The Kurdistan Committee of Canada

[kurdeng at aps.nl]

From: tabe at newsdesk.aps.nl
Subject: The Kurdistan Committee of Canada
Reply-To: kurdeng at aps.nl

------------------------ Forwarded from : kcc at magi.com -------------------------

Kurdistan Committee of Canada

     Most Canadian people had not heard about the Kurds until the
Gulf War. At that time, it suited the Western governments and media
to portray Kurdish people as casualties of Saddam's regime. The
coverage of European and American relief efforts and 'Operation
Provide Comfort' in South Kurdistan (northern Iraq) perpetuated the
acceptable image of the Kurdish people as refugees and grateful
dependants of the West.
     Far from being beneficiaries of the West, the Kurds continue
to be its victims. While in the so-called "safe haven" of northern
Iraq around 6 million Kurds enjoy the dubious protection of U.S.
air power, close to 20 million Kurds in Turkey are subject to
fierce state repression. Turkey, a NATO member financed and
equipped by the West, is engaged in a brutal counter-insurgency war
to destroy Kurdish resistance.
     This aspect of the West's policy has, until recently, received
little coverage in the media, which in general follows the European
and U.S. governments' acceptance of Turkey as a valued military
ally and candidate for entry into the European Union (EU). The
Kurds' armed struggle for national and cultural rights, a last
resort forced on the Kurdish people by the denial of any democratic
channels of expression, has been routinely stigmatised as
"terrorism".
     But things are beginning to change. The suppression of pro-
Kurdish newspapers, the banning of Kurdish political parties, and
the arrest of MPs has undermined Turkey's liberal facade. It is
becoming apparent that the cases of assassination and torture of
individuals, attacks on towns and villages by the military, and the
depopulation of rural areas are not the unfortunate side-effects of
the "war against terrorism". Instead these are part of a systematic
onslaught by the Turkish state against the people of Kurdistan in
order to destroy any aspirations towards cultural, political, or
economic independence.
     The struggle of the people of North Kurdistan (southeastern
Turkey) is vital to the future not only of the Kurdish people as a
whole but to all the peoples of the region. The Western powers
played a major role in partitioning Kurdistan and in sustaining
regimes which have tried to eliminate the Kurdish people. The
people of Canada have a responsibility to ensure that their
government finally ends its support for the opponents of the
Kurdish people's fight for self-determination.
     The truth about the situation in Kurdistan must be brought to
the widest possible audience through the media and political, human
rights, and trade union organizations. The Kurdistan Committee of
Canada (KCC) plays a vital role in this task.

The KCC:

* Provides the latest news on the situation in Kurdistan;
* Exposes every form of human rights violation and repression     
  against the Kurdish people;
* Informs the public about the political and cultural developments
  in Kurdistan.

The KCC aims:

* To disseminate information to the press and media;
* To solicit the support of human rights organizations;
* To secure the interest of parliament, political leaders, parties,
  and other democratic and progressive forces;
* To publish documents, reports, and books related to the politics
  and culture of Kurdistan;
* To provide information and give advice to journalists,
  parliamentarians, and human rights activists intending to visit the
  region.

KCC publications include:

* Kurdish News, a monthly newsletter;
* English translations of daily updates from the KURD-A news
  agency;
* Documents and resolutions from the Kurdistan Parliament in Exile;
* Reports from MPs, lawyers, and human rights organizations
  concerning human rights abuses in Kurdistan.

"We must never again leave millions of men, women, and children at
the mercy of the Turkish army."
     - Danielle Mitterand, wife of the President of France

The KCC calls for:

* An independent international human rights investigation into
  widespread human rights abuses committed against Kurds,
  particularly against Kurdish women;
* A UN special investigation into torture, arbitrary detention, and
  extrajudicial executions, and for the perpetrators of these grave
  violations to be brought to trial;
* The Kurdish people to be allowed to exercise their fundamental
  universally-acknowledged right to self-determination;
* A negotiated settlement to the Kurdish question, with the Turkish
  government agreeing to open an unconditional dialogue with
  representatives of the Kurdish people;
* The U.S., Canada, and all EU countries to immediately stop
  supplying weaponry to Turkey and to issue an arms embargo and
  impose economic sanctions;
* Canada and all other nations to end the deportation of Kurdish
  people to Turkey;
* Canada to recognize and support the Kurdistan Parliament in
  Exile;
* Tourists to boycott Turkey as a holiday destination.

"...Kurdish people throughout southern Turkey, very ordinary,
humble people, have decided they would rather die standing up than
spend their lives on their knees...it was the most extraordinary
and inspiring sight of my life...I hope one day they have the kind
of freedoms we take for granted."
     - Michael Ignatieff, writer and broadcaster

Kurdistan Committee of Canada
2487 Kaladar Ave. Suite 203
Ottawa, Ontario, K1V 8B9

Tel: (613) 733-9634
Fax: (613) 733-0090
E-mail: kcc at magi.com

A Brief History

     Kurdistan is situated in a highly strategic part of the Middle
East straggling the upper reaches of the Tigris and Euphrates
rivers. The Kurds are descendants of Indo-European peoples who
entered the area about 4,000 years ago and are believed to be
related to the ancient Medes. The Kurdish language, which is
divided into three main dialects, is related most closely to Farsi
and shares some similarities with other Indo-European languages.
The area now covered by Kurdistan has been occupied since the 7th
century BC by successive empires, including the Persian,
Macedonian, Roman, Armenian, and Byzantine.
     In the 7th century AD, under the impact of the Arab invasions,
many Kurds were converted to Sunni Islam. In the 11th century, the
Seljuq Turks, originating from central Asia, conquered much of what
is now eastern Turkey, including parts of Kurdistan. Predominantly
a nomadic, pastoral people, the Kurds retained a degree of
independence under their own tribal heads and feudal overlords
until the 16th century, when the land was partitioned between the
Ottoman (Turkish) and Safavid (Persian) empires. The Ottoman
sultans levied taxes on the Kurdish people and conscripted the
young men for military service but usually did not interfere with
the culture and traditional way of life of their Islamic subjects.
However, there were attempts by some Kurdish tribal leaders to
reassert complete political independence.
     Following the defeat of the Turks in the First World War, the
Ottoman Empire was carved up by the Western allies. The Treaty of
Sevres (1920) recognized that an independent Kurdish state should
be set up in northern Kurdistan (Turkey), but even this minimum
concession to the Kurds was ignored by the Treaty of Lausanne
(1923). Britain and France partitioned Kurdistan between their
protectorates, Iraq and Syria, and the newly established Republic
of Turkey. Eastern Kurdistan remained part of a pro-Western Persia.
Strategically, Turkey and Persia were seen as buffers against
Bolshevik Russia, while economically Britain had access to the
oilfields of southern Kurdistan.
     During the 1920s and 30s, the Kurds were bombed by Britain's
air force into a grudging acceptance of the Iraqi state and
monarchy. In Turkey, under the ultra-nationalist, Westernizing
military regime of Kemal Ataturk, the Kurds were deprived of any
right to express their own identity. Rebellions were crushed with
great ferocity, culminating in the suppression of the Dersim
uprising in 1938. In 1946, in the aftermath of the Second World
War, the first short-lived Kurdish state was established at Mahabad
in Iran, but this was soon destroyed by the Shah's forces.
     Following the overthrow of the pro-Western Iraqi monarchy and
coming into power of the populist military regime of General Qassim
in 1961, the Kurds of northern Iraq, frustrated by broken promises
of autonomy, launched an armed uprising. The bravery of the Kurdish
peshmerga fighters was ill-served by opportunist leaders who sought
deals first with the Baathist regime and later with the Shah. They
were defeated in 1975 and the process of the Arabization of
Kurdistan was accelerated by the Baathists in Iraq. Although the
Kurds of eastern Kurdistan (Iran) supported the struggle against
the Shah, Khomeini's Islamic regime reneged on promises of
political and cultural rights and the Kurds fell victim to general
repression. The outbreak of the Iran-Iraq war opened up the
opportunity for the Kurds to fight for their own cause, but all to
often the adherence to the principle of "my enemy's enemy is my
friend" led to clashes between rival Kurdish groups sponsored by
Iran or Iraq. This culminated in the Iraqi offensive which in 1988
included the use of chemical weapons against the town of Halabja
and the gassing of 5,000 Kurds.
     In Turkey, despite harsh political and cultural repression,
reinforced by periodic terms of military rule, the Kurdistan
Workers Party (PKK) developed a strategy of fighting for Kurdistan
on an unequivocal anti-imperialist program. In 1984, having
weathered the harsh repression of the military junta which came to
power in a September 1980 coup, the PKK launched an armed struggle,
establishing the People's Liberation Army of Kurdistan (ARGK). Over
the last decade, despite a brutal counter-insurgency campaign by
the Turkish state - including the use of death squads, torture, the
setting up of bands of armed collaborators ("village guards"), and
the destruction of over 2,000 villages to depopulate the
countryside - the resistance of the Kurdish people has increased.
     Allied to the PKK and the ARGK, the National Liberation Front
of Kurdistan (ERNK) has also continued to build up political
support among the people of Europe by exposing the role of the
Turkish state and demonstrating the will of the Kurdish people to
resist and achieve their freedom.
     The Kurds are the largest people in the world without their
own state. But the Kurdish people will not abandon their struggle
for national liberation. On April 12, 1995, the Kurdistan
Parliament in Exile was opened in Europe. This body will act as the
political voice of the Kurdish people in exile and of the national
liberation struggle and it will seek to achieve a peaceful and
democratic solution to the Kurdish question. We call on everyone to
support the Kurdistan Parliament in Exile!

Stop the dirty war in Kurdistan!

In 1994 alone, 12 billion dollars were spent on the war in
Kurdistan, resulting in 5,458 people killed, 1,292 death squad
murders, 1,500 villages destroyed, 328 persons disappeared, and
thousands of political prisoners.

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Kurdistan Committee of Canada		Tel: (613) 733-9634
2487 Kaladar Ave. Suite 203		Fax: (613) 733-0090
Ottawa, Ontario, K1V 8B9		E-mail: kcc at magi.com
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