TURKEY: ''DO NOT FORGET US''

[Howard Frederick]

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)