the Croats and Slovenes in Yugoslavia, the Quebecois in Canada, the Eritreans, Tibetans and Kashmiris And, most immediately, the Kurds. UN machinery and principles Happily the UN system is now somewhat better prepared to deal with these challenges, at least less unprepared than is often thought. It has developed a lot of relevant capacities since the days of Biafra and Bangladesh, particularly as a result of its Human Rights Commission and various sub- committees of that body. And the three years before the Gulf War saw a major expansion in its conflict resolving and peace-keeping activities. One UN body that which has been coming to grips with the new generation of self-determination claims is the Working Group on Indigenous Populations. Another is the body drafting the Convention on Genocide. Moreover the General Assembly has established principles, first developed in the period of decolonization, which are highly relevant to the present generation of self- determination claims. One particularly useful formulation is a 1960 resolution of the General Assembly which sets out three ways by which non-self-governing territories can become self-governing : independence, integration with an existing state and the apparently flexible but as yet largely unexplored range of options termed "free association". What is needed now The Kurds of Iraq are asking for a redefinition of their relationship with Iraq. Theoretically granted autonomy in 1970, they are demanding that Iraq become a federal state to give them the genuine autonomy they see as necessary for their security and self-management. They are asking that the UN should facilitate negotiations towards this end, and that it should create machinery to give their outcome recognition in international law. Far-sighted people in states and non-government organizations everywhere should therefore be pressing the UN to a major initiative of political reconstruction. Such an initiative would not only help the Kurds and other repressed groups in Iraq like the Shiites. It would also help the other "peoples of the second generation", peoples which have been struggling against what they see as oppression by outsiders. It would also help the governments of a number of multi-ethnic states, offering them a way to get off the treadmill of repression, resistance and more repression, enabling them to stop wasting resources in fruitless efforts to maintain an untenable status quo. The UN clearly needs to fashion new procedures by which self-determination claims of the second generation variety can be evaluated. And it would not be surprising if those procedures generated some entirely new outcomes, not only the old ones of independent statehood, membership of a federal or confederal unit, "special regions" and "special autonomous territories", but also new forms of "free association" for which there are currently no precedents. Those could well involve new types of international guarantees and new types of UN presence. Is it too much to hope that the Kurds' tragedy will force the UN to act innovatively in ways which help not only the Kurds but also the other repressed peoples of the second generation? It may not be, for what the Kurds are up against is not much more than a set of mental blocks. Most government leaders are cautious when there is talk of expanding the role of the UN and extending the scope of international law. Many of them, especially those of multi-ethnic states, are worried about what they see as threats to the domestic jurisdiction of states. But most of these leaders are also aware that the interdependence of states is here to stay and to grow, that global problems need global answers, and specifically that something must be done to prevent the refugee problem from getting further out of control. Most immediately, they are aware that millions all over the world are actively sympathetic to the Kurds, and puzzled that the coalition of powers which came to the aid of Kuwait could avert its eyes from the terrorization of the Kurds and Shiites of Iraq by the same Saddam regime. * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * This article is by Herb Feith and Alan Smith of the Politics Department of Monash University in Melbourne, Australia. Herb Feith is an Associate in this Department. He was a Reader in it till 1990. Alan Smith is completing a doctoral dissertation on self-determination. A 740-word abridgement of this article (with an Australian focus) was published in the Sunday Age (Melbourne) of 14 April under the title of "UN must answer the many calls for a homeland". Correspondence to: Herb Feith 40 Kyarra Rd. Glen Iris, Victoria, Australia, 3146 phone and fax 613-885-5422 (ring first to send fax) Melbourne 14 April 1991 From hfrederick at igc.apc.org Mon Apr 22 18:03:55 1991 From: hfrederick at igc.apc.org (Howard Frederick) Date: Mon, 22 Apr 1991 10:03:55 -0700 (PDT) Subject: Kurds and Jews: A Common Cause Message-ID: Subject: Kurds and Jews: A Common Cause >From daemon Sat Apr 20 07:53 PDT 1991 Received: from psuvm.psu.edu by cdp.igc.org (Ver 040391) id AA18299; Sat, 20 Apr 91 07:29:47 -0700 Received: from PSUVM.PSU.EDU by PSUVM.PSU.EDU (IBM VM SMTP R1.2.2MX) with BSMTP id 2807; Sat, 20 Apr 91 10:29:34 EDT Received: from PSUVM.BITNET by PSUVM.PSU.EDU (Mailer R2.07) with BSMTP id 1984; Sat, 20 Apr 91 10:29:32 EDT Date: Sat, 20 Apr 91 10:27:42 EDT Reply-To: Tom Benson 814-865-4201 Sender: Communication Research and Theory Network From: Tom Benson 814-865-4201 Subject: CRTNET 406 To: Multiple recipients of list CRTNET Status: RO +--------------------------------------------------------------------+ | | | CRTNET | | | | April 20, 1991 | | | +--------------------------------------------------------------------+ | Number 406 | +--------------------------------------------------------------------+ | | | COMMUNICATION RESEARCH AND THEORY NETWORK | | | +--------------------------------------------------------------------+ | Edited by Tom Benson, Penn State University | +--------------------------------------------------------------------+ = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = CONTENTS -- -- The Kurds, the Jews (Bob Werman) = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = Date: Thu, 18 Apr 91 8:59 +0300 [from] Bob Werman Subject: The Kurds, the Jews The Kurds, the Jews: Two People with a Common Cause ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ The Kurds are once again in the headlines; the only headline that this poor, besotted people seem to earn is one of slaughter and maltreatment, of broken promises, of hopes dashed, starvation and death. The Kurds are an ancient non-Arab Muslim people who may be of Iranian stock; they speak Kurdish, a language that bears some relation to Persian. They have been for most of their history migrating, pastoral mountaineers, known as brave and resourceful fighters, skilled in guerrilla warfare. The great Saladin was himself a Kurd. They live in Eastern Turkey, Northern Iraq and Iran and to a small extent in Northeastern Syria. They are mostly Sunni Moslems. The Turks captured part of Kurdistan in 1550, but the area was never completely conquered; the still ambivalent - at best - attitude of the Turks to the Kurds is evident in their current refusal to admit Kurdish refugees who have crowded the Iraqi Turkish border. Even more obviously antagonistic is the Turkish treatment of their own Kurds; the Turks have kept the Kurds living in abject poverty, isolated and with extremely limited economic opportunities. The migrations of the semi-nomadic Kurds in the past has produced great tension in Turkish-Persian relationships. The British promised the Kurds a homeland after World War I; this promise was forgotten when the British created the Kingdom of Iraq for their Arabian ally, King Faisal I, a cousin of Abdullah, the ally they set up in Jordan in contravention to the Balfour Declaration's promise of that territory as part of a homeland for the Jews. The Russians occupied Northern Iran after World War II and again promised the Kurds a state, but now in Iran as well; again the promise came to nought. And now President Bush has encouraged the Kurds to revolt and overthrow Saddam Hussein in the wake of Operation Desert Storm. And again the Kurds have been deserted. Believing that the Iraqi army had been destroyed as claimed by the US and that the US would support their revolution, the Kurds attacked and temporarily captured much of Northern Iraq. But this initial success was halted and reversed by a resurgent Iraqi army. Moreover, the expected aid from the Americans was not forthcoming. Secretary of State Baker spent all of 12 minutes at the Turkish-Iraqi border viewing the plight of the hundreds of thousands of Kurdish refugees [there are less than 5,000,000 of them altogether], who are camped on the border, in the cold mountainous atmosphere without shelter and food after having fled from Iraqi helicopters, supposedly destroyed by the US and its allies, from phosphorous bombs and Napalm. It was a detour for Secretary of State Baker, we have to admit that. So much for promises. The Iraqis have persecuted the Kurds with a vengeance; time after time the Kurds have attempted to revolt. In the 60's under Barazani [not Jewish, but the name - meaning from the town Barazan - is also found among Kurdish Jews, including Asnat Barazani [1590- 1670], the only woman head of a yeshiva that I have ever heard of] they appeared to have some success; Israel was known to favor the Kurdish revolt and probably supplied arms to the rebels as well as tactical aid. With Saddam Hussein's accession to the rule of Iraq, the Kurdish revolt was suppressed with finality. The Iraqis overflew a Kurdish village and dropped canisters of poison gas; the result: 5,000 dead, no survivors other than those villagers away at the time of the bombing. Jews have lived in Kurdistan since antiquity; Benjamin of Tudela, a 12th century traveller, visited the region about 1170 C.E., reporting that more than 100 Jewish communities were found there. He reported that in the town of Amadiya there were 25,000 Jews, all speaking Aramaic. Some of these are probably descendents of first century converts to Judaism, a national [Adiabene] conversion that began at royal levels and is recorded in a number of sources. The Kurds or Kurdistan are mentioned [as Kardu or Kurduchim] in the Targums to Genesis [8:4] and Jeremiah [51:27], in Josephus [Antiquities 1:93] and in the Talmud [Yevamot 16a]. In modern times the Jews of Kurdistan were singular in that they spoke ancient Aramaic, although polluted by insertions of foreign words from Kurdish, Persian, Arabic, Turkish and Hebrew. Kurdish Jews lived a difficult and poor life, working as farmers and as artisans. Their relations with the Kurdish Muslims were actually quite good, particularly after 1948. The positive attitude of Kurdish Jews in Israel [they all left in 1950-51, about 20,000 of them] to their ex-neighbors has played an important role in Israeli support of Kurdistani national ambitions at the political as well as offering practical military aid. I remember a Kurdish Jewish wedding in the 60's where a major part of the entertainment was recital of a ballad whose chorus was chanted by all; the theme of the ballad, in Arabic, was the heroism and successes of the non-Jewish Kurdi rebel leader of the time, Barazani. Following this tradition, Israel is now involved in sending supplies to the Kurdish refugees, providing blankets, tents, canned goods and medical supplies to be parachuted to the starving, freezing refugees. We have currently sent two tons of such supplies for the Kurds. Israel has other reasons to be concerned about the treatment of the Kurds. Israel identifies with the plight of the Kurds. Israel is now being asked to make territorial, political and military concessions to Israel's enemies, with the understanding that international guarantees, particularly American, will provide the protection needed and lost by these guarantees. If promises are not kept, if the word of the US and its Persian Gulf allies cannot be relied upon, how can Israeli put its trust in such guarantees? And it very much sounds as if promises were made to the Kurds, promises which were not kept. President Bush ended the Persian Gulf War too soon. He did not want the world to see him as vindictive, hunting Saddam Hussein down; he believed that the Iraqi people would depose a weakened Saddam Hussein, whose promises of victory were shown to be a mere illusion. He did not want to exceed his UN mandate, he was sensitive to the fear the Arabs had of Western presence and purposes in the Arab sub-continent. He did not want any more loss of lives of American soldiers; he was riding on a crest of popularity at home that would collapse in the face of heavy casualties. President Bush stopped when he had accomplished withdrawal of Iraq from Kuwait, when the army of Iraq no longer seemed a threat, when American self-image had risen to new heights. But his refusal to help the Kurds actively [after all, this is an internal problem of Iraq - a consideration that can be used most cynically] has opened the doors to new and renewed criticism of President Bush's motives in the Persian Gulf. Protecting sources of oil was always a consideration, and a correct one, in the US action against Iraq; now it incorrectly appears in the eyes of critics that it was the only one or the major consideration in US intervention. Even more damaging may be the loss of the newly regained image of the US as the major keeper of international morality, as a defender of the world, or at least as the leader in the world's self defence against aggression. The whole world once again asks with deep concern, "Can the US be counted on to keep its promises to other countries?" We in Israel have a very cynical attitude to promises. More than once we have witnessed UN buffer forces who walked out at the first smell of trouble. We have had the US guarantee the right of free passage in the Straits of Tiran; but when Egypt closed the Straits in 1967, the US did nothing more than remonstrate with Egypt. One of our Prime Ministers, Levi Eshkol, was caught, the story goes, in the act of breaking a promise. When someone pointed out that he had not kept his promise, Eshkol reputedly replied, "What? Are we no longer allowed to make promises?" We would like to believe promises made to us; it would make lives so much simpler, so much safer if we could count on the promises. But we are cynical. What is happening with the Kurds does not make it easier for us. It is very difficult for us to believe in promises. But we very much want to. __Bob Werman rwerman at hujivms Jerusalem copyright 1991 USA. All rights reserved. +--------------------------------------------------------------------+ | CRTNET is edited by: | | | | Tom Benson | | Department of Speech Communication | | The Pennsylvania State University | | 227 Sparks Building | | University Park, PA 16802 | | 814-865-4201; 814-238-5277 | | | | T3B at PSUVM (BITNET); t3b at psuvm.psu.edu (INTERNET) | +--------------------------------------------------------------------+ | BACK ISSUES | | Back issues of CRTNET may be obtained from two sources. | | (1) COMSERVE at RPIECS (bitnet) will respond to interactive commands | | or electronic mail; try asking for HELP; or send the command SEND | | CRTNET DIRECTRY for a directory of back issues. | | (2) LISTSERV at PSUVM archives CRTNET; if you are able to use | | interactive messaging, try TELL LISTSERV at PSUVM HELP to get | | started; for an index of CRTNET files, try TELL LISTSERV at PSUVM | | INDex CRTNET | +--------------------------------------------------------------------+ +--------------------------------------------------------------------+ | SUBSCRIPTIONS | | Subscriptions to CRTNET are free to all. 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All topics relating to the general area of human | | communication are welcome. | +--------------------------------------------------------------------+ +--------------------------------------------------------------------+ ** END OF CRTNET ** ************************* From earthstream at igc.apc.org Tue Apr 23 22:09:27 1991 From: earthstream at igc.apc.org (earthstream at igc.apc.org) Date: Tue, 23 Apr 1991 14:09:27 -0700 (PDT) Subject: American Red Cross Kurdish Relief Message-ID: Middle East Bulletin from Church Action Against S.C/Georgia Nuclear Ruin 1401 N Street, NW, Apt 707, Washington, DC 20005 (202) 462-3542 ----------------------------------------------------- 2 Ways to help rescue Kurdish Middle East Refugees from Heat Exposure, Thirst, Panic, Riot, Epidemic I Your credit card call to American Red Cross All Area Disaster Number: 1 800-842-2200. Specify your gift "For Middle East Refugee Relief". Charge to American Express, Master-Charge, or Visa. II Your Check or Money order, earmarked "Middle East Response" to: American Red Cross PO Box 37243 Washington, DC 20013 Please COPY, POST, PUBLISH, CIRCULATE, MAIL, FAX, ANNOUNCE From greenleft at peg.pegasus.oz.au Wed Apr 24 01:23:24 1991 From: greenleft at peg.pegasus.oz.au (greenleft at peg.pegasus.oz.au) Date: 24 Apr 1991 10:23:24 +1000 Subject: Setting the record straight Message-ID: Setting the record straight on the Kurds By Peter Boyle Recent Kurdish condemnation of governments long considered to be in the ``socialist'' camp and the pretended Western support for the Kurds have caused some confusion on the left. As well, some Arab nationalists are reluctant to support the Kurds, accusing them of being a Western tool and of seeking to break up Iraq. The Kurds are one of the few nationalities in the world with a large population (more than 15 million) yet without a state. In the Middle East today, they share the plight of the Palestinians and the Armenians. The colonial carve-up of the Ottoman Empire in 1916 left the Kurds' traditional territory divided between Turkey, Iran, Iraq and Syria. They have been repressed in each of these countries. (Smaller numbers of Kurds also live in the Soviet Union.) In 1920, the Kurds led a revolt against British colonial rule in the Gulf. In response, Turkey made a deal with France to grab a bigger slice of Kurdish teritory. Another uprising took place in 1923 and was crushed by the British army. The British suppressed another Kurdish rebellion in 1931. In 1946, the short-lived Kurdish republic of Mahabad was founded with Soviet support but was crushed by the shah of Iran with British assistance. In 1956, under the aegis of Britain and the US, Turkey, Iran and Iraq signed the Baghdad Pact, which included a clause providing for coordinated repression of Kurdish revolts in any of these couuntries. When the British puppet monarchy in Iraq was overthrown in 1958, the new military government renounced the Baghdad Pact and proclaimed a republic based on ``the free association of Arabs and Kurds''. However, five years later the Iraqi government began repressing Kurds, and an armed struggle began. In 1963, the Baathist Party staged a coup and organised a cease- fire with the Kurds but then proceeded to massacre Iraqi communists. Many communists fled to Kurdish territory for protection. (To this day, the only armed communist units in Iraq are part of a united front with the Kurdish Democratic Party.) The Baathists then turned against the Kurds. That year the Soviet Union declared support for the Kurdish movement. When the Baathists were ousted by more conservative military officers in 1964, the new regime followed its predecessor and offered to recognise Kurdish national rights. Once again this turned out to be a ruse, but it split the Kurdish movement before fighting broke out again. Another cease-fire was agreed in 1966. The Baathists came back to power in 1968 and relaunched war against the Kurds. After signing an agreement for Kurdish autonomy in 1970, the Iraqi regime began a program of assassinations against Kurdish leaders. In 1972 the Soviet government signed a friendship and cooperation treaty with the Baathists, opening a shameful era of collaboration with one of the world's bloodiest dictatorships. With Soviet military supplies, the Baathist regime was able to inflict heavy casualties on the Kurds. To counter Soviet influence in Iraq, the CIA began supplying some aid to the Kurds via the shah of Iran, according to King Hussein of Jordan, then on the CIA payroll. But in March 1975 the shah made an agreement with then vice-president Saddam Hussein to cut off support to the Kurds, thus ensuring their defeat. This brief episode of cynical US exploitation of the Kurdish struggle has been used to cover far greater crimes against the Kurds. Saddam Hussein then began his program of Arabisation of Kurdish territories, relocating or wiping out entire villages. In 1979, the Kurds helped topple the shah of Iran, but soon the new government under Ayotollah Khomeini turned against them. In 1980 Saddam Hussein, with Western backing, invaded Iran. The Kurds began armed struggle again, and Iran opportunistically offered them support. Over the next few years, most Iraqi opposition groups formed a united front with the Kurds. Thousands of Kurds in Iraq ``disappeared'' over the next few years. In 1988, Saddam killed 5000 Kurdish villagers in Halabja with chemical weapons. There was hardly any international outcry. The components for the chemical weapons came from the West, and the planes that dropped them were from the Soviet Union. The Western press suddenly rediscovered Halabja in 1990. Before the Gulf War, the Kurds halted military operations and called for a peaceful solution and a democratic Iraq. The Bush administration called upon the Iraqi people and the Kurds to depose Saddam Hussein. When Saddam's forces appeared defeated, the Kurds and the Shiite opposition in the south launched an uprising. Suddenly Bush changed his tune and said what he really meant was that the Iraqi armed forces should topple Saddam in a coup. The US allowed the same armed forces to massacre the rebels. ************************************************************ Reprinted from Green Left, weekly progressive newspaper. May be reproduced with acknowledgment but without charge by movement publications and organisations. From kurds at gn.apc.org Wed Apr 24 01:32:51 1991 From: kurds at gn.apc.org (kurds at gn.apc.org) Date: 24 Apr 1991 00:32:51 +0000 (GMT) Subject: A phone call from Iran today Message-ID: One of our people here at the Kurdish Cultural Centre got a phone call this morning from an Iranian border town. His cousin was on the line, in tears. He said a million people were still trapped in the mountains near the Iranian border. It was freezing. People were starving. Families have become separated. He'd lost his children in the crush. Somewhere up there in the snows they were wandering, frightened and alone. No aid has yet reached these people. Tomorrow a jumbo jet takes off carrying a load of relief supplies sent by us in conjunction with a major relief organisation. Please help us to help these forgotten Kurds. Credit card hotline: 071.820.9999. Or e-mail your donation to us. See Topic 24 of this conference for instructions. From kurds at gn.apc.org Wed Apr 24 03:32:06 1991 From: kurds at gn.apc.org (kurds at gn.apc.org) Date: 24 Apr 1991 02:32:06 +0000 (GMT) Subject: A phone call from Iran today References: Message-ID: SOCKS Out there, the cold December Has dumbed the wind. Inside, she sits alone While like small lambs Her children sleep around her. Her husband now for many years Has been a storm Following his love of the mountains. So she's sitting by herself Like a weeping willow, Her head bent over her lap KNITTING KNITTING KNITTING To finish the pair of Kurdish wool socks That he has asked for. By midnight, she'll have finished. But alas! she does not know that When the socks reach him, He'll only need the left one. Sherko Bekas From aldopacific at gn.apc.org Wed Apr 24 18:05:40 1991 From: aldopacific at gn.apc.org (aldopacific at gn.apc.org) Date: 24 Apr 1991 17:05:40 +0000 (GMT) Subject: O mother.... Message-ID: O mother, O mother, I hate bombs They frighten me to death when they drop For it shakes our house and city It shakes my heart, I tremble inside. I dream every night of war planes Appearing above my head in the sky I scream and cry in my dreams I am disturbed all through my sleep. O mother, how long will will this war last? How many of my brothers will be lost? I have already lost two, O mother I cannot afford to lose another! - from Iran - A Child's Story, A Man's Experience - Gholam-Reza Sabri-Tabrizi (one of the signatories of the Beseechment for the Kurds - see above) From aldopacific at gn.apc.org Wed Apr 24 18:33:15 1991 From: aldopacific at gn.apc.org (aldopacific at gn.apc.org) Date: 24 Apr 1991 17:33:15 +0000 (GMT) Subject: O mother.... References: Message-ID: Another by the same writer.... I wish war had never been created. I wish the seed of war had never been sown. War has swallowed so many children, War has destroyed so many blossoms. Our earth has experienced so many wars, Our earth is left in ruins by wars. My children are murdered by war, My heart has shed blood by war. I wish war had never been created, I wish the seed of war had never been sown. >From a poem by Siyavush Kasrai..... Look at our homeland! It is a cage of mourning birds which have bleeding beaks. Look at its earth! The torn remnants of red tulips rise up from it. Look at its roads A caravan of poverty and refugees are waving. Look at its sky Where the angry clouds are rolling... >From Armaghan-e Hejaz What shall I say about the poor, suffering Muslim, valuable only as a human being? He has neither energy nor excitement in his blood. His hands are as empty as his pockets. Do not tell me that God has done this. You can wash away dust by this excuse. Turn upside down this world - where the unjust steals from the just. >From Blake's Everlasting Gospel.... The Vision of Christ that thou does see, Is my Vision's Greatest Enemy... Thine loves the same world that mine hates, Thy Heaven doors are my Hell gates... Both read the Bible day and night, But thou read'st black where I read white. >From a peom by Hakimeh Billuri.... I love my people much, very much. Not because I am related to them; They appreciate one's service - Because of this I love them. They love guests - Because of this I love them. They are not interested in lining their pockets, But in filling their hearts, Thinking about others' pain.... Affection cannot be bought and sold, Love and service cannot be hindered, Work is regarded Holy. For these reasons my people make me life - the people's affection. And this longing to see my motherland Can also kill me. ****** the above all come from Sabri-Tabrizi's book, Mainstream publishing, UKP 14.95, 1989 ************* .... and one from Adrienne Rich, American feminist poet... My heart is moved by all I cannot change. So much has been destroyed. I have to call my lot with those who age after age perversely with no extraordinary power Reconstitute the world. (Dream of a Common Language) From kurds at gn.apc.org Thu Apr 25 02:58:53 1991 From: kurds at gn.apc.org (kurds at gn.apc.org) Date: 25 Apr 1991 01:58:53 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Letters from the public Message-ID: I've been looking through some of the replies to our appeal and thought I'd share a few with you. "You won't have time to read long letters but I just want to say that this small cheque comes with my love, thoughts and prayers. I am so heartbroken to see what is happening to your people and countrymen in Iraq, you are the victims of such terrible injustice and unbelievable neglect. I really pray for you all that you will find peace, safety and security soon and that your tears and sadness will be turned to joy. As I am a Christian, I believe in a God who has suffered already Himself and one who defends the weak and persecuted. I pray that through this time the Kurdish people will find that you have many friends - not just the mountains - and I want to be one of them. And I pray you will find your dignity as a people again soon, or rather, that you will MAINTAIN your dignity as you are not the ones who have lost it." (Katie Short, Edinburgh) "I cannot watch the plight of the Kurdish people on television or read the newspapers without weeping at the anguish and suffering of the Kurds." (Mrs J Roberts, Melton Mowbray) "I am so sorry and share your anguish and anger. Like most people everywhere I have very little power but will write to our leading politicians." (Unsigned) "I send you another cheque given to me by my friend. I do hope you are getting some help sent to you. - I feel so helpless when I see what is happening to those sad refugees. IT IS A DISGRACE TO HUMANITY." (Mrs L Swiatek, Wembley) "I write to express my heartfelt horror at what is happening to your people in Iraq. As I watch the tragedy unfold, I can only ask, Where is the moral outrage, Where is the shame, Where is the guilt? The Western Governments bear a direct moral responsibility for what is now happening in Iraq - they called for the Iraqi people to rise up against Saddam - and yet now they hide behind excuses and time delaying tactics which I find repugnant. Whilst I supported the eviction of Saddam Hussein from Kuwait, I can feel no sense of victory now, only shame that we have done nothing to support you in your fight." (Valerie Newman, Cornwall) "for the children love from charlotte 4 years" (from Charlotte, 4 years) "I like many other people am horrified at the plight of the Kurds. Hopefully something will be done to help them live peaceful lives permanently very soon". (Joyce Jones, Wirral) "I feel terrible about what is happening to the Kurdish people". (David Breen, St Helens) "I have been very moved by the reports and pictures showing the plight of the Kurdish people...Please know that British people are thinking of you and praying for you. God bless you." (Elaine Roberts) "Please accept this small donation in the hope that it will help to bring some comfort to the thousands of Kurdish refugees. It saddens us to see all those suffering such cruelty and desperate conditions. We pray that things will get better." (B Jones, Blaenau Ffestiniog) "Having but little money and a limited amount of time, I thought the very least I might to is to write with a message of sympathy, support and heart-felt wishes for all your people in this time of such tragedy and deep suffering in the mountains and high passes of Kurdistan. For your people gathered in this country, it must be a time of great anxiety, strain and sorrow that your sisters and brothers in Kurdistan, old, young and middle-aged, have to endure further hardship, loss and death, so soon following on a brief euphoria when there appeared the possibility of a successful path to free self-determination both for yourselves, and for the wider progress of a civilisation truly worthy of Iraq's long-born historical heritage, free from the tyranny of Saddam Hussein's brutal iniquities. May peace be upon you in your sufferings... As a British citizen, I have long felt some shame at the part our colonial policies played in the historical developments leading to modern-day tragedies in the Middle East - by political betrayals of Arab peoples following the First World War and, more recently, by the tame acquiescence of the British government to the overriding neo-imperialist concerns of the United States in the Gulf War. Oil was/is the key, and the chain of violence unleashed, both upon the peoples of Iraq in Operation Desert Storm, and now in the heightened repression being exercised by the Republican Guard against any who dared resist or are suspected of involvement with resistance, your people bear the brunt of the suffering. If there is any small way in which you think I may be able to help, please let me know and I will do what I can. It seems that international relief agencies are operating at last, let us hope it is not too little, too late. Most important is the long-term political future of the Kurdish (and Iraqi) people." (B Mackenzie, London) "I am sorry I can only send thirty pounds. I know it is a drop in the ocean but I send it with love for you all. I consider that you have been betrayed: your babies, your little children, your pregnant mothers, your grandparents -- all betrayed. I'm an Englishwoman born and bred, married to a Hungarian husband. The west betrayed Hungary too. Of course I am more than grateful that I live in a country in which I can say what I truly think, but that doesn't buy milk for Kurdish babies, does it? As usual, governments do too little too late and I feel guilty when I lie in my warm bed every night. I feel ashamed to be English." (Marjorie Gabsi) "Please accept this as a small token of our love for the Kurdish people. We continue to pray for their survival and ultimate happiness as befits every human being who has a right to live in dignity and peace." (George and Rosamund Bray, Kent) "Please find enclosed a cheque to help the Kurdish people in some way. I wish I could have sent more, but I am a pensioner and over 80 years of age. I do pray that God will help these poor people and send food and shelter to them from other countries, who are better provided for. May God bless and care for the Kurdish people." (Mrs J Wright, Bradford) "It seems to me that the Kurds have been rather forgotten by the world and so I have decided to send a large part of my savings to help them. ...I am 84 and registered blind." (Mrs K Fairbanks, Sussex) "I have had some small experience of suffering wartime upheavals by escaping from the Japanese invasion of Malaya and landing eventually in South Africa, 6 months pregnant and penniless in the clothes I stood up in. My late husband spent 3 1/2 years being persecuted by the Japanese whilst building the notorious Siamese Railway and my father suffered internment in Singapore. There was no mass media coverage for us way back in 1942. It is for this reason that I feel for your people and pray that something will soon be done to help those who survive the agonising times that they are experiencing." (Mrs R Hough, London) "I write to you with a deep sense of shame for what my country has done, not only to you as a people but also to Iraq as a nation that has already suffered terribly under Saddam. My small contribution is personal and pathetically inadequate, but I wish you every success in your magnificent attitude to keep your heads high while those around you have theirs in the sand." (Alastair Sawday, Bristol) "As a British officer I served in Iraq at Habbaniya between 1948 and 1950. I well remember Ali Askar, my Kurdish bearer, and I spent two memorable holidays at the leave centre at Armadiya. I consider that stability will not come to the Middle East until two new independent sovereign states are created - Kurdistan and Palestine." (Douglas Bliss, Andover) "I enclose a cheque to be used to help alleviate some of the misery being inflicted on your country's refugees. I would also like to express my sense of shame that this solution has been allowed to develop while the western powers have done nothing. Please God your day will come and your nation will be recognised as a separate, free, political entity." (Gerard and Siobhan McConnell, London) These are extracts from just a few of the handfuls of letters which I picked out of the cardboard boxes in which they're stacked in the Kurdish Cultural Centre, London. (We've tried to reply thanking each donor, except where they have specifically asked us not to.) To each and every one of them, our heartfelt thanks. You're magnificent. From aldopacific at gn.apc.org Fri Apr 26 00:26:32 1991 From: aldopacific at gn.apc.org (aldopacific at gn.apc.org) Date: 25 Apr 1991 23:26:32 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Letters from the public References: Message-ID: Surely the earth can be saved by all the people who insist on love. - Alice Walker (Horses Make a Landscape Look More Beautiful) From antennae at gn.apc.org Thu Apr 25 03:09:16 1991 From: antennae at gn.apc.org (antennae at gn.apc.org) Date: 25 Apr 1991 02:09:16 +0000 (GMT) Subject: EUNOMIA, publication details Message-ID: A couple of people have asked for details about Philip Allott's book 'EUNOMIA'. 'EUNOMIA. New Order for a New World'. Philip Allott Oxford University Press 1990 ISBN 0-19-825599-3 Price #16.95 From mlorin at igc.apc.org Thu Apr 25 16:25:39 1991 From: mlorin at igc.apc.org (Matthew Lorin) Date: Thu, 25 Apr 1991 08:25:39 -0700 (PDT) Subject: Amnesty Student Day April 27 Message-ID: In case anyone is interested. Saturday April 27th, 1991. 12 noon to five. Boston's Government Center. Amnesty International Students for Students Day. They have invited a Kurdish Refugee to speak and there will be several student organizations in support of the Kurdish refugees. Interested parties should attend or contact Susan Rich at Amnesty in Somerville MA, (617) 623-0202. It's a great opportunity to find support and friendship with like minded young people. Peace, Matt Lorin From peacenews at gn.apc.org Thu Apr 25 16:13:17 1991 From: peacenews at gn.apc.org (peacenews at gn.apc.org) Date: 25 Apr 1991 15:13:17 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Front page of current PEACE NEWS Message-ID: Frontpage comment in May issue of Peace News. (for full issue contents, see conf "wri.news") A disaster like the one that has unfolded in Iraq since the end of the Gulf War poses some difficult questions for Western peace activists. The first temptation is to accuse our governments of hypocrisy in encouraging the people of Iraq to overthrow their government, then standing idly by as they were cut to ribbons. True, the US and UK governments have been particularly inconsistent in their dealings with the Iraqi oppositions -- armed and unarmed. Nowhere in Europe have Kurdish refugees been welcomed. The creation of "safe havens" in Iraqi Kurdistan appears to be an admission of responsibility for the refugee crisis. But not all Kurds can or will return to Iraq at this time. In early April, up to a thousand a day -- mostly children -- died of dehydration and malnutrition. The situation was far worse on Iraq's border with NATO-member Turkey than on the eastern border with Iran, the West's favourite former bogeyman. The Iranian authorities -- who managed to deal with the flow of refugees with negligible help from the international community -- seem better to understand the ancient Indian principle of _hirat_. Populations fleeing tyranny depopulate their own state and take refuge in a neighbouring state as a way of hastening the fall of their ruler. If that is what comes to pass, we will be as glad as anyone. But wherever the Kurds are at the moment, in the mountains, in exile, or within Iraq, relief must get to them. In the UK, the Kurdish Cultural Centre is responding to the changing refugee situation. They can be contacted at 14 Stannary St, London SW11 4AA (tel 071 735 0918; fax 582 8894; email gn:kurds). ******************************************************* >From _Peace News_ May 1991. Please credit if reprinting. Peace News, 55 Dawes St, London SE17 1EL (tel +44 71 703 7189; fax +44 71 708 2525; email gn:peacenews) *************************************** From kurds at gn.apc.org Fri Apr 26 01:12:53 1991 From: kurds at gn.apc.org (kurds at gn.apc.org) Date: 26 Apr 1991 00:12:53 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Front page of current PEACE NEWS References: Message-ID: We are about to release another advertisement appeal, this time to run in the Daily Mail, probably Monday or Tuesday next week. I will upload the text here first. Indra pp Kurdish Cultural Centre, London From f1deravi at gn.apc.org Fri Apr 26 10:49:11 1991 From: f1deravi at gn.apc.org (f1deravi at gn.apc.org) Date: 26 Apr 1991 09:49:11 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Muslim Aid to Iraqi Refugees Message-ID: Subject: Muslim Aid to Iraqi Refugees >From SARKIMA at KIRK.VAX.ASTON.AC.UK Wed Apr 17 15:05:38 1991 Date: Wed, 17 APR 91 15:05:44 GMT From: SARKIMA at KIRK.VAX.ASTON.AC.UK The Islamic Relief here in Birmingham is indeed involve in raising fund to assist refugees in Iraq. The one I am aware of is being conducted under the banner of KURDISH APPEAL. I understand that they have produced posters/leaflets which have been distributed to various mosques, muslim/islamic centres, islamic organisations/societies, schools/universities etc in and around Birmingham requesting people to donate generously. Our islamic society did received a few of such leaflets/posters which as usual is distributed during friday prayers. Furthermore collection boxes have been distributed to mosques in and around Birmingham. Here at Aston University one is put out every friday and people are requested to donate generously. I am told that the donations(monetary,material or otherwise) are collected and collated regularly and any time they are enough to by the much needed materials some of their men are send to deliver them. Furthermore I understand that two of their men will be leaving(or have left) for Iraq(Turkey?) this week. Thats about all I know about the Islamic Relief's efforts in raising fund to assist refugees in Iraq. Perhaps other brothers and sisters in Birmingham know more. If you are interested in a copy of the leaflet then let me have your postal address so that I can post it to you, however if you want more then I will advise that you contact the Islamic Relief(see below for address/tel/fax). For your benefit I have reproduce(though not entirely/exactly) below the contents of the leaflet. As regards to the Muslim Aid I really don't know what they are doing. I am also not aware that our society has received any of their fund raising leaflets/posters if at all there is any. I will advise that you contact Islamic Relief for information in this regard. Wa'assalam, Sarki. ******************************************************************** KURDISH APPEAL TWO MILLION INNOCENT PEOPLE HOMELESS They are facing starvation and are freezing to death. Fear of outbreak of epidemic ----------------------------------- ! FOOD, MEDICINE & SHELTER ! ! URGENTLY REQUIRED ! ----------------------------------- They need your help... Please help them now ! your contribution could help save lives Please send your donations to Islamic Relief/Kurds Visa, Access, Mastercard etc. accepted ISLAMIC RELIEF: 517 Moseley Rd., 16 Queens Crescent, 38 Mapesbury Rd., Birmingham B12 Glasgow. London. Tel: 021-440 3114 G4 9BL NW2 4JD. Tel: 021-446 4502 Tel: 041-343 0083 Tel: 081-450 7612 Fax: 021-446 4001 Charity Reg. No 328158 ******************************************************************* From peacenet at igc.apc.org Fri Apr 26 18:30:20 1991 From: peacenet at igc.apc.org (PeaceNet * IGC * APC) Date: Fri, 26 Apr 1991 10:30:20 -0700 (PDT) Subject: A Peace Zone for Kurdistan? Message-ID: Subject: A Peace Zone for Kurdistan? Note from PeaceNet: Majid Tehranian is Director of Spark M. Matsunaga Institute for Peace. His recent books include Letters from Jerusalem and Technologies of Power. He is widely known around the world as one of the foremost theoreticians and writers on communications and peace. Howard H. Frederick, PeaceNet Director ---------------------------------------------------------------- >From ifp Thu Apr 25 11:59 PDT 1991 A PEACE ZONE FOR KURDISTAN By Majid Tehranian Spark M. Matsunaga Institute for Peace University of Hawaii Honolulu, Hawaii 96822 Tel.: (808) 956-7427, 988-9563 Fax.: (808) 956-5708 PeaceNet: ifp (Institute for Peace) Bitnet: majid at uhccux.bitnet The Gulf War and its tragic consequences present an unprecedented opportunity for an idea whose time has come: the possible creation of several Peace Zones in the Middle East. The obvious candidates are Kurdistan (extending into Iraq, Iran, Turkey, Syria, and Soviet Union), Palestine (including the West Bank and Gaza Strip), and Lebanon (federating the warring ethnic and religious communities into a number of Peace Zones). These are all countries or territories that have been war zones in recent decades. Simply put, a Peace Zone may be defined as (1) a transnational entity whose sovereignty resides in a United Nations Board of Trustees consisting of the governments or parties at dispute over a territory, (2) a global land authority for the development of a common market among the members and other interested parties acquiring "peace bonds" with commercial rates of return, and (3) to the extent possible, culturally homogeneous zones for the ethnically disenfranchised majorities but with strict guarantees of human rights for the ethnic or religious minorities residing in the zone. The above political, economic, and cultural requirements of Peace Zones leave considerable room for the negotiation of details in order to achieve positive rather than negative or zero-sum games for the parties at conflict. The plan aims at making peace profitable to all sides. By resolving protracted conflicts in a peaceful way, clearly all parties win more security. By entering into a common market arrangement, the participating governments and populations win in economic prosperity. By giving autonomy and status to disenfranchised ethnic groups, the entire world wins in a greater achievement o f human rights and international harmony. The idea of Peace Zones has been proposed by a number of peace scholars and activists, including Edna Fuerth Lemle, Johan Galtung, Bishop Antonio Fortich, and the people of Cheju Island in Korea. Edna Lemle has pursued this idea with the British and Argentine governments for a peaceful settlement of the Falkland/Malvinas Islands conflict. Johan Galtung has proposed it for Palestine. Bishop Fortich and his co-workers have, in fact, successfully established a number of peace zones in the Philippines. The Filipino zones of peace are civilian-initiated demilitarized areas created to allow noncombatants to establish homes and economic bases without the fear of becoming caught in the cross-fire between the military and the rebels. The communities define geographic areas where neither rebels nor government forces may enter. Inhabitants practice strict nonviolence, maintain their infrastructure of roads, bridges and schools, and form peacekeeping forces that monitor the presence of strangers. The Cheju Council on Foreign Relations is proposing to turn the island into a zone of peace for the reconciliation of North and South Korea. Although both Palestine and Lebanon are ripe candidates for Peace Zones, Kurdistan presents the most pressing case. None of the states presently controlling the Kurdish population are willing to grant independence to a proposed land-locked Kurdistan. All of them may be willing, however, to recognize the internal autonomy of the Kurds under a plan that puts them in charge of security (as members of the UN Board of Trustees) while attracting millions of dollars for a cooperative development of the region. Old ideas of indivisible national sovereignty in multi-national states such as Iraq have produced nothing but internal repression and external aggression. Why not try the transnational idea of zones of peace and sovereignty that, if successful, would set a significant precedent for resolving protracted and costly conflicts? From kurds at gn.apc.org Sat Apr 27 20:15:55 1991 From: kurds at gn.apc.org (kurds at gn.apc.org) Date: 27 Apr 1991 19:15:55 +0000 (GMT) Subject: SARBARZ, HELP ME FIND MY CHILDREN Message-ID: This is the text of our full page advertisement due to run in the Daily Mail on Monday 29th April. Only the names of the two people involved in the telephone call from Iran have been changed. Hawzhar's children - a seven year old boy and a five year old girl - are still missing. While the press talks of British Marines leading Kurdish families back into Zakho, 200 miles away on the Iranian border, the people's plight is desperate and getting worse. Even when Hawzhar, his wife and his remaining three year old child reached Sardasht, they found no shelter, no food. He says to tell you this: 'Our lives are ruined, but don't waste too much pity on us. Thousands of families have been visited by the same tragedy. Save the ones who can be saved, while there is still time.' ----------------------------------------------------------- SARBARZ, HELP ME FIND MY CHILDREN. This morning, one of our volunteers here at the Kurdish Cultural Centre got a phone call from the town of Sardasht, on the Iran-Iraq border. His cousin Hawzhar was on the line, in tears. With his wife and young children, he'd fled their home in the Kurdish city of Sulemaniyeh at 3am as the Iraqi army launched a scud and artillery attack. For seven days, they'd walked on dangerous paths across steep, snow-covered mountainsides. It was bitterly cold. They had nothing to eat or drink. As they neared Iran the trail became choked with fleeing people. Families were split up and separated. He'd lost his children in the crush. LOST: A LITTLE BOY OF SEVEN, A SMALL GIRL OF FIVE. Somewhere up there in the snows the children are wandering, frightened and alone. Hawzhar knows he'll probably never see them again. His desperate hope is that help will arrive in time. 'I've heard that the British and Americans are dropping supplies,' he said. 'When will they get here?' We had to tell him that the Allied troops were operating 200 miles away on the Iraq-Turkey border. There are a million people trapped in the mountains along Iraq's border with Iran. At this time of writing, they had received no aid of any kind. But with your help, we can reach them. WE KNOW OUR MOUNTAINS. We know the people, the language, the mountains. Most of us working here in the Kurdish Cultural Centre were born and brought up in those mountains. The people dying up there are our families, our friends, our children. We don't need telling how desperate things are. So there's no bureaucracy, no red tape. A DIRECT LINE TO THE REFUGEES. Every day we receive dozens of phone calls from refugees who have managed to cross into Turkey or Iran. Their stories help us build a picture of what's happening, so we know what's needed where. Our relief organisation of local Kurds is working flat out to get help straight to where it's needed most. We are sending Kurdish doctors directly into remote valleys. We have a flight leaving England later this morning with #60,000 worth of water purification and distribution equipment, emergency shelters, strong plastic sheeting, clothing and blankets. We're also working with major relief agenices. This work is financed by our national appeal, the Kurdish Disaster Fund. To date we've raised about #400,000, bringing help to people that the main relief operation has not reached. We need to raise at least 1 million (pounds sterling). Please help us help our people. WE'RE BRITAIN'S MAJOR KURDISH CHARITY. The Kurdish Cultural Centre was set up in 1985 to help Kurdish refugees in Britain and abroad. We have worked with Kurdish refugees in Britain and in camps in Turkey. (These are families who fled from Iraq's chemical attacks on Kurdish villages in 1988.) In February we appealed for money to help children in these camps who were suffering from illness, hunger and cold. (Putting people in camps is not the answer: these children had little food, no warm clothing and their tents were torn and useless in temperatures of minus 10 degrees C.) YOUR SUPPORT KEEPS US GOING. After a phone call like this morning's, we can find ourselves close to despair. Then we hear about something someone has done to help. We would like to say thank you. To the young man who apologised that he could only send #5 as he was living on supplementary benefit. Thank you, Martin. To the eighty year old pensioner, herself blind, who sent us her entire life savings because, she said, there was no better cause in the world. Thank you, Mrs Fairburn. To the university teacher who highlighted our people's plight by walking barefoot through Edinburgh for 5 days wearing a placard that said 'Kurds. Barefoot. Starving'. Thank you, Alastair McIntosh. To the many, many others who have already helped, thank you for your generosity and your warm letters of sympathy and support. MORE MONEY IS URGENTLY NEEDED We're also grateful to the governments and relief organisations who are working to help our people. But despite everyone's best efforts, 500 people are still dying every day. Many of them are children. It's going to take weeks to prepare the 'safe havens'. Even then they will accomodate only 350,000 people. More than two million are homeless. Meanwhile on the mountainsides, the graveyards are getting bigger. We also received a call today from someone who had travelled with a group of 25 Kurdish women and children from the city of Erbil. There were no menfolk. They had been taken by the regime in 1982 and had not been seen since. The women and children were barefoot, not properly clothed for the mountains. They were suffering dreadfully from hunger and cold. At night, when the temperature plummeted, the mothers tried to keep the children warm in their arms. On the way to the Iranian border, five of the women and eight of the children died. We know you will help. Thank you. * * * * If you want to make a donation to the KURDISH DISASTER FUND you can do so by one of the following methods: ----------------------------------------- Call our Credit Card Hotline 071-820 9999. ----------------------------------------- Send a cheque, made out to 'Kurdish Cultural Centre' to: KURDISH DISASTER FUND Kurdish Cultural Centre 14 Stannary Street London SE11 4AA ------------------------------------------ Or e-mail us with the following information: 1) Your name and address (as known to the credit card co) 2) The amount you wish to give 3) The type of credit card you want to use 4) The card number 5) Its expiry date ------------------------------------------- From antennae at gn.apc.org Sun Apr 28 23:35:13 1991 From: antennae at gn.apc.org (antennae at gn.apc.org) Date: 28 Apr 1991 22:35:13 +0000 (GMT) Subject: US responsible for Kurdish tragedy Message-ID: The following topic was originally posted in the Mideast.Forum conference by igc:csime at 10.07 April 27th. National Coalition Against U.S. Intervention in the Middle East 36 W. 12 St., New York, NY, 10003 phone (212)777-1246 fax (212)979-1583 ========FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE, April 27, 1991========= NATIONAL COALITION AGAINST U.S. INTERVENTION IN THE GULF SAYS U.S. IS RESPONSIBLE FOR SUFFERING OF KURDISH PEOPLE What is happening to the Kurdish people in Iraq, and unfolding on TV sets across the world, is a terrible tragedy. Responsibility for the dislocation and suffering of the Kurdish people lies firmly with the U.S. government and its allies. Unable to sustain a state of their own, the Kurdish nation has lived under the domination of others for many centuries. Their current plight, one of the most difficult in modern times, is due mainly to the barbarous attacks by the Pentagon against Iraq. All of Iraq faces a critical health emergency due to U.S. and allied bombings. As part of its strategy to conquer Iraq and overthrow of the Hussein government, the Bush administration utilized the difficult situation of the Kurdish people for its own ends. The CIA set up a radio station in Saudi Arabia urging their leadership to join in the attack against the Baghdad government. Then, as Washington has done with oppressed peoples so many times before, it abandoned the Kurds. This monstrous crime committed by the Pentagon against the Kurdish people has led to their displacement. Opposing even the UN, which says there is no precedent for such an action, thousands of U.S. and allied troops, including U.S. Special Forces, are carving out a military enclave in northern Iraq. Done under the name of helping the Kurds, this will surely be used for further assaults against Iraq. The Kurdish people are entitled to determine their own fate, and not to be harassed or become a dependency of the U.S. and its allies. The hypocritical and opportunistic character of U.S. "concern" for the Kurdish people is revealed by the Bush administration's policies towards Kurds in other countries. Washington supplies $800 million a year in military aid to the Turkish government, whose policies towards the 12 million Kurds in Turkey are so repressive that it is illegal for Kurds to write or speak their own language. And Washington is ignoring the plight of the Iraqi Kurds who fled to Iran. When Bush was asked why he isn't assisting these Kurds he replied, "You've got to be a realist--I mean, the Iranians have strained relations with the United States of America." (Los Angeles Times, April 18). HEALTH CATASTROPHE LOOMS IN ALL OF IRAQ The Kurdish people are not the only ones devastated by the U.S. assault. The destruction of the civilian infrastructure of Iraq by U.S. and allied bombing raids has created an emergency situation nationwide. Dr. David Levinson from Physicians Against Nuclear War, who just returned from Iraq, reports that "the entire health care system has been severely crippled," and "a health catastrophe of immense proportions" is threatened. Already UNICEF has reported cases of cholera. Many thousands could die. Bush has not said a word about the suffering of people all over Iraq. In fact, the U.S. government opposes an Iraqi request for the UN to lift sanctions so that Baghdad can purchase emergency food and medicine. Washington is threatening to keep the sanctions against Iraq until Hussein is overthrown, regardless of the many thousands who would die from lack of food, sanitation and medicine. These sanctions must be lifted immediately. Washington's systematic and continued targeting of the Iraqi civilian population of Iraq violates the Geneva and Nuremburg accords and is an international war crime. A great deal of assistance must and should be given to all the people of Iraq, including the Kurds, in order to alleviate famine and epidemic. But the U.S. government owes this money in the form of reparations for the crimes it has committed. From antennae at gn.apc.org Sun Apr 28 23:36:45 1991 From: antennae at gn.apc.org (antennae at gn.apc.org) Date: 28 Apr 1991 22:36:45 +0000 (GMT) Subject: US responsible for Kurdish tragedy References: Message-ID: This response to this topic also originally appeared in Mideast.Forum. KURDISH TRAGEDY: U.S. RESPONSIBLE Response 1 of 1 igc:goodwork mideast.forum 8:13 pm Apr 27, 1991 Two reactions as I read the above posting from the national group with which my local Coalition has been most connected these past months: 1. This is an example of the blame game. The responsibility for the tragedy of the Kurds is shared; such a horror is beyond the reach of one party to create. U.S. unleashed horrific dimensions of violence. Iraqi forces opposed the rebellion in the Kurdish areas and continued with an uncertain degree of retributions (people do not become refugees under the existing conditions and in the quantities of this emigration for nothing!). Some at least of the Kurdish leadership went for the opportunity, or the U.S. call, or implied promise if you interpret it that way, and chose the armed uprising method as many times in the past. knowing as they must what it might cost to many of the people they hoped to liberate. The temptation succumbed to in the topic posting is to load it all on one party, your unfavorite party. I realize that in the U.S. the tragedy is being piled at the feet of Saddam Hussein and the Iraqi government -- but there is a need for a comprehensive response rather than an immitative response which simply distorts in the opposite direction. Did the formulators of the statement intend to respond to the distorted total blaming of the Iraqi govt.? Was there some other reason for the choice to write the statement as it was done? 2. The statement is right on to bring up the tragedy in the rest of Iraq, which is more due directly to the violence of the U.S. military (and so of course isn't getting the coverage in the U.S. that it needs). Let's please as we talk about this whole situation bring up the needs of ALL in the area. Let's get out of the cycles not only of violence, but of political blaming. Though I suppose those I call political blaming are not doing so by their understanding, but would call it simply telling it like it is! Joe Maizlish, Los Angeles From antennae at gn.apc.org Sun Apr 28 23:39:20 1991 From: antennae at gn.apc.org (antennae at gn.apc.org) Date: 28 Apr 1991 22:39:20 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Kurds: US Sleeping? UK Sidetrack? Message-ID: This topic was originally posted on mideast.forum by Alastair at 11:46pm Apr 22,1991. I have moved it onto this conference because I think the discussion interesting and revealing. Kurds: US Sleeping? UK Sidetrack? 5 responses aldopacific mideast.forum 11:46 pm Apr 22, 1991 Martin Walker in NY had an article in this week's Scotland on Sunday, basically saying that the only reason Bush had moved on the Kurds was that Major and other Europeans had placed him under such strong pressure. He said that although folk in the US were aware of what's happened to to Kurds, they were'nt worked up about it in the way we Europeans are. Here it's headline news most days: Scot. on Sun., for instance, gave a full 3 pages to it, including 3 large photos which had a distincltly biblical quality to them. So what's happening in the US? Are your people trying to ignore the consequences of the war so that Vietnam can be the better expurgated, or are you actually expressing a depth of concern we're not hearing about in Europe. What's the peace movement doing? Why aren't we seeing more of you dipping into the mideast.kurds conference. Is it because it's a gn. conf., or is it that you haven't registered the Kurds as a big issue .... or is there, perhaps, a sense in which we in Britain particularly have been sidetracked into concern about the Kurds as a kind of political-media smokescreen to avert us from seeing what's happening in other parts of Iraq? ... well, I don't mean sidetracked cos I think the Kurdish scene is a 100% valid issue, but there's a risk that could be used to stop us seeing other suffering, in the same way as footage of Scud missile attacks during the war was used to effectively block many people from asking what was being done to the poor Iraqi conscripts. Thoughts? Alastair. Kurds: US Sleeping? UK Sidetrack? Response 1 of 5 igc:mphillips mideast.forum 5:12 am Apr 23, 1991 On the contrary, Alastair, a number of news accounts here (I forget which) have pointed to political pressure on Bush as the reason why he is finally stirring himself. I have also seen (again, I forget where; senility, maybe) complaints that the Kurdish situation is distracting attention away from the rest of the Middle East. The long-standing Israeli-Palestinian is getting attention too. Hang in there, everybody. Margaret Phillips, St. Louis, MO Kurds: US Sleeping? UK Sidetrack? Response 2 of 5 igc:goodwork mideast.forum 7:16 am Apr 23, 1991 But I do like Alastair's other questions. Some of the movement here doesn't know what to say about the situation. Activists here have had an education session, at which some Kurdish activists spoke. They challenged our unconditional "U.S. out" position. Some of us are working on what the peace movement might say on this. Maybe too it's that we are so used to opposing action it's hard to formulate something supporting action, particularly if it might involve government action. I'd like to see everyone, including U.S. militariy people, consult with all parties, Kurdish leadership, Iraqi authorities, etc. and develop unarmed aid work. Leave your weapons outside the door, please, and come on in and help! Joe Maizlish, Los Angeles Kurds: US Sleeping? UK Sidetrack? Response 4 of 5 igc:mphillips mideast.forum 4:53 am Apr 25, 1991 Hmm, yes, that's true here too, Joe, many questions about what to do, what to advocate. All I meant to say was that here in St. Louis we're keenly aware of the Kurds and I hope their situation can be used to show how destructive the war was to innocent people in the region; but also some other concerns (especially Israeli- Palestinian issues) need attention. There have been questions here too about what the U.S. should do; it hasn't been at all obvious that the U.S. should (or shouldn't) step in militarily. We have scheduled a meeting tonight, we hope a wider meeting than the 20 or so who came to the biweekly planning meetings during the war, to discuss just that, what points of agreement we can come up with. But that discussion may be preempted by a discussion about what this organization sees as its focus in the coming months. There has been much interest in broadening its focus beyond the Middle East; the name has been changed from "St. Louis Forum for Peace in the Persian Gulf" to "St. Louis Forum for a Just Peace". That gets to questions like should it continue to exist but as a coordinating mechanism, not an organization with efforts of its own. There are many local organizations dealing with pieces of it, with traditional Middle East concerns (i.e. Israeli- Palestinian issues), with arms sales to the region (and to other parts of the world too), with just peace issues elsewhere (for instance, Latin America), and so on and so on. But given the present constellation of organizations and efforts here, the Kurds would be left out if that's the structure we decide on. The draft of points of agreement to present to the big meeting tomorrow includes a statement that the U.S. must contribute heavily financially to resettlement of and aid for refugees, specifically including the Kurds, but also that it must be carried out under U.N. auspices, and/or Arab League where appropriate (no more unilateral U.S. actions posing as U.N.). I would like to know if others are coming to similar conclusions. I would very much like to know how other parts of the U.S. in particular are developing future directions, responses to the U.S. position, directions for future work, etc. You have raised some very serious concerns, Joe. Margaret Kurds: US Sleeping? UK Sidetrack? Response 5 of 5 igc:goodwork mideast.forum 10:26 pm Apr 25, 1991 Sounds like a good general combination your group is coming up with, I talk about: 1. consultation of any helpers with Kurdish and Iraqi leadership 2. aid provided by unarmed people (this could include members of anyone's militaries, and since they would be functioning after consultation and agreement, that's a reasonable request(!)). 3. recognition of the needs of ALL in Iraq, and commitment to aid the non-Kurds too. There are similar considerations about the shape and goals of the L.A. Coalition Against U.S. Intervention in the Middle East; it seems that for now we'll keep our name and focus. Meditation: Consider the suffering of those whose suffering we have been told to consider; consider the suffering of those whose suffering we have not been told to consider; consider the suffering of those whose suffering we have been told not to consider; consider the suffering of those who tell us whose suffering to consider and whose suffering not to consider; consider our own suffering as witnesses and people attempting to help with the suffering of others in this time. _______________________ From aldopacific at gn.apc.org Mon Apr 29 23:02:40 1991 From: aldopacific at gn.apc.org (aldopacific at gn.apc.org) Date: 29 Apr 1991 22:02:40 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Kurds: US Sleeping? UK Sidetrack? References: Message-ID: That's a magic meditation on suffering. Yes! I've been wondering why I've been all worked up about the Kurds, while friends are going round with badges saying, "I've not forgotton Africa". I actually bought one of these badges the other day, but then didn't put it on because I thought that in honesty, I had rather forgotton Africa, at least in the sense that I wasn't active on it. Why? I think because we're so very obviously implicated in the suffering of the Kurds and the Shi'ites. Acting on there behalf feels like also making a statement that WAR DIDN'T WORK! And that's important, when we recognise that war, or the mentality which causes war, is at the heart of so much famine etc. in the world. I think another thing has been that I love Africans - so much so that I filled in the infamous census question the other day saying my "race" was "Celtic - but with a black heart". But in the past I've felt ambivalent about peoples of the middle east. One of the good things to come out of the war has been the need to re-examine such stereotypes, and start to understand middle eastern peoples. Identification with their suffering at our hands has, for me at least, achieved this. It's maybe still a bit hollow - I don't know any Kurds personally, for instance, but the attitude shift is there, so that's a start. I suppose this admission might land me some hate mail, like in forum when I asked who Malcolm X was. But I hope not (says he pre-emptively!), because acknowledging the reality of our prejudices, our racism if you like, and not pretending we've already arrived and are totally right-on, is surely an essential first step for many of us in the society of the "allies" if we are to have any hope of averting future wars. From antennae at gn.apc.org Sun Apr 28 23:41:13 1991 From: antennae at gn.apc.org (antennae at gn.apc.org) Date: 28 Apr 1991 22:41:13 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Libya's view of Kurdish tragedy Message-ID: These items were originally posted on mideast.gulf by peg:lacc at 12:50am Apr 29, 1991. LIBYAN COMMENT ON "ENTHUSIASM" FOR KURDS -- TRIPOLI, LIBYAN TELEVISION NETWORK, APRIL 13TH 1991. -- As much as we are touched by the tragedy of the Iraqi Kurds, we are astonished at the enthusiasm of Western circles for humanitarian causes, such as the cause of the Kurds. The Great Jamahiriya was the first to advocate the rights of the Kurds. At international gatherings and organisations, it called upon the countries of the world, including the Western countries, to stand up for the rights of the oppressed Kurdish nation which is suffering in countries other than Iraq, from the attempts of these countries to obliterate its national character, to the extent of banning the use of the Kurdish language, practicing segregation against them, and treating them as second-class citizens. Where were these glowing humanitarian feelings of the West then, and where are they now as regards the tragedy of the Palestinian people, the famine experienced by the Somali people, and the racial practices carried out against the people of Africa. Is this the new world the West is dreaming of, or is it one of its fantasies designed to throw dust in our eyes? UNOFFICIAL TRANSLATION - LIBYAN ARAB CULTURAL CENTRE MELBOURNE AUSTRALIA - PO BOX 373, BRUNSWICK, 3056, MELBOURNE, AUSTRALIA. ----------------------------------------------------------- LIBYA CONDEMNS INTERFERENCE peg:lacc mideast.gulf 12:51 am Apr 29, 1991 CALLS FOR INTERFERENCE CONDEMNED -- APRIL 12TH 1991 JAMAHIRIYA ARAB NEWS AGENCY, COMMENT BY INTERNATIONAL AFFAIRS EDITOR -- Calls for interfernence in the internal affairs of other states is a novelty in the international law which must be confronted and despised, because the principle of the sovereignty of states is sacred according to the U.N. charter and the principle of international legitamacy and that any attempts to interfere in the internal affairs of other states is considered a flagrant breach of such charter. The disputes that occurs amongst the minorities of the world are not solved by foreign intervention, on the contrary this latter thing increases their intensity and as a result the true solution is the establishment of people's authority so that all can live and coexist in security and peace and in order that a minority will not be oppressed by the majority, the masses are equal in the people's conferences and people's committees. UNOFFICIAL TRANSLATION - LIBYAN ARAB CULTURAL CENTRE MELBOURNE AUSTRALIA - PO BOX 373, BRUNSWICK, 3056, MELBOURNE, AUSTRALIA. ----------------------------------------------------------- LIBYA ON U.S. OCCUPATION peg:lacc mideast.gulf 12:53 am Apr 29, 1991 LIBYA ON U.S OCCUPATION -- MARCH 28TH 1991 LIBYAN DOMESTIC RADIO SERVICE -- The consequences of Iraq's occupation of Kuwait have begun to emerge. Another Arab country has lost its independence, thus raising to four the number of Arab countries now under occupation, namely Iraq, Bahrain, Kuwait, and Palestine. On a sad, black day, Bahrain has become a U.S. colony and it has transpired that the despatch of forces to liberate Kuwait was a big act of deception, for they have remained in Kuwait replacing the Iraqi occupation with U.S occupation. UNOFFICIAL TRANSLATION - LIBYAN ARAB CULTURAL CENTRE MELBOURNE AUSTRALIA - PO BOX 373, BRUNSWICK, MELBOURNE, 3056, AUSTRALIA. From kurds at gn.apc.org Sun Apr 28 23:58:28 1991 From: kurds at gn.apc.org (kurds at gn.apc.org) Date: 28 Apr 1991 22:58:28 +0000 (GMT) Subject: Stay tuned for news from Kurdistan Message-ID: At the Kurdish Cultural Centre we are in daily touch with refugees who have reached Iran or Turkey. We take perhaps twenty phone calls a day from border regions in these countries and are thus in a good position to know exactly what is going on. As media coverage of the Kurdish tragedy wanes, we will take over the task of keeping you informed of events in the region. >From tomorrow, we shall be posting daily bulletins on this conference containing the latest news. Our reports have had a reputation for accuracy. Many times during the past weeks, we have given a story to the press - one example was of Kurdish women and children being strapped onto Iraqi tanks as human shields - which later have been verified by independent sources. Our reputation among the journalists here in London is good. Sarbast Aram, our co-ordinator, has also been a frequent guest on TV current affairs discussion programmes, most recently BBC's 'Newsnight'. Keep watching this space. From kurds at gn.apc.org Mon Apr 29 00:30:29 1991 From: kurds at gn.apc.org (kurds at gn.apc.org) Date: 28 Apr 1991 23:30:29 +0000 (GMT) Subject: While listening to Kurdish singing Message-ID: This conference was originally started to give you background information about the Kurdish people, land, history, culture and present situation. Sadly, it has been dominated by the tragedy that followed the Gulf War. For the last month now, we have been working round the clock on our Kurdish Disaster Fund Appeal. (Which is now at around 400,000 pounds sterling - we're aiming for a million.) Our Appeal began with no funding - indeed, no funds - all the money we had raised earlier in the year had gone to help children who were cold and hungry in the Turkish refugee camps that had been established after the 1988 chemical attacks on Kurdish villages. We had to borrow the money to run the first advertisement - so we've come a long way. But it feels like being halfway up a steep and dangerous mountain. Looking back the way you came, you are amazed you made it - but then you look upwards and see that the steepest, most dangerous part is still to come. I did not actually begin this topic to tell you all this, but to make a plea for more discussion on this conference. What are your views on what should happen in Iraqi Kurdistan or, as it is known to most Kurds, to Kurdistan (Iraq sector)? Do you think the Kurdish people will ever achieve true self-determination and, if so, how do you think such a thing will ever come about? Indeed, in these days of world federalism and European communities, is the nationalism of a dispossessed people a backward looking stance? Think globally, act locally - the rallying cry of the Greens - could this hold a clue to the future of our region? What do you think of some of the ideas put forward in earlier items on the conference? What, in the light of EUNOMIA's comments, should one make of the Libyan remarks about 'sacred' sovereignty? And vice versa? Someone thought there was common cause between the Kurds and the Jews. Might it not be argued that there is at least as much common cause between the Kurds and the Palestinians? And does not herein lie another poignant irony? Sooner or later the full extent of Western support for Saddam Hussein in the years before his Kuwait adventure will come out into the open. When it does, will anyone learn anything? Isn't it incredible that after Auschwitz, German firms could still supply chemicals to Saddam, knowing full well that he was probably turning them into weapons? Has anyone yet realised that the first use of chemical weapons against Kurdish civilians was not by Iraqi forces but by Britian's Royal Air Force, back in the bad old days after the First World War? No-one has told the British public this. Isn't it at least arguable that if western governments had behaved - as Antennae puts it - 'morally' when Saddam was gassing Kurds, and had taken strong measures to stop him, that he would never have invaded Kuwait in the first place? In which case doesn't it become incumbent on the peace movement to make its main concern PREVENTATIVE protest action, rather than banner waving when it's too late? In other words, if you want peace, fight for human rights. Do it now. Tomorrow is always too late. If it is too late, as it was with Saddam, what is the 'moral' stance on military action? Is war always totally and utterly wrong? Can it be justified to free a people that is being unjustly oppressed and wickedly tortured? I can't remember the exact quotation, but didn't Mahatma Gandhi, the greatest pacifist ever, himself say that if it came to a choice between cowardice and violence, he would choose violence? (He did, by tomorrow I'll have checked the reference.) And is it not the rankest moral cowardice to stand by when a people is being slaughtered, wringing your hands and calling upon higher moral principles to justify your actions? These thoughts are like huge rocks, they prop each other up and cannot be shifted. Yet wouldn't it be wonderful if, somehow, there was a way for a people to be free, without violence, without hatred, without tears? Indra From mphillips at igc.apc.org Mon Apr 29 12:38:21 1991 From: mphillips at igc.apc.org (Margaret B. Phillips) Date: Mon, 29 Apr 1991 04:38:21 -0700 (PDT) Subject: While listening to Kurdish singing References: Message-ID: I agree completely, Indra, on the need for preventative peace movement action. Our actions here (St. Louis, MO, USA) have been publicly quiet while we discuss what to do from here. The decision so far is to do just the sort of preventative public education you are talking about, illuminating for the public what the U.S. policies were which made the war happen, just how cynical the U.S. attitude towards the Kurds has been, and so on. But it takes some time to discuss and think through how we want to do this. Margaret Phillips From greenleft at peg.pegasus.oz.au Tue Apr 30 09:27:13 1991 From: greenleft at peg.pegasus.oz.au (greenleft at peg.pegasus.oz.au) Date: 30 Apr 1991 18:27:13 +1000 Subject: Debate: Iraq and the Kurds Message-ID: DEBATE: IRAQ AND THE KURDS By John Arrowood In his article ``Kurds: `Bush Responsible for Massacre''' (issue 8), Peter Boyle writes: ``United States forces occupying southern Iraq ... did nothing to stop Saddam Hussein from brutally crushing the Kurdish revolt and an earlier revolt by Shiites in the south''. He appropriates here both the perspective and the language of apologists for the continuing imperialist adventure in the Gulf region. No-one would want to deny or minimise the plight of the Kurdish refugees. However, by abstracting their suffering from its context in devastated post-war Iraq, Peter plays right into the hands of the propagandists and fails to grasp the essential content of his own headline. Bush and the forces he represents are indeed responsible for the present crisis, but not in the simple one-sided way the article suggests. They are responsible primarily because, by destroying the infrastructure of the Iraqi nation, they created the conditions in which such an outcome was entirely predictable. When the economic, social and political foundations of a society are vandalised by the most brutal means imaginable, chaos inevitably results. That the consequences are bloody should surprise no-one. By focussing on the suffering of the Kurds in isolation, Peter further assists the propagandists. They want to ignore the desperate condition of the rest of the Iraqis and of the captive populations (largely but not exclusively Palestinian) of Kuwait in the aftermath of this vicious war. They cynically exploit the Kurds to distract attention from these realities, as well as to retrospectively justify the savagery of the US and its allies. Peter also colludes with imperialist propaganda by personalising the issues. Saddam brutally crushed the revolt. This is nonsense. It invests Hussein with a degree of personal power and demonic energy which exists nowhere in the real world. It is the stuff of propagandist fantasy. But it is not just a form of words. Saddam is not my ideal of a political leader; neither is he a demon. To turn him into one was, as Ramsey Clarke pointed out months ago, the prime move of the Americans in justifying their attack on Iraq. They continue to do so in the aftermath of the war in case people start questioning who the real ``demons'' were. Peter should not have been drawn into participation in this project. Most significantly, the inescapable conclusion to be drawn from the sentence quoted above is that the US should have done ``something''. That ``something'' could only be further military intervention. Is that what Peter wanted? Following through the logic of his statement, you find that he is upholding the right of the US to use its military might to determine the course of political events in Iraq and elsewhere. This was the ``right'' they exercised in prosecuting the war - and will soon be exercising somewhere else in the third world. Which side is Peter on? He goes much further than the Kurdish representatives he quotes. They make their opposition to American intervention clear. In short, Peter Boyle has fallen into the trap in which large sections of the peace movement have been caught since the conflict began. He reinforces key elements in the imperialist propaganda while attempting to oppose the actions it is used to justify. I regret having to take him to task over this. Attempting to come to terms with complex and changing events, and surrounded by propagandist distortion, we all make mistakes of judgment. Only through open and vigorous debate will the left achieve the clarity it so desperately needs in the present period. Saddam, imperialism and the Kurds By Peter Boyle I also think vigorous debate has a place in left politics, though I would hope it might take place without immediately reaching for extreme accusations, such as that of collusion with imperialist propaganda. I do not support United States military intervention in Iraq or anywhere else. The Kurds have called for a United Nations peacekeeping force, and I would support such a call provided the force is made up of genuinely neutral troops. Secondly, much of the media coverage of the Kurds' plight is not imperialist propaganda but fairly accurate reportage of a human disaster. Moreover, it is coverage that embarrassed the Bush government, which would have preferred to let Saddam Hussein deal with the Kurds without the glare of international publicity. Yes, chaos and civil disaster are an inevitable outcome of war, but the flight of more than half the Kurdish population of Iraq does not fall simply within this category. The Kurds fled out of fear that they would be slaughtered by the Iraqi army in retaliation for their abortive uprising. I accept there is some ambiguity in my phrase ``United States forces occupying southern Iraq ... did nothing to stop Saddam Hussein from brutally crushing the Kurdish revolt''. But this phrase reflects the opinions of the Kurdish representatives I spoke to. They have a point. Their grievances against the regime are of long standing, and when Bush called for a revolt against Saddam, the Kurds and Shiites took him seriously. They didn't realise that only a revolt within the army would be acceptable to Bush, that he simply wanted a more tractable general in power, and that unacceptable mass revolts would be left, unarmed or very lightly armed, to face the full force of the Iraqi army. I think the US should get right out of the Middle East, but since the US was at least partly responsible for this latest Kurdish uprising, might not the Kurds have reasonably expected some support - such as, for example, no-strings-attached military and material aid? What about diplomatic initiatives at the United Nations and elsewhere in support of Kurdish self-determination? As with the whole Gulf War, military intervention was only one option. Of course, the Kurds were rather credulous in expecting assistance from the US, but that doesn't excuse Bush's callous acceptance of a mass slaughter resulting, at least partly, from a call he made for an uprising. As for my supposed demonising of Saddam, it's true I held Saddam responsible for the policies of the Iraqi government, just as I hold Bush responsible for the policies of the US government. Would John blame the Iraqi parliament instead? It's worth filling in a little background on Saddam. This is no glorious anti-imperialist fighter. He heads the Baath Party, a group originating among right-wing elements in the army in 1951. It emerged in reaction to a huge rise of popular struggle led largely by the Iraqi Communist Party. Ideologically, Baathism drew directly on some aspects of Nazism. Formed in 1934, by 1959 the Communist Party was leading demonstrations of up to 500,000 in Baghdad, calling for fundamental social and economic change and land reform. CIA boss Allen Dulles said the situation in Iraq was the most dangerous in the world. >From late 1958, the Baath Party, aided by police, organised murder squads and terror against the Communists and the mass movement. In these gangs, Saddam Hussein began his rise to the top of the Baath Party. Slowly, the mass movement declined, but still the Communist Party was a mass force, so in 1963 the Baathists unleashed nine months of bloody terror in which Communist Party members and mass leaders were shot in the street, herded into concentration camps, tortured to death and executed after mock trials. During all this, the CIA fed the Baathists lists of names. In recent years, Saddam has zigzagged politically, and at one stage the Communist Party fell into the trap of an alliance with the Baathists. But through all this, the Iraqi regime has been one of the most repressive in the Middle East. This leaves aside its role in launching the Iraq-Iran war, the poison gas attacks on the Kurds etc. I came on the scene far too late to demonise this vicious dictator. He did that himself, long ago. The imperialist propagandists didn't even need to tell many lies about him! ************************************************************ Reprinted from Green Left, weekly progressive newspaper. May be reproduced with acknowledgment but without charge by movement publications and organisations.