From kurd-l at burn.ucsd.edu  Wed Aug  7 15:27:05 1996
From: kurd-l at burn.ucsd.edu (kurd-l at burn.ucsd.edu)
Date: 07 Aug 1996 15:27:05
Subject: Torture in Turkey
References: <APC.1.0.54efc68e.50d@igc.apc.org>
Message-ID: <bac1c849.Pine.NEB.3.95.960807084..@burn.ucsd.edu>

From: Arm The Spirit <ats at locust.cic.net>

Turkey Reels Amid Abuse Allegations

Adana, Turkey (Boston Globe - August 5, 1996) Her left arm
hanging painfully, the scar above her right eye still fresh, she
says she was tortured by the Turkish police.
     It is a terrifying story of being stripped, blindfolded and
beaten, hanged by her arms, singed with electrical wires,
threatened with rape by unseen tormentors. After three days, she
says, she was thrown into the street without being charged.
     Asking to be called by the pseudonym Dilan, this 23-year-old
reporter for a Kurdish rights magazine says doctors believe it
will be six months before her arm returns to normal. But while
she has sought therapy and is on medication, the antitorture
center that treated her is under attack by the state.
     The story of Dilan and the center that helped her provides a
window into the state of human rights in Turkey, a country that
not only straddles East and West but is caught in an uncertain
political transition from strict secularism to a greater role for
Islam in public affairs.
     As troubling as Turkey's human rights record is - the U.S.
State Department's most recent report cites "very serious
problems" - it is a far cry from that of its neighbors, Iran,
Iraq and Syria, where a torture treatment center like the one
here, if it ever found its way into existence, would be shut down
and everyone associated with it incarcerated.
     A Western diplomat in Ankara, the country's capital, said:
"Torture is something that can be stopped here. There are people
at the top of the government who want it to stop. But they have
got to get control of the apparatus." Dilan's circumstances tell
much about Turkey today - she is a Kurd in a state where Kurdish
identity is denied official status, and a reporter in a country
where 20 journalists have been killed by security forces in the
past eight years. While condemning the system, she feels
confident enough in it to talk to a foreign reporter.
     Yet it is the Treatment and Rehabilitation Center in this
southern port city that has drawn the attention of international
human rights organizations.
     An unassuming downtown office of gray-green carpeting and
comfortable furniture, the 18-month-old center, an oasis for
Turkey's victims of state torture, is snared in a legal Catch-22
by a government unhappy with its penchant for publicizing details
of abuse.
     The dispute has become a minor cause celebre, with the
American Medical Association and Amnesty International, among
others, coming to the center's defense.
     In legal terms, the charges against the center, one of four
operated by the Human Rights Foundation of Turkey, are that it
has no Health Ministry license and that its directors are guilty
of failing to report a crime - torture.
     In reality, human rights activists here and abroad say, the
case, which returns to court in early September, is a form of
harassment since the center can hardly be expected to provide
details of its clients to the police when it is the police who
have allegedly victimized those same clients.
     "There is something Kafkaesque about the whole case", said
Dr. Charles Clements, president of the Boston-based Physicians
for Human Rights, who was recently here.
     "People who have been tortured and tell doctors so are often
taken back and retortured", Clements said. "Physicians
interviewed fear for their own safety. And the provincial
governor we talked to said torture doesn't exist, so how can they
treat it? In other words, officials deny torture exists and then
charge people for not reporting it."
     A new report on torture of detainees in Turkey by Physicians
for Human Rights is scheduled to be released tomorrow.
     The AMA wrote in a letter to Turkish authorities that to
hand over names and files "would be in violation of medical
confidentiality and the duty of health professionals to protect
the well-being of their patients."
     "They are trying to oblige us to give the names of the
victims to the police", said Yavuz Onen, president of the Human
Rights Foundation, sitting in his Ankara office. "This is a
crucial point for us. Victims are often afraid to come to us at
first. We have to create conditions where they feel secure."
     That is no easy task. Adana is on the edge of a region under
emergency military rule where a virtual civil war between the
Workers Party of Kurdistan and the Turkish military has rendered
large sections of the country's southeast unliveable.
     In recent years 3,000 villages where the Workers Party of
Kurdistan guerrillas either has been active or could take refuge
have been burned to the ground by the military, creating huge
waves of internal refugees. Adana, whose population is officially
900,000, is said to have grown to 2.5 million inhabitants today
as a result.
     These include families such as that of Suleiman Tan, 60,
whose village of Tiri in Sirit province was burned down several
years ago after he and many of the other residents declined the
army's demand that they become "village guards", a paramilitary
force aimed at keeping out the Workers Party of Kurdistan, known
by its initials here as PKK.
     It may seem strange that Tan would refuse to play a role in
stopping the PKK, a group that has never hesitated to engage in
brutal terrorist acts even against its own people if they are
thought to be collaborators with the Turkish military.
     But significant portions of Turkey's 12 million Kurds - 20
percent of the population - resent that their language, culture
and identity have been squelched so fiercely by Turkey since the
state was founded on the remains of the Ottoman empire 73 years
ago by Mustafa Kemal Ataturk.
     And with few other possibilities for ethnic expression -
broadcasts in Kurdish are forbidden and pro-Kurdish political
groups are constantly harassed - there is widespread sympathy for
the Kurdish party among the impoverished southeastern population.
     "In my family there are at least 20 people who are in the
PKK. That is the reality of the Kurdish people today", said
Behcet Aslan, a 38-year-old produce wholesaler who was also
tortured by the police, forced to sign a confession but then
acquitted of activism by a court.
     Ataturk's view was that nationalism, supported by outside
powers, ate away at the Ottoman empire, and that if a country
were to survive here, it had to ban any identity other than a
Turkish one. That is essentially how most Turks still feel.
     The United States is unhappy about the lack of Kurdish
rights and gently says so to the country's leaders, but the
United States has more strategic concerns in Turkey.
     For years, Turkey, the second-largest army in NATO and
third-largest recipient of U.S. military aid, was a bulwark
against the neighboring Soviet Union. When the Soviet Union
collapsed at the start of this decade, Turkey still was seen as
having a key role in competing with Iran for the hearts and minds
of Central Asia, home to a variety of Turkish peoples.
     In addition, Turkey is more democratic than nearly all its
neighbors. And it permits the U.S.-led allies to run Operation
Provide Comfort from an air base next to Adana, which keeps Iraqi
President Saddam Hussein and his air force out of northern Iraq
and away from the Iraqi Kurds.
     Finally, Turkey has longstanding disputes with Syria, Iraq
and Iran, none of them great friends of Washington, and it has
recently upgraded its relations with Israel and Jordan, two key
U.S. allies in the region.
     But the political future has been thrown into question by
the rise of the Islamic-oriented Refah, or Welfare Party. Its
leader, Necmettin Erbakan, campaigned against Provide Comfort and
the pact with Israel and promised more attention to Kurds.
     Having squeaked into power through an alliance with the
pro-Western conservative Tansu Ciller, Erbakan is in no position
to carry out many of his campaign promises and he has begun to
back away from them.
     But no one knows if Refah peaked with its 21 percent of the
vote or has simply begun its climb. And since its arrival in
power marks such a radical departure from Ataturk's secular,
nationalist philosophy, it is unclear what other taboos, such as
an emphasis on ethnic identities, will be broken.

Turkish Doctors Forced To Deny Torture - U.S. Group

Ankara, Turkey (Reuter - August 6, 1996) Turkish security forces
regularly coerce doctors to conceal physical findings of torture
among detainees, a report released Tuesday by a U.S. medical
group said.
     "The Turkish government permits widespread and systematic
torture of detainees in Turkey and physicians are coerced to
become the unwilling accomplices of the government in this
practice", the Boston-based Physicians for Human Rights (PHR)
said in a report.
     It urged Turkey to prohibit incommunicado detention,
investigate allegations of torture, provide detainees with prompt
medical examinations and train security officials to respect
human rights.
     The two-year study, based on evidence from six independent
sources, included a survey of 60 Turkish doctors, analysis of
more than 150 official medical reports of detainees and
interviews with 39 torture survivors.
     The torture victims detailed beatings, sexual violations,
electric shock to the genitals, burns, deprivation of food and
water, spraying with pressure hoses, mock executions and threats
to friends and family.
     Among the victims were health professionals, lawyers,
journalists, shopkeepers, taxi drivers, teachers and students.
     The report highlighted the coercion of doctors in the mainly
Kurdish southeast of Turkey where the armed forces have been
fighting separatist rebels for the last 12 years.
     One doctor told of his examination of a young female
detainee whose signs of torture he refrained from reporting for
fear of reprisals.
     "I could not write the report. It was terrible. I felt that
if I did, I would either be exiled or be a victim of a mysterious
killing", he said.
     Security officials in the southeast have the power to exile
suspected Kurdish militants to other parts of the country.
     Another doctor said he was threatened for reporting torture.
     "Once, when I reported positive findings, one of the police
officials got very irritated. He threatened me and said the
police would not bring new cases to me", he said.
     A 17-year-old girl, identified as C.M., was arrested and
tortured in 1995 for hanging a poster, the report said. She was
stripped naked, blindfolded and suspended from a bar attached to
her arms.
     "It was extremely painful. A wire was attached to one of my
toes and another wire applied shocks to different parts of my
body: my breasts, feet, abdomen, and vagina", she said in an
interview with the human rights group.
     The doctors' survey revealed that 96 percent of respondents
believe torture is a problem in Turkey and 60 percent believe
that "nearly everyone who is detained is tortured."


From stk at schism.antenna.nl  Thu Aug  1 04:05:00 1996
From: stk at schism.antenna.nl (stk at schism.antenna.nl)
Date: 01 Aug 1996 04:05:00
Subject: Iran Attacks Kurdistan Democratic P
References: <bac1c849.Pine.NEB.3.95.960730082..@burn.ucsd.edu>
Message-ID: <080196010523Rnf0.77b9@schism.antenna.nl>

------------------------------ forwarded message -----------------------------
M.MERLIN at TBX.berlinet.de (Maurice Merlin) writes:

## Nachricht zur Information/Dokumentation weitergeleitet
## Orig.-Abs. : ats at locust.cic.net (arm the spirit)



Statement From The Political Bureau Of Kurdish Democratic Party
Of Iran (KDPI)

Dear countrymen!
Respectful people of Kurdistan!
All freedom-lovers in the world!

     As can be seen and as we had warned earlier, the Islamic
Republic regime [of Iran] has implemented its treacherous plot by
attacking the centre of KDPI and the families of Iranian Kurdish
refugees by trespassing into the territory of its neighbouring
country.
     In the night of the 5th and the beginning hours of 6th of
Gelawij [Iranian month Mordad] 1375, that is July 27, 1996, a
force of some thousands of Sepah-e Pasdaran-e Iran equipped with
all kinds of heavy guns such as artillery (cannons), Katyushas
and tanks entered from Mariwan border into the territory of Iraq
and that night reached Suleymaniya and took up positions in
Muesker el-Salam. Less than 24 hours after reaching there, they
faced the region where the base of the Political Bureau is
located. Around the night of July 28, they penetrated into a very
strategic point in that region.
     At 6:30 in the morning on July 28, the invading forces
started to fire shells at the Party's base and at the Iranian
Kurdish refugees camp. This is still going on and at 10:00 in the
morning of the same day, they started their land invasion and
heavy fighting is continuing between the reactionary forces of
Pasdaran and the Pishmarg forces of the Party.
     At this time that we expose their savage invasion, we ask
all countrymen, all members of the Party, and political
organisations and any international group and association to do
any thing that they can to stop this invasion by the Iranian
regime and don't let this act against humanity end without a
response.

Political Bureau of the Kurdish Democratic Party of Iran (KDPI)
July 28, 1996

-------------------------------------------------------------------

The original Kurdish text (Kurmanji and Surani) follows:

--------------------------------------------------------------------
The printout on Laser printer looks fine. Here is the corresponding
letters for the control characters:

=CA   E^
=CE   I^
=DE  =20
=E7   c, that is /ch/=20
=EA   e^
=EE   i^
=FB   u^

-----------------------------------------------------------------------
Kurmanji
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
>Daxuyaniya Pol=EEtb=FBroya Partiya Demokrat a Kurdistana =CEran=EA
>
>Hevn=EEshtimaniy=EAn h=EAja!
>Gel=EA bi sheref=EA Kurdistan=EA!
>Azad=EExwaz=EAn seraser=EA C=EEhan=EA!
>
>Wek=EE ku em li bend=EA b=FBn =FB me ber=EA j=EE =EEnqaz kirib=FB, rej=EEm=
a Komara =CEslam=EE plan=EAn=20
>xa=EEnane y=EAn xwe ji bo jihol=EArakirina binkey=EAn Partiya Demokrat a K=
urdistana =CEran=EA,=20
>malbat=EAn kurd =EAn =CEran=EA =EAn penaber =FB b=EAhurmetiya axa welatek=
=EE c=EEran, li dar xist.
>
>=DEeva nabera 5 =FB 6-=EA Gelaw=EAja 1357, r=EAkevta 27/07/1996 h=EAzeke =
=E7end hezar=EE ji=20
>Spah=EA Pasdar=EAn =CEran=EA bi hem=FB celeb=EAn =E7ek=EAn giran wek=EE to=
pxane, katy=FBsha =FB=20
>tank, ji s=EEnor=EA Mer=EEwan=EA we kete nav axa Kurdistana Iraq=EA =FB di=
 eyn=EE shev=EA de=20
>gih=EEshte Sul=EAmaniy=EA =FB li (Meesker el-Selam) c=EEh girt.
>Pisht=EE gih=EEshtina wan k=EAm=EE 24 saetan, h=EAz=EAn wan ber bi nav=E7e=
ya(mintiqeya) Koy=EA -=20
>ku Pol=EEtb=FBroya me li wir e - bi r=EA ketin =FB sheva 28/7 li gelek cih=
=EAn stratej=EEk li=20
>dorber=EA Koy=EA damezira.
>
>H=EAz=EAn h=EArishkeran ji saet 6.30 sibeha roja 28/7 ve binkey=EAn Partiy=
=EA =FB kamp=EAn=20
>kurd=EAn penaber da ber agir=EA gurr =EA topxaney=EA =FB di saet 10.00-=EA=
 v=EA roj=EA dest bi=20
>h=EArisha zem=EEn=EEya xwe kir. Heta niha j=EE sherek=EE giran di navbera =
Pasdar=EAn=20
>kevneperest=EAn =CEran=EA =FB P=EAshmergey=EAn Partiy=EA de didome.
>
>Bi eshkerekirina v=EA h=EArish=EA, em ji hem=FB hevnisht=EEmaniyan, ji hem=
=FB part=EE =FB=20
>r=EAxistin=EAn siyas=EE =FB ji gisht kom =FB komeley=EAn navnetewey=EE dax=
waz dikin ku, bi hem=EE=20
>navg=EEn=EAn ku ji wan re muyeser e, di rawestandina h=EArisha rej=EEma =
=CEran=EA de hewl=20
>bidin =FB neh=EAlin ev tawana dijmirovatiy=EA b=EA reaksiyon derbas be.
>
>Pol=EEtb=FBroya Partiya Demorkat a Kurdistana =CEran=EA
>
>1996-07-28=20
>

-----------------------------------------------------------------------
Surani
-----------------------------------------------------------------------

>Rageyandin=EE Defter=EE Siyas=EE Hizb=EE Demokrat=EE Kurdistan=EE =CAran
>
>Hawn=EEshtimane ber=EAzekan!
>Xelk=EE be sheref=EE Kurdistan!
>Azad=EExwazan=EE seranser=EE c=EEhan!
>
>Herwek =E7aweriwan dekra =FB p=EAshtir=EEsh hushdarman dab=FB, rij=EAm=EE =
Komar=EE =CEslam=EE=20
>p=EElan=EE xa=EEnaney xoy bo l=EAdan=EE binkekan=EE Hizb=EE d=EAmokrat=EE =
Kurdistan=EE =CAran =FB=20
>binemaley kurde awarekan=EE Kurdistan=EE =CAran =FB p=EA sh=EAlkirdin=EE h=
urmet=EE xak=EE wilat=EE=20
>diraws=EA dest p=EA kird.
>
>Shew=EE 5 le ser 6-=EE gelaw=EAj=EE 1357 r=EAkewt=EE 27-=EE J=FB=EEyey 199=
6 h=EAz=EAk=EE =E7end hezar kes=EEy=20
>Supay Pasdar=EE =CAran be hem=FB c=FBre =E7ek=EAk=EE qurs wek topxane, kat=
y=FBsha =FB tanke we=20
>le sin=FBr=EE Mer=EEwane wehate n=EAw xak=EE Kurdistan=EE =CAraq =FB her e=
w shewe gey=EEshte=20
>Sul=EAman=EE =FB le (Muesker el-Selam) c=EAg=EEr b=FB. Kemtir le 24 saet d=
iway=EE gey=EEshtin=EE,=20
>berew naw=E7ey Koye ke binkey defter=EE siyas=EE l=EA ye, wer=EA kewt =FB =
shew=EE 28 J=FB=EEye le=20
>zor nuxtey strat=EAj=EEy dewr =FB ber=EE Koye damezra.
>H=EAze pelemarderekan le saet=EE 6.30 beyan=EE roj=EE 28 J=FB=EEye be xest=
=EE topbaran=EE=20
>binkekan=EE H=EEzb =FB ord=FBgay kurde aware =EAraniyekan=EE dest p=EA kir=
dewe ke ta =EAsta=20
>berdewam e =FB le saet 10 ser le beyan=EE ew rojewe pelemar=EE zem=EEn=EE =
dest p=EA kirdewe=20
>=FB =EAsta sher=EAk=EE qurs le n=EAwan Pasdaran=EE koneperest=EE =CAran =
=FB P=EAshmergekan=EE H=EEzb=20
>berdewam e.
>=CAme le kat=EAk da em pelemare dirindaneye ashkera dekeyn, le hem=FB=20
>hawn=EEshtimanan, le t=EAkray h=EEzb =FB r=EAkxirawe siyasiyekan =FB le gi=
sht kor =FB komele=20
>n=EAwneteweyiyekan dawa dekeyn, be her r=EAgayek da boyan dekr=EA bo ragir=
tin=EE=20
>h=EArish=EE rij=EAm=EE =CAran t=EAbikoshin =FB neh=EAlin ew tawane dij=EE =
=EEnsaniyey be ser da t=EA per=EA.
>
>Defter=EE Siyas=EE H=EEzb=EE D=EAmokrat=EE Kurdistan=EE =CAran
>
>1996-07-28
>1357-05-07

(ATS Note: Thanks to the comrade who sent us this statement. As none of us
in ATS are Kurdish we hope that the text in Surani and Kurmanji is
readable...)

 ++++ stop the execution of Mumia Abu-Jamal ++++
   ++++ if you agree copy these lines to your sig ++++
     ++++ see http://www.xs4all.nl/~tank/spg-l/sigaction.htm ++++

+++=3D=3D=3D+++=3D=3D=3D+++=3D=3D=3D+++=3D=3D=3D+++=3D=3D=3D+++=3D=3D=3D+++=
=3D=3D=3D+++=3D=3D=3D+++=3D=3D=3D+++=3D=3D=3D+++=3D=3D
Arm The Spirit is an autonomist/anti-imperialist information
collective based in Toronto, Canada. Our focus includes a wide=20
variety of material, including political prisoners, national=20
liberation struggles, armed communist resistance, anti-fascism,=20
the fight against patriarchy, and more. We regularly publish our=20
writings, research, and translation materials in our magazine and
bulletins called Arm The Spirit. For more information, contact:

Arm The Spirit
P.O. Box 6326, Stn. A
Toronto, Ontario
M5W 1P7 Canada

E-mail: ats at etext.org
WWW: http://burn.ucsd.edu/~ats
FTP: ftp.etext.org --> /pub/Politics/Arm.The.Spirit
ATS-L Archives: http://burn.ucsd.edu/~archive/ats-l
+++=3D=3D=3D+++=3D=3D=3D+++=3D=3D=3D+++=3D=3D=3D+++=3D=3D=3D+++=3D=3D=3D+++=
=3D=3D=3D+++=3D=3D=3D+++=3D=3D=3D+++=3D=3D=3D+++=3D=3D=20



----------------------------- end forwarded message --------------------------
**********************************************************
Solidaritygroup Turkey-Kurdistan
Memberorganisation of Foundation Initiativegroup Kurdistan
P.O. Box 85306
3508 AH Utrecht
The Netherlands
stk at schism.antenna.nl
**********************************************************

From stk at schism.antenna.nl  Thu Aug  1 04:04:00 1996
From: stk at schism.antenna.nl (stk at schism.antenna.nl)
Date: 01 Aug 1996 04:04:00
Subject: KDP POSITION ON IRANIAN INCURSION I
Message-ID: <080196010452Rnf0.77b9@schism.antenna.nl>

------------------------------ forwarded message -----------------------------
M.MERLIN at TBX.berlinet.de (Maurice Merlin) writes:

## Nachricht zur Information/Dokumentation weitergeleitet
## Orig.-Empf.: /SOC/CULTURE/KURDISH
## Orig.-Abs. : alex.atroushi at mbox200.swipnet.se (Alex Atroushi)


July 28, 1996

PRESS RELEASE

KDP POSITION ON IRANIAN INCURSION INTO IRAQ KURDISTAN
Salahuddien, July 28
It is confirmed that a large Iranian forces of Islamic Revolutionary Guards
( Pasdaran) backed by heavy weapons and assisted by  Patriotic Union  
ofKurdistan (PUK) has crossed the Iranian border and entered the  
region ofIraqi Kurdistan from Bashmakh Penjwien in Sulaimanya  
province.
These forces  moved  Sulaimanya city, Dokan and then camped in Koi  
Senjagtown.
At 06:00 hrs local time on Sunday July 28, the Iranian forces  
startedattacking the bases of Kurdistan Democratic Party of Iran  
(KDPI) and therefugee camps of Iranian Kurds in Koi Senjaq region 50  
kms east of Erbilcity. The attack has resulted in many casualties  
among Iranian Kurds livingthere.
We have always expressed our objection and protest against any  
violation ofinternational borders and military incursions by foreign  
troops in ourcountry.
We  do condemn the current Iranian incursion and demand an immediate  
halt tothe ongoing military operation and the withdrawal of Iranian  
forces fromregion.
The PUK leaders bear the entire and prime responsibility for the  
operation,what they have done is tantamount to a disgraceful  
national betrayal, ThePUK has indeed orchestrated the present strife  
and invited the Iranians tointervene.
They have also led the Iranian forces through 200 kms of territory  
away fromthe Iranian borders and guided them to attack the Iranian  
Kurdish refugees.
The PUK objective in this military collaboration is to gain material  
andmilitary assistance for future deployment in the internal  
conflict. By suchaction PUK leaders are sewing discord and deepening  
the internal crisis inIraqi Kurdistan, and are paving the way for  
the foreign intervention in theinternal affairs of our people. To  
achieve selfish goal the PUK do nothesitate even to commit national  
treason against the interest of Kurdishnation.

KDP spokesman
2025 1Street N.W  Suite 1108
Washington, DC 20006
Tel. 202-331-9505
Fax. 202-331-9506


----------------------------- end forwarded message --------------------------
**********************************************************
Solidaritygroup Turkey-Kurdistan
Memberorganisation of Foundation Initiativegroup Kurdistan
P.O. Box 85306
3508 AH Utrecht
The Netherlands
stk at schism.antenna.nl
**********************************************************

From kurd-l at burn.ucsd.edu  Thu Aug  1 15:09:18 1996
From: kurd-l at burn.ucsd.edu (kurd-l at burn.ucsd.edu)
Date: 01 Aug 1996 15:09:18
Subject: Turkey: Government Backs Down After
Message-ID: <bac1c849.Pine.NEB.3.95.960801090..@burn.ucsd.edu>

From: Arm The Spirit <ats at locust.cic.net>
Subject: Turkey: Government Backs Down After 12 Die On Hunger Strike

Turkey: Government Backs Down After 12 Die On Hunger Strike

(The following article was written by a member of the Communist
Action Group in England.)

     On Saturday, July 27th, the 69 day old Hunger Strike in
Turkish prisons ended in complete victory. Just one day after he
had threatened to send in troops to end the Hunger Strike by
force, the Minister for Justice Kazan announced that the
government would meet all the demands put forward by the
prisoners.
     The Hunger Strike started in May in response to the
announcement of a new policy on political prisoners by the then
Minister for Justice Mehmet Agar. On May 6th, Agar, who is linked
to the death squads in Turkey, said that all political prisoners
were to be transferred to the notorious Eskisehir prison, known
in Turkey as The Coffin. Unlike most of the country's other
jails, where prisoners are kept in large "wards" where they can
freely associate, prisoners in Eskisehir are kept in solitary
confinement in individual cells. In the first month after the
announcement, over 100 political prisoners were placed in The
Coffin.
     The prisoners demands were simple: the withdrawal of the May
6th decision, and the closure of  Eskisehir and all other
isolation prisons in the country. In addition, they demanded  an
end to attacks on prisoners, proper medical treatment to
prisoners wounded in attacks, and the right for all prisoners to
attend their own trials without being subjected to torture and
mistreatment.
     Turkey has a terrible reputation for prison conditions and
for torture of suspects. The government is carrying on a brutal
war against the Kurdish people, who are fighting for national
liberation. In addition, many left groups are armed, and are
carrying out a guerrilla war to overthrow the fascist government.
There are some 9,000 political prisoners in Turkey, only one in
four of which has actually been tried. It is not unusual for the
accused to have to wait for years before they appear in court.
And when they do appear, justice is not on the agenda.
     As well as the widespread use of torture, Turkey has a
higher level of political "disappearances" than Latin America -
the government simply bumps opponents off and dumps their bodies
where they cannot be found. Family and friends of prisoners are
subjected to every form of harassment, including being arrested
and tortured themselves. Many female relatives and friends have
been raped when they go on visits.
     In addition to all this, the authorities have staged a
number of armed raids on prisons where political prisoners are
held. On December 13, last year, one prisoner was killed and 40
injured when special police units and soldiers attacked prisoners
at Umraniye prison. On December 21, three prisoners were killed
and 39 wounded in a similar attack on Buca prison. On January 4
of this year, another attack at Umraniye left three dead and many
more wounded. A number of the prisoners wounded in this attack
were on the verge of death, but refused medical treatment, which
resulted in a fourth death a short while after. Two others
remained in a critical condition for a long period, but were
denied access to the medical treatment they needed. Conditions in
the jails was so bad that even before the May 6th decisions on
political prisoners, a group of prisoners at Diyarbakir prisoner
had begun an indefinite Hunger Strike against the increased
torture and mistreatment of inmates. On May 16th, they were
joined by a large number of inmates from different groups, mostly
from the Kurdish liberation movement (PKK), who went on an
alternating Hunger Strike with two groups of prisoners refusing
food for five days at a time. On May 19th, a further 1500
prisoners went on protest from Communist groups, this time on a
permanent, indefinite Hunger Strike. On July 3, a group - to
begin with 161 - turned this into a Hunger Strike to the death.
     Right from the start, there were solidarity Hunger Strikes
all over Europe, as well as inside Turkey and Kurdistan. These
included people going on Hunger Strike for fixed periods,
alternating with others, as well as a smaller number who were on
indefinite Hunger Strike. In Brussels and London, six members of
the biggest Communist group involved in the Hunger Strike, the
Revolutionary People's Liberation Front (DHKC), stepped up the
struggle in mid-July and themselves went on Hunger Strike to the
death. More and more prisoners joined in with them, including
some 4,000 Kurdish prisoners from the PKK who joined in the last
week.
     The Hunger Strikers were well aware of the Irish Hunger
Strike of 1981. In fact, the heroic stand of Bobby Sands and his
comrades was a direct inspiration for the Hunger Strikers of
1996, just as it had been for earlier Hunger Strikes in Turkish
jails. This was borne out when Aygun Ugur became the first Hunger
Striker to die, on Sunday, July 21st: the same day, a slogan
appeared in a part of East London where there is a large Turkish
and Kurdish population, which read: "1981 Bobby Sands, 1996 Aygun
Ugur".
     Twelve Hunger Strikers died on the protest. 100 more are in
a critical condition, and will only recover, if at all, as a
result of very intensive medical care. One veteran Hunger
Striker, Zeynel Polat, who survived after being on Hunger Strike
for 70 days in 1984 and who joined in this struggle in solidarity
15 days ago, knew fully what was involved: "A Hunger Strike is
the hardest method of protest. Every day, every hour, every
second, you are conscious of going to death. After 60 days,
irreparable damage appears in certain organs."
     The Hunger Strike unleashed a wave of protest and rebellion
throughout the state of Turkey. In much the same way as the 1981
Hunger Strike in Ireland, the protest strengthened the resolve of
the people to struggle against repression and injustice. The
Turkish state has been shaken to its foundations. The people are
on the rise, and they are not in a mood to give in.
     The twelve Hunger Strikers who gave their lives are listed
below, together with their organisations initials and full names
in English:

Aygun Ugur - TKP(ML) [Communist Party of Turkey
(Marxist-Leninist)]
Altan Berdan Kerimgiller - DHKC [Revolutionary People's
Liberation Front]
Olginc Ozkeskin - DHKC
Huseyin Demircioglu - MLKP [Marxist-Leninist Communist Party]
Ali Ayata - TKP(ML)
Mujdat Yanat - DHKC
Tahsin Yilmaz - TIKB [Revolutionary Communist League of Turkey]
Ayse Idil Erkman - DHKC
Hicabi Kucuk  - TIKB
Yemliha Kaya - DHKC
Osman Akgun - TIKB
Hayati Can - TKP(ML)

For more information, write to the DHKC Information Bureau, BM
Box 8253, London WC1N 3XX. Tel/fax: 0171-272-2621

 ++++ stop the execution of Mumia Abu-Jamal ++++
   ++++ if you agree copy these lines to your sig ++++
     ++++ see http://www.xs4all.nl/~tank/spg-l/sigaction.htm ++++

_________________________________________________________________
Arm The Spirit is an autonomist/anti-imperialist information
collective based in Toronto, Canada. Our focus includes a wide 
variety of material, including political prisoners, national 
liberation struggles, armed communist resistance, anti-fascism, 
the fight against patriarchy, and more. We regularly publish our 
writings, research, and translation materials in our magazine and
bulletins called Arm The Spirit. For more information, contact:

Arm The Spirit
P.O. Box 6326, Stn. A
Toronto, Ontario
M5W 1P7 Canada

E-mail: ats at etext.org
WWW: http://burn.ucsd.edu/~ats
FTP: ftp.etext.org --> /pub/Politics/Arm.The.Spirit
ATS-L Archives: http://burn.ucsd.edu/~archive/ats-l
_________________________________________________________________




From ww at wwpublish.com  Thu Aug  1 17:48:55 1996
From: ww at wwpublish.com (ww at wwpublish.com)
Date: 01 Aug 1996 17:48:55
Subject: Turkey Prison Strike Victory
Message-ID: <bac1c849.199608020029.UAA14767@nyxfer.blythe.org>

From: NY Transfer News Collective <nyt at blythe.org>


-------------------------
Via Workers World News Service
Reprinted from the Aug. 8, 1996
issue of Workers World newspaper
-------------------------

TURKEY: PRISON HUNGER STRIKERS SET BACK REGIME

By Andy McInerney

Thousands of hunger strikers in Turkish prisons declared 
victory July 28, after winning promises from the Turkish 
government that it would improve prison conditions. 

But the victory came at a heavy cost. Twelve of the hunger 
strikers, who had taken only sweetened water for 69 days, 
died. Ambulances rushed 170 more critically ill prisoners to 
hospitals after the negotiations concluded.

The hunger strike began in May, when the government 
ordered prisoners from various jails to serve time at the 
Eskisehir prison--known as "the coffin" because of its tiny 
cells. Law yers for the prisoners charged that in addition 
to the brutal conditions at Eskisehir, authorities were 
trying to deny prisoners access to their families and legal 
representatives.

The settlement between the hunger strikers and the 
government provides that none of the current or future 
prisoners will be transferred to Eskisehir.

The original hunger strike comprised thousands of 
prisoners--including both Turkish militants opposed to the 
military regime and Kurdish supporters of the Kurdish 
Workers Party (PKK), which has waged a 12-year liberation 
war for a Kurdish homeland. Of the original strikers, about 
314 in 45 jails had declared a "death fast"--pledging to 
starve unless their demands were met.

After the death July 21 of the first hunger striker, 
thousands more joined the action. The July 29 New York Times 
reported that 4,000 PKK supporters had joined, along with 
2,000 other Turkish prisoners.

WIDESPREAD SOLIDARITY

The hunger strike became a focus of struggle for Turkish 
workers and students around the world.

In Turkey, anti-government protesters battled daily with 
police in Istanbul, Ankara, and other major cities. Turkish-
owned properties in Germany have been firebombed in 
solidarity with the movement in Turkey.

The struggle was reported widely in European and U.S. news 
media. Most often it was described as "the first crisis" for 
the new government of Prime Minister Necmettin Erbakan and 
his Islamic-based Refahyol party.

While the hunger strike was launched before Erbakan took 
office, his representatives brokered the settlement. In the 
days before the agreement, the government had indicated that 
it might storm the prison to quell the strike.

Imperialist powers in Europe, and the United States, had 
shown their preference for a deal. All the major capitalist 
powers in Europe "pressed Ankara to meet the hunger 
strikers' demands," according to the July 29 New York Times.

Germany, Turkey's main European ally, had a particular 
interest in the settlement. Over 2 million Turks live in 
Germany.

Two days before the settlement, the U.S. government issued 
a statement leaving the door open to support for repression 
against the prisoners. It recognized "repression and 
brutality" in the prisons. But the statement also echoed 
Anakara's description of the strikers as "hardened 
terrorists and extremists" who refused to accept the Turkish 
government's "olive branch," according to a July 26 UPI 
report.

On July 26, the "olive branch" was the demand they end the 
hunger strike unconditionally.

Beneath the mask of Erbakan's civilian government lurks 
the Turkish military, infamous for its brutality against the 
people's movement both in Turkey and in Kurdistan. In 1980, 
the military took over the government, ruling with an iron 
fist.

During those years, Turkey came to be the third-biggest 
recipient of U.S. mili tary aid, trailing only Israel and 
Egypt.

Five of the 12 fallen hunger strikers were members of the 
Revolutionary People's Liberation Front (DHKC). In a July 25 
bulletin distributed on the Internet, the DHKC declared that 
"the uprising of the prisoners is the uprising of the 
people. It is a call for the war for an independent, 
democratic and socialist country.

"Maybe we will lose many comrades," the bulletin 
continued, "but the uprising will spread step by step over 
the whole country."

While the prisoners were able to force concessions from 
the government in this struggle, the Turkish military 
continues its genocidal campaign against the Kurdish people. 
Reuter reported July 25 that the Turkish air force bombed 
Kurdish camps in northern Iraq--the "no-fly zone."

On July 27, Reuter reported a series of clashes between 
the PKK and the military, with 25 Kurdish fighters and 16 
government troops reported killed.

In its July 29 victory statement, the DHKC stated that 
"the 12 comrades who died did not only win the struggle in 
the prisons against this most cruel and bloody government, 
they also used their bodies as a barricade against the 
attacks of this fascist state against our peoples."

                         - END -

(Copyright Workers World Service: Permission to reprint
granted if source is cited. For more information contact
Workers World, 55 W. 17 St., NY, NY 10011; via e-mail:
ww at wwpublish.com. For subscription info send message to:
ww-info at wwpublish.com. Web: http://www.workers.org)

=================================================================
  NY Transfer News Collective   *   A Service of Blythe Systems  
           Since 1985 - Information for the Rest of Us           
              339 Lafayette St., New York, NY 10012              
  http://www.blythe.org                  e-mail: nyt at blythe.org
=================================================================

From kurd-l at burn.ucsd.edu  Fri Aug  2 18:33:04 1996
From: kurd-l at burn.ucsd.edu (kurd-l at burn.ucsd.edu)
Date: 02 Aug 1996 18:33:04
Subject: Turkey's Punch-Up Culture
Message-ID: <bac1c849&v01540b00ae27ca025214@[>

From: akin at kurdish.org (AKIN)

A Punch-Up Culture

Extracts from a commentary by Ahmet Altan in 'Yeni Yuzyil', July 22, 1996

I read a declaration of our Minister of Culture in the paper 'Hurriyet' the
day before yesterday. He said that "our people like Kirkpinar fighting.
[note: Kirkpinar is the place where annual wrestling tournaments are held]
They don't like opera and ballet; hand to hand fighting, that is part of
the daily culture of our people!"

Goodness, he's quite right, the good fellow. We have a society in which we
identify with wrestlers, smeared with out from head to foot, who grab one
another brutally by the neck or waist to throw the other down on the grass,
a society that enjoys these brutal punch-ups but doesn't like opera or
ballet.

That, no doubt, is why the Minister of the Interior declared that he had "a
little surprise for the week" - that week, the mothers of the "disappeared"
prisoners were not beaten up by the police!  Because, indeed, the fact that
old women were not beaten up by the police is a surprising thing in this
country.

So, we have in this land a society that likes wrestlers, dripping with oil,
that values brutal punch-ups, that from time to time, to give everyone a
surprise, omits to beat up old women, that detests opera and ballet, that
doesn't read the papers and is indifferent to poetry.

I confess I sometimes wonder whether "we're proud of brutal punch-ups and
wrestlers, we excel in punch-ups and they form part of our social life".
And our Minister of the Interior will announce to the world the good news:
"This week we have a surprise for you - we won't beat up old women." Our
people will point out as "our most reliable institution" an army that has
carried out three coups d'etat. After summary executions, as they transport
the bleeding copses of their victims, our police shoot in the air to
congratulate themselves on their deeds and the crowds will dance folk
dances to joyously celebrate these police exploits.

I have the impression that if we were to disappear from the scene it will
not be because of the economy or of politics but because of our strange
punch-up culture. Because I really don't think that, in the present state
of world evolution, such a culture can survive.

We, the intellectuals of this country, have just finished the chapter of
the last 70 years with a defeat. And this society has just won the most
unhappy victory in its history - against its poets and its intellectuals. A
victory that unfortunately will cost it dearly.


----
American Kurdish Information Network (AKIN)
2623 Connecticut Avenue NW #1
Washington, DC 20008-1522

Tel: (202) 483-6444
Fax: (202) 483-6476
E-mail: akin at kurdish.org
Home Page: http://burn.ucsd.edu/~akin
----

"The American Kurdish Information Network (AKIN) provides a public service
to foster Kurdish-American understanding and friendship"




From kurd-l at burn.ucsd.edu  Sat Aug  3 17:28:29 1996
From: kurd-l at burn.ucsd.edu (kurd-l at burn.ucsd.edu)
Date: 03 Aug 1996 17:28:29
Subject: Update On Kurdish Political Prisone
Message-ID: <bac1c849.Pine.NEB.3.95.960803120..@burn.ucsd.edu>

From: Arm The Spirit <ats at locust.cic.net>
Subject: Update On Kurdish Political Prisoner Kani Yilmaz

Kani Yilmaz Update

Defend The Kurds
Defend Human And Civil Rights In Britain And Europe
44 Ainger Road
London NW3 3AT
England

Press Release - July 8, 1996

Kani Yilmaz: Update

His Lawyers Intend To Appeal To The House Of Lords

     On July 4, 1996 the Divisional Court gave judgement in the
application for Habeas Corpus in the case of Kani Yilmaz,
European spokesman of the Kurdish National Liberation Front
(ERNK) and the PKK (Kurdistan Workers Party). Mr. Yilmaz was
arrested in London in October 1994 just before he was due to
address a meeting of British parlementarians concerning the
announcement of PKK ceasefire proposals regarding its conflict
with the Turkish Republic. He was initially arrested on grounds
of national security, despite having entered the country legally
some three days earlier. Mr. Yilmaz was later detained in custody
persuant to a request for his extradition made by the Federal
Republic of Germany for alleged participation in a wave of
bombing campaigns carried out by the PKK in June and November
1993.
     The present Judgement upheld the legality of the request and
dismissed the application for Habeas Corpus. Lawyers Mike
Mansfield and Mark Miller on Mr. Yilmaz's behalf had sought to
argue that the request was made in bad faith and on account of
his political opinions and prominence within the Kurdish
community in Germany and not in consequence of any credible
evidence of guilt. Furthermore, it was submitted that the
offences were of a "political character" and therefore not
extraditable in any event. The Divisional Court rejected both
grounds, the first due to lack of evidence, the second by virtue
of ruling at law.
     The Court did however find as a fact that the offences were
politically rather then criminally motivated. It held that the
offences were in part directed towards the Federal Republic's
foreign policy toward Turkey and its hostile domestic policy
towards Kurds within the FRG. However, it ruled, as matter of
law, that such offences could only be of a political character
within the meaning of the Extradition Act 1989, if they were
directed solely against the requesting state. It, therefore,
dismissed the applicant's legal subsmission that a dual purpose
was permissible within the meaning of the Act.
     Mr. Yilmaz's lawyers have given notice of their intention to
appeal to the House of Lords on this important point of law,
which has clear implications for all emigre dissidents currently
in exile in the UK and for the future scope of security
operations between European states.
     In Germany the PKK is banned since November 1994 and many
Kurdish cultural ans community organisations have been closed
down. Members of the Kurdish community have been subject to
numerous restrictions on their civil rights and to police
harassment. Germany is also one of Turkey's closest NATO allies
and a main arms supplier.

 ++++ stop the execution of Mumia Abu-Jamal ++++
   ++++ if you agree copy these lines to your sig ++++
     ++++ see http://www.xs4all.nl/~tank/spg-l/sigaction.htm ++++

_________________________________________________________________
Arm The Spirit is an autonomist/anti-imperialist information
collective based in Toronto, Canada. Our focus includes a wide 
variety of material, including political prisoners, national 
liberation struggles, armed communist resistance, anti-fascism, 
the fight against patriarchy, and more. We regularly publish our 
writings, research, and translation materials in our magazine and
bulletins called Arm The Spirit. For more information, contact:

Arm The Spirit
P.O. Box 6326, Stn. A
Toronto, Ontario
M5W 1P7 Canada

E-mail: ats at etext.org
WWW: http://burn.ucsd.edu/~ats
FTP: ftp.etext.org --> /pub/Politics/Arm.The.Spirit
ATS-L Archives: http://burn.ucsd.edu/~archive/ats-l
_________________________________________________________________




From kurd-l at burn.ucsd.edu  Sat Aug  3 22:16:27 1996
From: kurd-l at burn.ucsd.edu (kurd-l at burn.ucsd.edu)
Date: 03 Aug 1996 22:16:27
Subject: Sunday - NPR Talks About The Kurds
Message-ID: <bac1c849&v01540b00ae2968c5f649@[>

From: akin at kurdish.org (AKIN)

Dear friend,

Listen to National Public Radio (NPR) this Sunday from 5-7pm! The show "All
Things Considered" will be doing a report on the situation in southeastern
Turkey.



----
American Kurdish Information Network (AKIN)
2623 Connecticut Avenue NW #1
Washington, DC 20008-1522

Tel: (202) 483-6444
Fax: (202) 483-6476
E-mail: akin at kurdish.org
Home Page: http://burn.ucsd.edu/~akin
----

"The American Kurdish Information Network (AKIN) provides a public service
to foster Kurdish-American understanding and friendship"




From ozgurluk at xs4all.nl  Sun Aug  4 20:40:00 1996
From: ozgurluk at xs4all.nl (ozgurluk at xs4all.nl)
Date: 04 Aug 1996 20:40:00
Subject: Turkish press on prisoners
Message-ID: <6EGjQBSuy7B@cephe.link-atu.comli>

Content-type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii


Turkish press, August 2, 1996

Torture increases.

According to the Human Rights Association (IHD) and the Torture Inquiry
Commission  1238 people have been tortured in Istanbul in the last 6 months. Six
people died during torture in the beginning of the year. Torture increased
further this year. It started this year at the funeral of Riza Boybas and Orhan
Ozen who were massacred in Umraniye-prison when 1.400 people were locked up and
tortured in a gymnasium. Istanbul is the city where torture most frequently
occurs. During this torture, also a 1,5 month old unborn child was killed.

Yeni Yuezgil

Delegation in Turkey hindered.
A delegation of  members of the PDS, the Gruenen and students from Darmstadt
made a press statement after they observed the situation in Turkey for four
days: "Although Tansu Ciller declared that delegations from abroad would have
access to the hospitals at all times, this was obstructed by Sevket Kazan." And
the added: "Sevket Kazan and Mehmet Agar are responsible for the death of 12
people. The minister of Justice should be put on trial before the European Court
of Human Rights."

Cumhueriyet

The health situation of the prisoners after the transportation to the University
hospital in Istanbul remains problematic. 9 prisoners are in a very critical
condition. The other prisoners, who participated in the hunger strike for 2
months, are in hospital as well. It became obvious that the ministry of Health
did not take the necessary preparations for their treatment. 10 prisoners in the
Haydarpasa hospital were chained to their beds, that's why they refuse medical
treatment. Clothes and food are not allowed in by the gendarmes.

Demokrasi

Looking for the guilty inside the prisons.

After the death of 4 prisoners in the Bayrampasa prison, the chief  prosecutor
of Eyuep wrote a letter to the prison board, asking for the names of all
prisoners so he could look for who was responsible for the death of the
prisoners. He noted: "I will summon the prisoners in groups of 3 or 4. When they
don't show up, this will be recorded in the protocols."


------------------------------------------
Visit HTTP://WWW.xs4all.nl/~ozgurluk
For regular news and information
about the classwar in Turkey and Kurdistan
## CrossPoint v3.02 ##

From kurd-l at burn.ucsd.edu  Tue Aug  6 21:11:42 1996
From: kurd-l at burn.ucsd.edu (kurd-l at burn.ucsd.edu)
Date: 06 Aug 1996 21:11:42
Subject: IHD Balance - May 1996
Message-ID: <bac1c849.199608061944.PAA01956@l>

From: Arm The Spirit <ats at etext.org>

Human Rights Association (IHD)
Balance Of Human Rights Violations In Turkey - April/May 1996

Attacks by "unknown assailants"                 3
Deaths in detention or from torture             28
Killed in fighting                              433
Civilians killed                                12
Civilians wounded                               12
Disappeared in police custody                   2
Cases of torture                                35
Arrests                                         2,860
Persons jailed                                  234
Villages depopulated or destroyed               6
Bomb attacks                                    17
Associations, unions, publications banned       18
Press workers arrested                          48
Press organs confiscated                        27


 ++++ stop the execution of Mumia Abu-Jamal ++++
   ++++ if you agree copy these lines to your sig ++++
     ++++ see http://www.xs4all.nl/~tank/spg-l/sigaction.htm ++++

-----------------------------------------------------------------
Arm The Spirit is an autonomist/anti-imperialist information
collective based in Toronto, Canada. Our focus includes a wide 
variety of material, including political prisoners, national 
liberation struggles, armed communist resistance, anti-fascism, 
the fight against patriarchy, and more. We regularly publish our 
writings, research, and translation materials in our magazine and
bulletins called Arm The Spirit. For more information, contact:

Arm The Spirit
P.O. Box 6326, Stn. A
Toronto, Ontario
M5W 1P7 Canada

E-mail: ats at etext.org
WWW: http://burn.ucsd.edu/~ats
FTP: ftp.etext.org --> /pub/Politics/Arm.The.Spirit
ATS-L Archives: http://burn.ucsd.edu/~archive/ats-l
-----------------------------------------------------------------



From kurd-l at burn.ucsd.edu  Tue Aug  6 21:11:53 1996
From: kurd-l at burn.ucsd.edu (kurd-l at burn.ucsd.edu)
Date: 06 Aug 1996 21:11:53
Subject: Political Intolerance in Turkey
Message-ID: <bac1c849.199608061936.PAA01728@l>

From: Arm The Spirit <ats at etext.org>

From: akin at kurdish.org (AKIN)

Political Intolerance in Turkey

The New York Times Editorial, Saturday, August 3, 1996

Turkey's war against its Kurdish guerrillas has taken 20,000 lives since
1984, mainly in the Kurdish southeast. Now the unwarranted arrest of
nonviolent Kurdish political leaders threatens to put a political solution
even further out of reach.

The new troubles revolve around a June gathering of the People's Democracy
Party, a legal Kurdish party that advocates a political solution to the
conflict and attracted 1.2 million votes in the last elections. During the
party convention in Ankara, an unidentified man wearing a burnoose cut down
the Turkish flag and raised the flag of the Kurdistan Workers Party, or
P.K.K., the Kurdish guerrilla group outlawed by the Government.

The flag substitution set off a furor around the country as Turkish
television repeatedly replayed the incident. People's Democracy Party
officials expressed regret, but the damage was done. The morning after, 49
party officials were detained and later that day the police began raids on
various party offices, where according to the Government, they found P.K.K.
propaganda. Three party members traveling home from the convention were
ambushed and killed. The man who yanked down the flag has not been caught.

On June 26, Sirri Sakik, a Kurdish Politician who walked out of the
conference to protest the incident, was arrested for allegedly saying,
"People who desire that a certain respect be paid to their own flags should
also be respectful of others' flags." The Government claims that Mr.
Sakik's statement implies the Turkish Flag is not his flag, which would be
a violation of Turkey's anti-terrorism laws. Several detained officials
have been released, but the remaining 28, including Mr. Sakik, await trial.


It seem unlikely that the People's Democracy Party would disrupt its own
convention and in doing so commit political suicide. Kurdish officials know
they must step lightly, as 89 members of Kurdish parties have been killed
since 1990 and the Government has frequently banned Kurdish political
organizations.

Even if a People's Democracy Party member were responsible for removing the
flag, the Government's reaction would be disproportionate. But no one knows
who disrupted the convention. Nor is the alleged possession of P.K.K.
literature a reason for a crackdown on a legal party and its members in a
democratic country.

The People's Democracy Party representatives should be released. The
repression of peaceful advocates of the Kurdish cause tramples on civil
liberties and polarized Turkish politics. If the People's Democracy Party
is dissolved, it will fuel both sides in this bitter war. The Government,
will have closed an organization hard-liners accuse of working for the
P.K.K. The P.K.K. will have scored a propaganda victory and lost its
competitor for Kurdish support.

The arrest deepen ethnic animosities in a country already strained by
division. The Turkish Government should be encouraging, not silencing,
those who support a political solution to the Kurdish crisis.


----
American Kurdish Information Network (AKIN)
2623 Connecticut Avenue NW #1
Washington, DC 20008-1522

Tel: (202) 483-6444
Fax: (202) 483-6476
E-mail: akin at kurdish.org
Home Page: http://burn.ucsd.edu/~akin
----

"The American Kurdish Information Network (AKIN) provides a public service
to foster Kurdish-American understanding and friendship"



----- End of forwarded message from AKIN -----

From kurd-l at burn.ucsd.edu  Tue Aug  6 21:12:02 1996
From: kurd-l at burn.ucsd.edu (kurd-l at burn.ucsd.edu)
Date: 06 Aug 1996 21:12:02
Subject: Kurdistan News Briefs
Message-ID: <bac1c849.199608061943.PAA01945@l>

From: Arm The Spirit <ats at etext.org>

(News From Kurdistan Rundbrief #16/96; Translated By Arm The Spirit)


Kurdistan Parliament In Exile Met In Rome

        The Kurdistan Parliament in Exile held its 5th General Assembly
meeting on July 14, 1996 in Rome, Italy. The Kurdistan Parliament in Exile
was invited to Rome on behalf of the city government, and on July 8th the
Italian Parliament extended a formal invitation as well. The Turkish state
protested against this invitation, but the Italian government dismissed this
"interference in domestic affairs". During the session, the Kurdistan
Parliament in Exile was addressed by Italian MPs and representatives of
Italy's Foreign Ministry. Yasar Kaya was re-elected as Chair of the
Kurdistan Parliament in Exile, with Ahmet Aktas and Kazim Timurlenk selected
as Vice Chairs. The Parliament also discussed and agreed upon a plan of
action for the next three months.

Local And Regional Elections In Novemer In Turkey

        This November, local and regional elections will be held in Turkey.
The pro-Kurdish leftist parties ODP and HADEP have stated that they will
participate. The official campaign period will be limited to an extremely
short two-week period right before the elections.

War News

        During a clash between state forces and members of the People's
Liberation Army of Kurdistan (ARGK) near a gendarme station in Kocbac in the
Van-Ozalp region on July 10th, 7 Turkish soldiers were killed.
        During a clash on July 11th in Gerdi in the Sendinli region, 5
soldiers were killed. That same day, 7 other soldiers were killed near the
village of Sidata in Sirnak-Eruh after riding over a mine.
        During a clash near the Gulluk military station at the Iranian
border in Van province, 5 soldiers were killed. The ARGK suffered no losses.
        On July 12th, the ARGK carried out a road control on the
Dersim-Ovack roadway. That same day, there was a clash near Hozat and Ovack
in Dersim province, during which 5 soldiers were killed.
        On July 13th, guerrillas controlled the road between Bingol and
Karlova. A clash took place after three military vehicles passed by.
        During a battle near Semdinli and Yuksekova in Hakkari province on
July 14th, 18 soldiers were killed. Another 18 soldiers and 5 village guards
were wounded.

Iraq: Attacks On Kurds From Iran

        The Kurdistan Democratic Party of Iran (KDP/I) has recorded "more
than 100 terrorist acts" carried out by Iranian state agents against Iranian
Kurds in northern Iraq over the past few years. In most cases, victims of
the attacks were KDP/I members.


 ++++ stop the execution of Mumia Abu-Jamal ++++
   ++++ if you agree copy these lines to your sig ++++
     ++++ see http://www.xs4all.nl/~tank/spg-l/sigaction.htm ++++

-----------------------------------------------------------------
Arm The Spirit is an autonomist/anti-imperialist information
collective based in Toronto, Canada. Our focus includes a wide 
variety of material, including political prisoners, national 
liberation struggles, armed communist resistance, anti-fascism, 
the fight against patriarchy, and more. We regularly publish our 
writings, research, and translation materials in our magazine and
bulletins called Arm The Spirit. For more information, contact:

Arm The Spirit
P.O. Box 6326, Stn. A
Toronto, Ontario
M5W 1P7 Canada

E-mail: ats at etext.org
WWW: http://burn.ucsd.edu/~ats
FTP: ftp.etext.org --> /pub/Politics/Arm.The.Spirit
ATS-L Archives: http://burn.ucsd.edu/~archive/ats-l
-----------------------------------------------------------------



From stk at schism.antenna.nl  Wed Aug  7 18:01:00 1996
From: stk at schism.antenna.nl (stk at schism.antenna.nl)
Date: 07 Aug 1996 18:01:00
Subject: Kurdistan Parliament in Exile holds
Message-ID: <080796150137Rnf0.77b9@schism.antenna.nl>


Ozgur Politika    13 July-18 July 1996    Weekly Bulletin

Kurdistan Partliament in Exile holds its 5th General Assembly in Rome

The 5th General Assembly of the KPE has begun in Rome. The Italian 
Parliament's decision to allow the KPE to hold its assembly was followed 
by an official request by Turkey to the Italian PM Romano Prodi demanding 
that the assembly be banned. Italian parties and press reacted to this by 
accusing Turkey of interfering in Italy's internal affairs and the Italian
government intervened, taking responsibility for the assembly away from 
the Rome municipality and providing a hall at the Ergife Palace Hotel. The
Italian government also cancelled bookings made a two hotels and rented a 
luxury hotel for the members of the KPE. At the opening session of the 
General Assembly KPE chair Yashar Kaya said that the holding of the 5th 
Assembly in Rome had been archieved despite the efforts of the Turkish 
government and that this was a victory for them. Mr. Kaya explained that 
efforts had been made to prevent their recent General assemblies in Vienna
and Moscow, where the Turkish foreign minister's letter had been thrown in
the litter bin. Yashar Kaya called for national unity and warned certain 
circles regarding meetings organised by Turkey in France and Zwitzerland.

16 July 1996


**********************************************************
Solidaritygroup Turkey-Kurdistan
Memberorganisation of Foundation Initiativegroup Kurdistan
P.O. Box 85306
3508 AH Utrecht
The Netherlands
stk at schism.antenna.nl
**********************************************************

From DHKC at LINK-ATU.COMLINK.DE  Sat Aug 10 20:25:00 1996
From: DHKC at LINK-ATU.COMLINK.DE (DHKC at LINK-ATU.COMLINK.DE)
Date: 10 Aug 1996 20:25:00
Subject: DRINGENDER AUFRUF
Message-ID: <6EdlIIjPy7B@cephe.link-atu.comlink.de>

Content-type: text/plain; charset=iso-8859-1
Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit

                                           DDDD    H    H   K   K   CCCC
                                           D   D   H    H   K  K   C
                                           D   DD  HHHHHH   K K   CC
                                           D   D   H    H   KK K   C
                                           DDDD    H    H   K   K   CCCC

                                           *DEVRIMCI HALK KURTULUS CEPHESI*
                                           Informationsb?ro Wien 11.08.96


>Wir dokumentieren einen Aufruf des
>          Solidarit?tskomitees mit den Freien Gefangenen
>
>*************************************************************************


                  *D R I N G E N D E R   A U F R U F*

                 *An die demokratische ?ffentlichkeit*


Vom 20. Mai bis 27. Juli befanden sich in der T?rkei ?ber 2.000 politische
Gefangene im unbefristeten Hungerstreik. ?ber 300 Gefangene wandelten
diesen Hungerstreik in ein Todesfasten um. Ihr Widerstand richtete sich
gegen die Verschlechterung der Haftbedingungen (Er?ffnung von
Isolationsgef?ngnissen), behinderung der Verteidigung und medizinischen
Versorgung, ?bergriffe und Folter an Gefangenen und Polizeiterror gegen
die Angeh?rigen.

Der Widerstand endete nach 69 Tagen mit der Erf?llung der wichtigsten
Forderungen. Der Kampf um die Rechte der Gefangenen hat bisher 12
Menschenleben gekostet:
       Ayg?n UGUR am 63. Tag
       Altan Berdan KERIMGILLER am 65. Tag
       Ilginc OZKESKIN am 66. Tag
       H?seyin DEMIRCIOGLU am 67. Tag
       Ali AYATA am 67. Tag
       M?cdat YANAT am 67. Tag
       Tahsin YILMAZ am 68. Tag
       Ayse Idil ERKMEN am 68. Tag
       Yemliha KAYA am 69. Tag
       Hicabi K?C?K am 69. Tag
       Osman AKG?N am 69. Tag
       Hayati CAN am 69. Tag (Er starb nach Beendigung des Todesfastens.)

Die ?berlebenden Gefangenen werden derzeit in verschiedenen Krankenh?usern
behandelt. Ihr Gesundheitszustand ist noch immer kritisch. 30 Gefangene
sind noch immer im Koma, bei sehr vielen besteht die Gefahr von bleibenden
gesundheitlichen Sch?den.

Zus?tzlich verschlimmert wird die Situation dieser Gefangenen durch das
t?rkische Gesundheitssystem. In vielen Spit?lern fehlen die notwendigen
Medikamente. Auch die Kosten f?r eine ausreichende medizinische Versorgung
m?ssen von den Angeh?rigen getragen werden.

Die Gefangenen waren bereit, im Kampf f?r die Menschenrechte ihr Leben zu
geben. Sie sind in Hungerstreik und ins Todesfasten getreten und haben
nach 69 Tagen gewonnen. Heute brauchen sie unsere Hilfe zum ?berleben.

*Wir rufen alle Menschen auf, die Gefangenen nicht im Stich zu lassen!*

Wir sammeln Geld f?r Behandlungskosten
                   (insgesamt werden mehr als 300.000 DM gebraucht),

sowie folgende Medikamente f?r 2.000 Menschen:
                   Rentinol Paranteral Vitamin A (Infusionen)
                   Paranteral Vitamin E
                   Nutricia (als Pulver oder fl?ssig)
                   Milupa-S?uglingsnahrung
                   Sopradyn (Vitamintabletten)
                   CA-C 1000 Sandoz (Vitamintabletten)
                   Alitraq
                   Bemix B1

*Wir ersuchen um Geldspenden auf folgende Konten:*

     ?sterreich: BAWAG-Konto Nr. 06110700154, BLZ 14000,
                 lautend auf Cengiz Caglar, Kennwort: "Gefangene"

     Deutschland: Stadtsparkasse K?ln, Nr.: 72943095, BLZ: 37050198,
                  lautend auf Informationszentrum f?r Freie V?lker e.V.,
                  Kennwort: "Medikamente"

*und Medikamentspenden an folgende Adressen:*

     ?sterreich: Verein VIAS, Kirchstetterngasse 56, 1160 Wien,
                 Tel: 0222/4080885, Fax: 4080886

     Deutschland: Informationszentrum f?r Freie V?lker e.V.,
                  Kalkarerstra?e 2, 50733 K?ln,
                  Tel: 0221/7607656, Fax: 7602887

Solidarit?tskomitee mit den Freien Gefangenen, 11. 8. 1996


>*************************************************************************
>
>Ende der Dokumentation
>

                                                      *DHKC*
                                        Revolution?re Volksbefreiungsfront
                                              Informationsb?ro Wien

## CrossPoint v3.02 ##

From kurd-l at burn.ucsd.edu  Tue Aug 13 08:20:48 1996
From: kurd-l at burn.ucsd.edu (kurd-l at burn.ucsd.edu)
Date: 13 Aug 1996 08:20:48
Subject: Oppression Provokes Resistance - Ro
Message-ID: <bac1c849.Pine.NEB.3.95.960812233..@burn.ucsd.edu>

From: Arm The Spirit <ats at locust.cic.net>
Subject: Oppression Provokes Resistance - Roots Of The PKK's Armed Struggle

Oppression Provokes Resistance

Ismail Besicki assesses the initial conditions for the armed
struggle of the PKK.

     The start of the armed struggle of the PKK on August 15, 1984
is an important turning-point in the history of Kurdistan, Turkey
and the Middle East. The resistance struggle under the leadership
of the PKK is developing despite attempts to suppress and destroy
it. It is an uprising against barbarism and a state policy based on
assimilation, destruction, racism and exploitation. The state
attempts to obscure the basic dynamics of the Kurdish question
while hiding its chauvinistic, oppressive methods and denying the
legitimate basis of the August 15 armed struggle by depicting it as
"terrorism". The Turkish state denies the existence of the real
problems underlying that struggle. That is why we consider it
appropriate to deal with the political and social conditions which
led to the organisation of August 15, 1984 and the PKK.

The Situation Before The August 15 Offensive

     The central pillar of the Turkish state's Kurdish policy is
total assimilation. This policy was implemented in a most decisive
and systematic manner from the inception of the Republic. Concepts
like "Kurd", "Kurdistan" were banned. At the time of the one-party
system Kurdish-speaking people were penalised and sentenced to pay
fines. There are important documents in existence which bear
evidence of the decisions of the policy of assimilation and of
instructions to implement it.
     States like England and France and Iran who participated in
the carve-up of Kurdistan, carried out the same racist and
oppressive policies vis-a-vis the Kurds in their areas of
influence. These states too legitimised all means for the
realisation of the policy of assimilation. Iraq and Syria, after
achieving their independence from England and France, showed the
same enthusiasm in the use of their own racist and oppressive
policies in South Kurdistan and Southwest Kurdistan.
     In the 30's and 60's broad campaigns were started in which
Kurds were declared Turks and the Kurdish language as a dialect of
Turkish. In addition the national and social existence of the Kurds
was denied. All traces which could remind one of the Kurds, as for
example monuments, the Kurdish language and culture, were to be
destroyed. The Kurdish cultural heritage, like Kurdish traditional
dances, Kurdish songs and Kurdish melodies, were Turkified. If
there was any reference at all to the Kurds in magazines or some
research done on the Kurdish problem by university professors, they
all propagated the fiction that Kurds were Turks and the Kurdish
language a dialect of Turkish.
     At the end of the 60's the national consciousness of the Kurds
developed with the founding of Devrimci Dogu Kultur Ocakalri
(Revolutionary Culture Association of the East) and Dogu Mitingler
(Event about the East). To counter this development state terror
was intensified. Through "Commando unit" operations suppression and
torture was carried out systematically. One of the methods most
frequently employed was to force villagers to assemble in the
market square and humiliate and torture them. Sexual organs of the
men were tied with a string and the women instructed to pull the
men behind them as they were forced to walk them round the village.
Older men were pulled by their beards, thrown on the ground and
trampled on in front of their families. Women were also dragged by
their hair through the village. All these methods of torture were
justified under the pretext of searching for weapons and capture of
'criminal' fugitives. But the real reason was the emerging national
consciousness of the Kurds. The military coup of March 12, 1971 had
its origin in this situation.
     One of the most important reasons for the assumption of power
by the military was this development in Kurdistan. During this time
big trials were held against the "Revolutionary Associations of the
Eastern Culture" and the Democratic Party Turkey-Kurdistan.
     The indictments contained long and detailed analyses to prove
that the Kurds were Turks and, like them, came from Central Asia.
It was also stated that the Kurdish language did not exist but was
a primitive form of Turkish. Talking of the rights of the Kurds the
following arguments were adduced: "There is no indigenous Kurdish
people, therefore there was no Kurdish language and consequently no
rights for the Kurds". Because of the denial of the existence of
the Kurds by the Turkish state it was not prepared to even consider
discussing this problem. Therefore until the 70's all political
roads for independent political representation for the Kurds were
completely blocked. The narrow framework became even narrower. In
this situation the PKK succeeded in organising and developing
itself. Among the first recruits to the PKK in the 70's were many
youths. It was they who witnessed the torture of their fathers,
mothers, grandparents and brothers and sisters by the "Commando
units".
     The main reason for the military coup of 1980 was to
effectively counter the national and social awakening in Kurdistan.
During the military dictatorship Kurdistan experienced
indescribable atrocities. Torture, systematically implemented, was
an integral part of state policy and found its most intense
expression in the prisons. It is impossible to erase the traces of
torture from the memory of those who were imprisoned between 1981-
1985.
     In Diyarbakir alone over 40 people were murdered under
torture. There was only one reason for carrying out systematic
oppression and torture: to erase everything Kurdish from the memory
of the people and in that way force them to abandon their ideals.
     Therefore, the August 15 offensive in 1984 emerged from a
situation of unimaginable horror. Since then the resistance which
started with the attacks on Eruh and Semdinli, deepened and
intensified. The Turkish state, for the first time confronted with
actions of such magnitude, immediately labelled them as banditry
and terrorism. If someone says the PKK is a "terrorist
organisation" he is covering up for Turkish state terror because
this really means keeping silent about the political and social
conditions from which the PKK emerged. That the Turkish state is
pursuing this policy with success is well known. Turkey itself as
well as other western countries are bombarded with propaganda
material to such an extent that they associate the PKK
automatically with terrorism. The aim of this policy is to conceal
the brutal reality from the public as was done with the cruelties
committed in the prisons of Diyarbakir.
     Looking at the propaganda machinery of the Turkish state one
has to deal with the role that human beings play in this machinery.
They form an important part of the National Secret Service. Their
reports are written to conform with the security interests and
objectives of the Turkish state and never deviate from the
ideological framework and terminology of the Kemalist state. In
return the media are supported with huge credits by institutions
like the European Council, the European Parliament and
international governments. Even some human rights delegations and
democratic institutions who visit Turkey as observers, can
advisedly, be included within this category because they too,
invariably, join in the state-orchestrated chorus demonising the
PKK as a "terrorist organisation" outside the pale of political
collaboration which must be destroyed militarily as a precondition
for the recognition of Kurdish identity and culture and the
implementation of a political solution within the framework of the
unitary Turkish state.
     This attitude not only covers up for state terror, but it even
declares it non-existent. So who is actually starting the
confrontation, who carries it out? Who prepares the ground for the
conflicts? There has to be a new approach to this problem. It is
necessary to show this by way of an example.

Turkey's Role In Kurdistan

     A mere description of the violence cannot convey enough
information for a full understanding of the problem. Without
examining the effects and goals of state terrorism, it would be
false to define the war being waged by the guerrilla as terrorist.
It should be stressed that the use of violence by the guerrilla is
in reaction to state terrorism. The increase in state terrorism is
designed to prop up the state's illegal and anachronistic official
ideology.
     The guerrilla united itself within a short time with the
Kurdish population at large. The national consciousness then
developed very quickly. Within Kurdish society, a very significant
social and political change took place; the cultural-political and
global-political outlook changed. Kurdish women began to take on
active roles within the guerrilla struggle. All classes of Kurdish
society became politicised. The Turkish state, on the other hand,
tried to stop and oppress these increasingly stronger political and
social developments by means of an unchanging official ideology.
State terrorism is an important means of halting these developments
and maintaining the status quo. To do this, an entire war machine
was mobilised. Despite this reality, the situation is not described
as a war, rather as a mobilisation to weaken and destroy a small
group of bandits. But when has a group of bandits ever demanded
such things as autonomy or federation from a government? It should
also be noted that army units of between 20,000-30,000 men are in
operation against the guerrilla in the regions of Dersim, Agri,
Kulp and Gabar. Even the Turkish media itself stated that a 50,000-
strong army unit was in operation in Dersim. A situation where a
state utilises tanks, cannon, military aircraft, Super Cobra
helicopters, Sikorskys and units of 30,000-50,000 soldiers should
by all rights be defined as a war. But still, the official line is
that the government is 'fighting against a small group of bandits'.
     It would be pure self-deception to describe an organisation
which can field more than 20,000 guerrillas, more than 60,000
militia members and tens of thousands of sympathizers as a mere
terrorist group of bandits. This mass movement can be seen today in
the hunger strikes in prisons and in the broad support for the
hunger strikes from relatives of the prisoners. Tens of thousands
of people both inside and outside of the prisons have tried to win
their political demands by means of an indefinite hunger strike.
     As a part of the war of destruction being waged by the Turkish
state within its 'own' borders, from time to time operations have
gone well beyond the political borders of Turkey. Operations are
often carried out in South Kurdistan. The March 20, 1995 invasion
into South Kurdistan of an army unit of more than 35,000 men led by
heavy artillery, was lauded by the Turkish press. The same was true
of the failed operation in March 1994 in South Kurdistan against
the PKK camp in Zele, which involved 52 military aircraft. These
operations affected international relations with regard to Turkey
and its neighbours. Currently every country is developing its own
Kurdish policy. The fact that Kurdistan and the Kurdish people are
divided means that the Kurdish problem is by definition an
international question. The operations which the Turkish state
carries out in Kurdistan are designed to destroy the Kurdish
people, who are very close to the guerrilla and from whom the
guerrilla arise, and thereby to overcome the popular dynamic of the
Kurdish problem. As a result of this policy, the people whose
villages and homes are destroyed are forced to flee from their
homeland.
     These refugees are spread out across all of Kurdistan and
Turkey. Many people who end up in Police custody are found dead
days later. Such murders, which number in the thousands, are
officially described as 'murders perpetrated by unknown persons',
but those responsible are known to the state. In some places people
are burned to death in their homes along with their livestock. All
property is then confiscated. The fields are set on fire. Animals
needed for survival are killed. The number of destroyed villages is
well over 2,000. In many areas, agriculture and livestock have been
wiped out. The representatives of the state ideology are trying to
make the region uninhabitable and as depopulated as possible.
Burning forests is another part of Turkey's systematic policy. The
government, which affects concern about the burning of forests in
western Turkey, at the same time encourages the burning of forests
in Kurdistan. By doing this they hope to deny living space for the
guerrillas. We know that the destruction of villages has forced
millions of people to flee. What does it mean when women and
children are driven from their homes? How does a woman feel when
she sees her house and her animals burned, her entire life
destroyed? How does it feel to be driven from your homeland? Is it
possible to understand the feelings of people who have no idea
where to go, where they can live, what they will eat and drink, how
they will protect themselves from the cold and the heat? Can a
seemingly sensitive state, which cries crocodile tears following a
PKK attack on a village guard family ('...so many women and
children...'), feel what a woman feels when she has seen her house
burned to the ground, her son and husband murdered and her daughter
arrested? Does the Turkish state understand the feelings of
children whose fathers, mothers and grandparents have been tortured
and whose siblings have been thrown into prison? How does it feel
to live as a person driven into exile? What do the children feel,
whose homes have been burned, whose sheep and lambs have been
killed?
     For as long as the war in Bosnia rages on, the Turkish state
tries to divert the world's attention away from its own operations
in Kurdistan. But it is no longer possible to classify the military
operations which Turkey is systematically waging against the
Kurdish people as mere human rights violations. Human rights
violations are committed by a state against its citizens and the
state is viewed as guilty. But the operations described above are
not being carried out by a state against its citizens, but rather
against an enemy. The Turkish state treats the Kurds as an enemy
and yet not a single member of the armed forces who has murdered
Kurds in the most brutal manner has ever been brought to justice.
In fact, it is not even correct to classify the Turkish state's
conduct as one being waged against an enemy, for the Turkish
state's conduct against the Kurds does not adhere to any standards
whatsoever.
     It is also well known that the daily newspapers Ozgur Gundem
and Ozgur Ulke, which reported on the state's operations despite
the tense conditions in Kurdistan, were subjected to fierce
repression. The daily paper which now appears is always censored.
The result: When democratic channels are blocked, the weapon
becomes the only form of expression.
     It is important to evaluate the relationship between the
action and the reaction of the guerrilla and the state. The state's
blocking of all democratic paths has provided the starting point
and legitimacy for the guerrilla. Therefore it is incorrect to term
the PKK as a terrorist organisation. The PKK is an organisation
which is leading a national and social liberation struggle. It is
an organisation which is fighting for the equal rights and the
values of a people who have been robbed of their national and
democratic rights. It is a democratic organisation with an organic
relationship to a broad mass of people. Above, we have outlined the
politics of the Turkish ruling class and the function of the
political system against the Kurds. Within this mechanism, the
political parties, the government and the Turkish Grand National
Assembly have no meaning whatsoever. All power, ideology and
politics is decided by the generals and the ideology of the army is
unquestioned within the National Security Council, The government's
only function is to put the policies of the National Security
Council into practice. The parliament does not have a say in
discussions on security matters. This body is heavily influenced by
the military's ideology. The authorities named above exercise great
control over all institutions and it is the Kurdish dynamic which
has exposed this mechanism.
     Today, the state in both its domestic and its foreign policy
is entirely directed against the PKK. In order to destroy the PKK,
the state will resort to any means necessary. But in spite of this,
the PKK has been able to develop itself through the channels open
to it. It is trying to further develop its relations with the
Kurdish people. It is also starting to strengthen its international
relations. By means of its struggle both political and cultural
institutions are being created. The Kurdistan Parliament in Exile
is one example of this. These institutions are proof of the
strength of the PKK and of the influence of the Kurdish dynamic in
social and political affairs. This is the level which the guerrilla
movement has reached after 11 years of struggle.

(The Turkish sociologist and author Ismail Besikci has been
sentenced to a total of 211 years in jail for more than one hundred
"separatist propaganda" cases opened against him mainly under
Article 8. The above article was translated from German and was
written in 1995.)

(Source: Kurdistan Report #23 (Special Issue), March-May 1996)

 ++++ stop the execution of Mumia Abu-Jamal ++++
   ++++ if you agree copy these lines to your sig ++++
     ++++ see http://www.xs4all.nl/~tank/spg-l/sigaction.htm ++++

-----------------------------------------------------------------
Arm The Spirit is an autonomist/anti-imperialist information
collective based in Toronto, Canada. Our focus includes a wide 
variety of material, including political prisoners, national 
liberation struggles, armed communist resistance, anti-fascism, 
the fight against patriarchy, and more. We regularly publish our 
writings, research, and translation materials in our magazine and
bulletins called Arm The Spirit. For more information, contact:

Arm The Spirit
P.O. Box 6326, Stn. A
Toronto, Ontario
M5W 1P7 Canada

E-mail: ats at etext.org
WWW: http://burn.ucsd.edu/~ats
FTP: ftp.etext.org --> /pub/Politics/Arm.The.Spirit
ATS-L Archives: http://burn.ucsd.edu/~archive/ats-l
-----------------------------------------------------------------



From kurd-l at burn.ucsd.edu  Wed Aug 14 16:58:19 1996
From: kurd-l at burn.ucsd.edu (kurd-l at burn.ucsd.edu)
Date: 14 Aug 1996 16:58:19
Subject: AKIN Campaign To Free Leyla Zana
Message-ID: <bac1c849&v01540b03ae3795ba5014@[>

From: akin at kurdish.org (AKIN)

                                                                   August 1996

Dear Friend,

        We would like you to join us as we call upon Mrs. Hillary Clinton
to help validate the Kurdish quest for civil rights in Turkey. For the past
70 years the Turkish government has conducted an oppressive campaign
against the rights and persons of Kurdish origin with the aim of forcing
their assimilation. This campaign has employed terrible levels of violence
as witnessed by the "hunger strikers" whom you learned about thess past
weeks who were protesting conditions in Turkish prisons.
        Today, Kurdish cities are governed by martial law. Dissent for
Kurds is prohibited by Turkish law. This prohibition includes
parliamentarians who have represented their constituents with integrity. On
September 4, 1993, Mehmet Sincar, a deputy who represented Mardin, was
murdered. At present, of the thirteen Kurdish parliamentarians stripped of
their immunity and expelled from the Turkish Grand National Assembly in
1994, four are serving prison terms of up to 15 years.
        One of these MP's is Leyla Zana, the first Kurdish woman ever to
serve in the Turkish Parliament. As an advocate for the political rights of
the Kurds, the Norwegian Parliament nominated her for the Nobel Peace
Prize. She received the Sakharov Peace Prize this past year from the
European Parliament. Mrs. Zana was invited by the Helsinki Commission to
participate in a hearing in the House of Representatives concerning human
rights violations in Turkey. Her participation resulted in a charge of
treason in Turkey and she was tried and convicted. She is now serving a
fifteen year sentence.
        We are, therefore, asking you to sign the letter on the reverse
side of this information sheet. We will mail it to Mrs. Clinton, and fax it
to Mr. Anthony Lake, Mr. John Shattuck and to President Suleyman Demirel of
Turkey. We appreciate your participation in addressing the violation of
international laws guaranteeing human and civil rights to which Turkey is
signatory. Thank you.

American Kurdish Information Network (AKIN)

-----


Mrs. Hillary Rodham Clinton
The White House
Washington, DC 20500

Dear Mrs. Clinton:

        The American Kurdish Information Network is a national human rights
organization of Kurdish Americans and their friends here in the United
States. Their work performs the laudable task of educating us on the rights
we hold dear in this country and their denial to Kurds in parts of their
homeland, Kurdistan. One of those areas is Turkey. This country is holding
Mrs. Leyla Zana, a former member of parliament, in prison for exercising
freedom of thought and speech. Mrs. Zana was invited by the Helsinki
Commission to participate in a hearing in our House of Representatives on
the matter of human rights violations in Turkey. Her participation and
representation of those who elected her have resulted in a charge of
treason and fifteen years in prison. If that happened here in our country
there would be a great hue and cry from every corner of our system. In
fact, it couldn't happen here.

        The Turkish government persists in labeling those who give voice to
the very basic violations of law in their country as expressions of
"terrorism". Sweet reason does not prevail. In such cases others must make
responsible intervention. When international laws are violated it is no
longer a matter of intervening in the internal affairs of a sovereign
country. The international community has a responsibility to keep the law
strong by insisting upon the signatories adhering to what they have
forsworn to keep.

        I, therefore, ask that you pursue an approach to the Turkish
government with the support of Mr. Anthony Lake, Assistant to the President
for National Security Affairs, and Mr. John Shattuck, Asst. Secretary of
State for Human Rights, to exercise some quiet diplomacy in this matter and
obtain the release of Mrs. Zana. I also encourage you to ask President
Demirel to adhere to Article 10 of the European Convention on Human Rights,
to which Turkey is a State Party, as the legal basis for the release of
Leyla Zana


        Sincerely,

        ___________________________

        ___________________________

        ___________________________

Cc:

Mr. Anthony Lake, Assistant to the President for National Security Affairs,
fax:(202) 456-9460
John Shattuck, Asst. Secretary of State for Democracy, Human Rights and
Labor, fax:(202) 647-5939
President Suleyman Demirel, fax: 011-90-312-468-5026




----
American Kurdish Information Network (AKIN)
2623 Connecticut Avenue NW #1
Washington, DC 20008-1522

Tel: (202) 483-6444
Fax: (202) 483-6476
E-mail: akin at kurdish.org
Home Page: http://burn.ucsd.edu/~akin
----

"The American Kurdish Information Network (AKIN) provides a public service
to foster Kurdish-American understanding and friendship"




From kurd-l at burn.ucsd.edu  Wed Aug 14 18:44:50 1996
From: kurd-l at burn.ucsd.edu (kurd-l at burn.ucsd.edu)
Date: 14 Aug 1996 18:44:50
Subject: Aliza Marcus: Reporter Fights Turki
Message-ID: <bac1c849&v01540b00ae379ee3604d@[>

From: akin at kurdish.org (AKIN)
Subject: Aliza Marcus: Reporter Fights Turkish Spies, US Indifference

Reporter Fights Turkish Spies, US Indifference

By Charles M. Sennott, The Boston Globe

        ISTANBUL - The foreign correspondent walked into a smoky bar in a
hotel here, lighted a cigarette and ordered a scotch. Glenfiddich. No
rocks. Make it a double.
        Meet Aliza Marcus, an American reporter for Reuters News Service,
assigned to cover a decade-long war in the mountains of Turkish Kurdistan.
As wars go, this one is uncelebrated. No live coverage from CNN. You won't
find Dan Rather here. But that doesn't mean it isn't as cruel as any other
war.
        In an effort to crush a Kurdish insurgency in the southeast, Turkey
has bombed 2,200 villages, according to Human Rights Watch. Some 19,000
people have been killed, including civilians, Kurdish militants, and
Turkish soldiers.
        And here's Marcus, the only full-time Western reporter covering a
war that goes unnoticed by the rest of the world.
        "You're risking your life, traveling along roads that are mined,
and you realize that you're writing a story that will be a paragraph
somewhere buried in the newspapers back home," she says. "You realize
there's probably two people who are going to read this. It can be
depressing."
        Through a cloud of smoke in the bar, she notices two men with dark
hair sitting at the next table. They have been there 20 minutes and have
ordered nothing. One is leaning awkwardly, with one ear cocked, apparently
to hear our conversation.
        She turns, asking, "Who the hell are these guys?"
        They both stand up. One is carrying a walkie-talkie. Abruptly, they
leave. It is obvious to her that they are Turkish military intelligence. If
so, it is the second time that day Marcus has challenged the government
spies assigned to monitor the media. At a morning news conference, she
spotted two others and asked why they were posing as reporters.
        "We are just interested in what's going on here," one of them said,
staring sullenly and refusing to give his name.
        If the look was meant to intimidate, it didn't. Marcus stoop in
front of him - clad in Levi's and black combat boots - jotting down notes
in a reporter's pad.
        "The truth is, I've gotten pretty drained by the harassment. I used
to get mad," says Marcus, 33, who grew up in Westfield, N.J., but lived for
several years in Cambridge, Mass., free-lancing for the Christian Science
Monitor. "Now, to be honest, I'm getting more concerned. I feel like I just
don't know what they are capable of."
        So far "they" have proven themselves capable of making her life
difficult. In July, the Turkish government charged Marcus with "provoking
enmity by showing regional or racial differences." Their key evidence was
an article she wrote for Reuters on the Kurdish nationalist movement that
was published in a now-closed Kurdish newspaper.
        "There was nothing wrong in the story. No factual inaccuracies. No
misspellings," says Marcus."So how do you prove that you are not inciting
racial differences?...It was a clash between what Western journalism is and
what the Turkish government believes journalism should be."
        Marcus points out that the harassment she has received is only an
annoyance compared with the censorship that the Turkish government has
imposed on Kurdish newspapers and pro-Kurdish writers and intellectuals.
Scores of writers have been convicted and jailed under the state's tough
antisperatism laws - not for acts of violence but for expressing political
ideas at odds with the official ideology of an indivisible nation. Marcus'
charge carried a maximum of three years, but the state Security Court, a
semi-military tribunal, acquitted her, citing "lack of evidence and
intent."
        She is now waiting to hear if Turkey will renew her press
credentials for the new year. Something, she says, pushes her to stay on
and write about a war that so few seem to care about.



----
American Kurdish Information Network (AKIN)
2623 Connecticut Avenue NW #1
Washington, DC 20008-1522

Tel: (202) 483-6444
Fax: (202) 483-6476
E-mail: akin at kurdish.org
Home Page: http://burn.ucsd.edu/~akin
----

"The American Kurdish Information Network (AKIN) provides a public service
to foster Kurdish-American understanding and friendship"




From kurd-l at burn.ucsd.edu  Thu Aug 15 18:36:36 1996
From: kurd-l at burn.ucsd.edu (kurd-l at burn.ucsd.edu)
Date: 15 Aug 1996 18:36:36
Subject: Italy Recognizes ERNK
Message-ID: <bac1c849.199608151714.NAA13908@l>

From: Arm The Spirit <ats at etext.org>


Italy Enters Into Official Talks With The ERNK

        At the end of July 1996, the National Liberation Front of Kurdistan
(ERNK) was officially recognized in Italy following meetings with Italian
government officials.
        The ERNK has long enjoyed good relations with political parties in
Italy and has carried out a variety of activities there.
        An ERNK delegation met recently with party representatives and was
officially received by Deputy Prime Minister Giorgio Bogi and recognized as
the representatives of the Kurdish people.

(Source: 'Kurdistan Rundbrief' Nr. 16, Vol. 9, 13.8.1996)


-----------------------------------------------------------------
   Arm The Spirit / ats at etext.org / http://burn.ucsd.edu/~ats
-----------------------------------------------------------------

From kurd-l at burn.ucsd.edu  Thu Aug 15 18:36:50 1996
From: kurd-l at burn.ucsd.edu (kurd-l at burn.ucsd.edu)
Date: 15 Aug 1996 18:36:50
Subject: ARGK War Balance Since December 15,
Message-ID: <bac1c849.199608151713.NAA13873@l>

From: Arm The Spirit <ats at etext.org>
Subject: ARGK War Balance Since December 15, 1995


ARGK War Balance Since August 15, 1995

        On December 15, 1995, the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) announced a
unilateral cease-fire in its war with the colonialist/fascist Turkish state.
Despite this political gesture, the Turkish army has pressed on with its
dirty war against the Kurds, forcing the guerrillas to fight in defensive
actions. The following statistics of the fighting in Kurdistan from the
period following the December 1995 unilateral cease-fire are from the
People's Liberation Army of Kurdistan (ARGK), the armed wing of the PKK:

Balance of the War in Kurdistan
December 15, 1995 - July 28, 1996

Guerrillas killed       143
Guerrillas wounded      68
Soldiers killed         553
Soldiers wounded        128
Village guards killed   58
Village guards wounded  23
Policemen killed        10
Special forces killed   5

(statistics quoted from 'Kurdistan Rundbrief' Nr.16, Vol.9, 13.8.1996)


-----------------------------------------------------------------
   Arm The Spirit / ats at etext.org / http://burn.ucsd.edu/~ats
-----------------------------------------------------------------


From kurd-l at burn.ucsd.edu  Fri Aug 16 21:05:49 1996
From: kurd-l at burn.ucsd.edu (kurd-l at burn.ucsd.edu)
Date: 16 Aug 1996 21:05:49
Subject: International Women's Conference fo
Message-ID: <bac1c849&v01540b00ae3a4350e8bb@[>

From: akin at kurdish.org (AKIN)
Subject: International Women's Conference for Peace

International Women's Conference for Peace
November 1-3, 1996
Istanbul, Turkey

Subject of the Conference:

- to put an end to the war in Turkey waged against the Kurds, a war which
has been going on for the last 12 years;
- to achieve an active role for women's peace initiatives in finding a
peaceful political solution to the Kurdish question;
- to organize events and initiatives and to establish more active women's
initiatives with the aim of achieving peace.

Aims of the Conference:

- to achieve the active participation of women's movements in peace efforts;
- to highlight the fact that in our society women are the most affected by
the war;
- to seek a solution to the dirty war against the Kurdish people in their
own homeland;
- to expose Turkish state policy toward the Kurdish people;
- to evaluate the suggestions of the participants on the Kurdish question;
- to achieve basic strategies for peace efforts.

        The fundamental rights of our people are being systematically
violated in the homeland of Kurdish women. In reality, the war being waged
against the Kurdish people has gone beyond being a simple violation of
human rights. It has reached the point of aiming at the total annihilation
of the Kurdish people. This fact has been confirmed by independent bodies
and individuals, both nationally and internationally. In Turkey, especially
in those areas where the Kurds live, the right to live, civil security,
freedom of speech and thought, the right to a fair trial, and many other
basic fundamental rights are being violated.
        Kurdish villages and towns are being forcibly evacuated by Turkish
state forces. The Turkish state's policy of the depopulation and
destruction of Kurdish areas is systematic and can only be described as
ethnic cleansing. The main aim of this policy is to destory the demographic
structure of the Kurdish population and to put the Kurds in an ethnic
minority status in their own country. It is also the state's official
policy of "draining the sea to catch the fish". The local economy in the
region has collapsed, woodlands and human settlements have been destroyed,
and even animals have fallen victim to this terror. So far, 2,617 villages
have been either evacuated or razed to the ground.
        Kurdish civilians have been the main victims of this dirty war. And
Kurdish women and children are the ones who suffer the most. Today, when
Turkish soldiers raid Kurdish villages, there are only women left, no men.
They beat the women and curse them. They harass the women and assault their
children before their eyes. The smash all the furniture in the houses, and
they threaten the inhabitants and force them to leave the village.
        Hundreds of Kurdish women are imprisoned in Turkish jails. These
women are regularly tortured with the use of electical shocks and other
methods, including systematic rape by police using truncheons or gun
barrels. Former Democracy Party (DEP) Member of Parliament Leyla Zana has
been imprisoned in Ankara Central Closed Prison since March 1994. She was
sentenced to 15 years in prison on charges of supporting terrorism and
separatism after her parliamentary immunity was lifted.
        This tragic situation has imposed more difficult living conditions
on Kurdish women. The strength drawn from the Kurdish resistance, the
dignity of being a woman, of being a mother, a human being, all of this
gives strength to Kurdish women to resist this situation.
        But this dirty war not only has a negative effect on Kurdish women.
Turkish women, in particular Turkish mothers who have lost their sons in
this war, have also suffered great pain. Both Turkish and Kurdish women,
noting that being women is not an obstacle to making efforts aimed at
stopping the war, are hand-in-hand, raising the need for peace. For this
reason we wish to bring together Turkish and Kurdish women and women from
all around the world. Our main slogan will be: "For a world without war!"
The International Women's Conference for Peace will be a platform for
bringing women together for peace.

If you would like more information about the International Women's
Conference for Peace in Istanbul, or if you would like to register to
attend, please contact the organizers at the following address:

Mrs. Nebehat Akkoc
c/o Human Rights Association (IHD)
Inonu Cad. Oryil Tabibler Sitesi 6-32
Diyarbakir, Turkey

Tel: +90-412-223-4526 or 224-6814
Fax: +90-312-285-2200 or 285-2297

There is also a contact address in Germany:

Vorbereitungskomitee der Internationalen Frauenkonferenz
c/o DEM News Agency
Eigelstein 103-113
50668 Cologne, Germany

Tel: +49-221-120063
Fax: +49-221-120060


----
American Kurdish Information Network (AKIN)
2623 Connecticut Avenue NW #1
Washington, DC 20008-1522

Tel: (202) 483-6444
Fax: (202) 483-6476
E-mail: akin at kurdish.org
Home Page: http://burn.ucsd.edu/~akin
----

"The American Kurdish Information Network (AKIN) provides a public service
to foster Kurdish-American understanding and friendship"




From stk at schism.antenna.nl  Mon Aug 19 13:47:00 1996
From: stk at schism.antenna.nl (stk at schism.antenna.nl)
Date: 19 Aug 1996 13:47:00
Subject: International Women's Conference fo
References: <bac1c849&v01540b00ae3a4350e8bb@[>
Message-ID: <081996104740Rnf0.77b9@schism.antenna.nl>

------------------------------ forwarded message -----------------------------
M.MERLIN at TBX.berlinet.de writes:

## Nachricht zur Information/Dokumentation weitergeleitet
## Orig.-Abs. : akin at kurdish.org (akin)


International Women's Conference for Peace
November 1-3, 1996
Istanbul, Turkey

Subject of the Conference:

- to put an end to the war in Turkey waged against the Kurds, a war which
has been going on for the last 12 years;
- to achieve an active role for women's peace initiatives in finding a
peaceful political solution to the Kurdish question;
- to organize events and initiatives and to establish more active women's
initiatives with the aim of achieving peace.

Aims of the Conference:

- to achieve the active participation of women's movements in peace efforts;
- to highlight the fact that in our society women are the most affected by
the war;
- to seek a solution to the dirty war against the Kurdish people in their
own homeland;
- to expose Turkish state policy toward the Kurdish people;
- to evaluate the suggestions of the participants on the Kurdish question;
- to achieve basic strategies for peace efforts.

        The fundamental rights of our people are being systematically
violated in the homeland of Kurdish women. In reality, the war being waged
against the Kurdish people has gone beyond being a simple violation of
human rights. It has reached the point of aiming at the total annihilation
of the Kurdish people. This fact has been confirmed by independent bodies
and individuals, both nationally and internationally. In Turkey, especially
in those areas where the Kurds live, the right to live, civil security,
freedom of speech and thought, the right to a fair trial, and many other
basic fundamental rights are being violated.
        Kurdish villages and towns are being forcibly evacuated by Turkish
state forces. The Turkish state's policy of the depopulation and
destruction of Kurdish areas is systematic and can only be described as
ethnic cleansing. The main aim of this policy is to destory the demographic
structure of the Kurdish population and to put the Kurds in an ethnic
minority status in their own country. It is also the state's official
policy of "draining the sea to catch the fish". The local economy in the
region has collapsed, woodlands and human settlements have been destroyed,
and even animals have fallen victim to this terror. So far, 2,617 villages
have been either evacuated or razed to the ground.
        Kurdish civilians have been the main victims of this dirty war. And
Kurdish women and children are the ones who suffer the most. Today, when
Turkish soldiers raid Kurdish villages, there are only women left, no men.
They beat the women and curse them. They harass the women and assault their
children before their eyes. The smash all the furniture in the houses, and
they threaten the inhabitants and force them to leave the village.
        Hundreds of Kurdish women are imprisoned in Turkish jails. These
women are regularly tortured with the use of electical shocks and other
methods, including systematic rape by police using truncheons or gun
barrels. Former Democracy Party (DEP) Member of Parliament Leyla Zana has
been imprisoned in Ankara Central Closed Prison since March 1994. She was
sentenced to 15 years in prison on charges of supporting terrorism and
separatism after her parliamentary immunity was lifted.
        This tragic situation has imposed more difficult living conditions
on Kurdish women. The strength drawn from the Kurdish resistance, the
dignity of being a woman, of being a mother, a human being, all of this
gives strength to Kurdish women to resist this situation.
        But this dirty war not only has a negative effect on Kurdish women.
Turkish women, in particular Turkish mothers who have lost their sons in
this war, have also suffered great pain. Both Turkish and Kurdish women,
noting that being women is not an obstacle to making efforts aimed at
stopping the war, are hand-in-hand, raising the need for peace. For this
reason we wish to bring together Turkish and Kurdish women and women from
all around the world. Our main slogan will be: "For a world without war!"
The International Women's Conference for Peace will be a platform for
bringing women together for peace.

If you would like more information about the International Women's
Conference for Peace in Istanbul, or if you would like to register to
attend, please contact the organizers at the following address:

Mrs. Nebehat Akkoc
c/o Human Rights Association (IHD)
Inonu Cad. Oryil Tabibler Sitesi 6-32
Diyarbakir, Turkey

Tel: +90-412-223-4526 or 224-6814
Fax: +90-312-285-2200 or 285-2297

There is also a contact address in Germany:

Vorbereitungskomitee der Internationalen Frauenkonferenz
c/o DEM News Agency
Eigelstein 103-113
50668 Cologne, Germany

Tel: +49-221-120063
Fax: +49-221-120060


----
American Kurdish Information Network (AKIN)
2623 Connecticut Avenue NW #1
Washington, DC 20008-1522

Tel: (202) 483-6444
Fax: (202) 483-6476
E-mail: akin at kurdish.org
Home Page: http://burn.ucsd.edu/~akin
----

"The American Kurdish Information Network (AKIN) provides a public service
to foster Kurdish-American understanding and friendship"



----------------------------- end forwarded message --------------------------
**********************************************************
Solidaritygroup Turkey-Kurdistan
Memberorganisation of Foundation Initiativegroup Kurdistan
P.O. Box 85306
3508 AH Utrecht
The Netherlands
stk at schism.antenna.nl
**********************************************************

From stk at schism.antenna.nl  Mon Aug 19 13:47:00 1996
From: stk at schism.antenna.nl (stk at schism.antenna.nl)
Date: 19 Aug 1996 13:47:00
Subject: Danish-Kurd tortured by Turkish gov
References: <6F4ot4jcazB@chana.tbx.berlinet.d>
Message-ID: <081996104732Rnf0.77b9@schism.antenna.nl>

------------------------------ forwarded message -----------------------------
M.MERLIN at TBX.berlinet.de writes:

## Nachricht zur Information/Dokumentation weitergeleitet
## Orig.-Empf.: /SOC/CULTURE/KURDISH
## Orig.-Abs. : rojbahjat at aol.com (RojBahjat)


 I retrieved this from Rueters:


     COPENHAGEN, Denmark (Reuter) - Denmark said Friday it would
investigate allegations by a Kurd of Danish nationality that he was
tortured while held in a Turkish prison for five weeks.
    ``On the basis of our investigation, we will consider what steps if
necessary to take against the Turkish government,'' Foreign Minister Niels
Helveg Petersen told reporters.

    He added that Denmark might also take the matter up in the European
Union.

    Kemal Koc, a naturalized Dane, was arrested and jailed by Turkish
authorities in Ankara on July 9 while attending his brother's funeral and
charged with giving economic assistance to the Kurdish Workers' Party
(PKK) from Denmark.

    PKK guerillas have been fighting the Turkish army for independence or
autonomy in south-east Turkey since 1984. The fighting has claimed more
than 18,500 lives.

    An Ankara court Thursday ordered Koc freed pending trial in September
but he was expected to be deported to Denmark on Friday, the Danish
Embassy in Ankara said.

    ``I have been treated atrociously in prison. Turkey is a military
dictatorship,'' Koc told Danish reporters in the court.
    Throughout the hearing he repeatedly said he was an innocent member of
a Kurdish cultural organization in Denmark and that a confession he made
to Turkish police was signed after torture.
    Turkey protested to Denmark in March over the holding of a session of
the Brussels-based Kurdish parliament in exile in the Danish legislature.
The vast majority of Denmark's large Turkish immigrant population are
Kurds.

    Turkey's prisons are notorious for their overcrowding and deplorable
conditions. Last month, Turkish prisoners nationwide who were clamoring
for better treatment went on a hunger strike and a number of them  
died.

10:16 08-16-96


----------------------------- end forwarded message --------------------------
**********************************************************
Solidaritygroup Turkey-Kurdistan
Memberorganisation of Foundation Initiativegroup Kurdistan
P.O. Box 85306
3508 AH Utrecht
The Netherlands
stk at schism.antenna.nl
**********************************************************

From kurd-l at burn.ucsd.edu  Tue Aug 20 16:37:43 1996
From: kurd-l at burn.ucsd.edu (kurd-l at burn.ucsd.edu)
Date: 20 Aug 1996 16:37:43
Subject: War News From Kurdistan
Message-ID: <bac1c849.Pine.NEB.3.95.960820104..@burn.ucsd.edu>

From: Arm The Spirit <ats at locust.cic.net>

War News From Kurdistan
Translated By Arm The Spirit From Kurdistan-Rundbrief, Nr.16, Vol.9, 13.8.1996

        A radio station two kilometers outside of Van, which was being
guarded by village guards, was attacked by guerrillas on the night on July
23. The village guards called for Turkish troop reinforcements, who then
raided several homes in Van.

        The People's Liberation Army of Kurdistan (ARGK) attacked a base of
200 Turkish soldiers on the occupied hill of Maruka near the border with
South Kurdistan on July 27. The ARGK stated that this action was in
solidarity with the revolutionary prisoners who were staging death fasts.
According to figures from the Special Governor's office, 16 soldiers and 9
guerrillas were killed and 8 guerrillas were wounded, many due to aerial
bombardments. The ARGK Press Office, however, released a list of the names
of 39 Turkish soldiers who were killed in the attack and who were
indentified by their military ID cards which the ARGK had possession of. The
ARGK also stated that another 38 soldiers were wounded.

        On July 28, in the small town of Hasancelebi in Malatya province,
the ARGK torched a tour bus belonging to the Aksu tourism company and
arrested two of the firm's drivers and one other employee. The company is
accused of providing transportation for Turkish soldiers despite repeated
warnings not to do so.

        Two soldiers were killed in a clash between Turkish troops and ARGK
guerrillas in Zorkun-Alm in Adana Osmaniye in western Turkey. Three other
soldiers were killed during an ARGK raid on a military station in Eris. That
same day, 3 soldiers were killed in a clash in Mardin-Dargesit. The
guerrillas suffered no casualties.
        

 ++++ stop the execution of Mumia Abu-Jamal ++++
   ++++ if you agree copy these lines to your sig ++++
     ++++ see http://www.xs4all.nl/~tank/spg-l/sigaction.htm ++++

-----------------------------------------------------------------
Arm The Spirit is an autonomist/anti-imperialist information
collective based in Toronto, Canada. Our focus includes a wide 
variety of material, including political prisoners, national 
liberation struggles, armed communist resistance, anti-fascism, 
the fight against patriarchy, and more. We regularly publish our 
writings, research, and translation materials in our magazine and
bulletins called Arm The Spirit. For more information, contact:

Arm The Spirit
P.O. Box 6326, Stn. A
Toronto, Ontario
M5W 1P7 Canada

E-mail: ats at etext.org
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From kurd-l at burn.ucsd.edu  Wed Aug 28 02:48:08 1996
From: kurd-l at burn.ucsd.edu (kurd-l at burn.ucsd.edu)
Date: 28 Aug 1996 02:48:08
Subject: Kurdish Party Leaders Charged In Tu
Message-ID: <bac1c849.Pine.NEB.3.95.960827195..@burn.ucsd.edu>

From: Arm The Spirit <ats at locust.cic.net>
Subject: Kurdish Party Leaders Charged In Turkey

Kurdish Party Leaders Charged In Turkey

Istanbul, Turkey (Reuter - August 26, 1996) A Turkish court has
indicted top members of a Kurdish party for forming an armed
separatist gang in a case reminiscent of an earlier trial of
Kurdish MPs that badly damaged Ankara's shaky rights record.
     "They have brought charges. The allegations are extremely
serious", Sedat Aslantas, a lawyer of the People's Democracy
Party (HADEP), told Reuters on Monday.
     HADEP lawyers said 41 people had been indicted, including
party leader Murat Bozlak and other executives, many of whom are
to be tried under article 168 of the penal code, which has a
maximum jail sentence of 22 1/2 years.
     The trial could bring further problems for Ankara abroad
over its human rights credentials and undermine promises by
Islamist Prime Minister Necmettin Erbakan to improve justice and
tackle a 12-year Kurdish insurgency in the spirit of "brotherly
love."
     "The hawks are still in control in Turkey", said political
analyst Mehmet Altan. Erbakan, two months into his premiership,
did not look like he could combat the hardline military thinking
that dominates Turkish state affairs, Altan said.
     Sirri Sakik, a prominent Kurdish politician, is to be tried
under Article 8 of the anti-terror law - against separatist
propaganda - which has a maximum three-year jail sentence and is
often used to limit discussion of the Kurdish issue.
     Sakik was tried and sentenced alongside six other MPs of the
pro-Kurdish Democracy Party (DEP) in 1994 in a trial that sparked
widespread condemnation from Turkey's Western allies and hindered
Ankara's efforts for closer ties with Europe.
     Four of the six, including Nobel-prize nominee Leyla Zana,
are still in jail on 15-year sentences under article 168, which
punishes leading an armed group formed to divide the country.
     "It looks like this could go the way of DEP", Aslantas said.
"The charges are similar. The prosecutor has turned his political
views into an indictment.. There is no proof."
     He said the prosecution's evidence was largely based on
speeches by HADEP members. DEP lawyers had charged the same.
     After the DEP trial, Turkey was pressed by Europe to improve
its rights record as a condition for signing a customs union
deal. It changed its 1992 military-era constitution and slightly
eased Article 8, allowing the deal to go into effect in January.
     But rights activists and lawyers say the changes were
cosmetic and failed to address the core of the problem.
     "The mentality at the time of DEP has not changed a jot. I
can see HADEP going to the constitutional court", Aslantas said.
     HADEP was formed after DEP was closed down by Turkey's
constitutional court in 1994 and its 13 MPs thrown out of
parliament for alleged links with the Kurdish separatists.
     Twenty-eight of the defendants have been in jail since June
after masked youths tore down a Turkish flag at a party congress
and replaced it with the banner of the rebel Kurdistan Workers
Party (PKK) and a poster of its leader, Abdullah Ocalan.
     More than 20,000 people have been killed since 1984 in the
PKK's fight with the army for control of the southeast.
     "In the indictment we say HADEP worked as a recruitment
office for the PKK", prosecutor Nuh Mete Yuksel said.
     He said HADEP gave pro-PKK training and that it was clear
from Ocalan's speeches on pro-Kurdish television and speeches by
HADEP members that the party was trying to legitimise the PKK.
     "And the latest lowering of the Turkish flag in public is an
example of this", Yuksel told Reuters.
     A man was arrested on Monday by Ankara state security court
over the flag incident, Anatolian news agency said. Faysal Akcan
faces the capital charge of treason.
     Turkey's sensivity towards its red-and-white national flag
was demonstrated earlier this month when a Greek Cypriot
protester was killed trying to tear down a Turkish flag on land
controlled by Turkish Cypriots.
     "There will be little reaction to the trial at home as this
is hidden behind the flag business", said Altan. "But DEP was a
legal scandal... And Europe will be looking more closely to see
what this new trial is all about."


From kurd-l at burn.ucsd.edu  Fri Aug 30 19:59:45 1996
From: kurd-l at burn.ucsd.edu (kurd-l at burn.ucsd.edu)
Date: 30 Aug 1996 19:59:45
Subject: AI Op-Ed Letter Re: Turkey & Tortur
Message-ID: <bac1c849&v01540b00ae4cd8029407@[>

From: akin at kurdish.org (AKIN)
Subject: AI Op-Ed Letter Re: Turkey & Torture

Dear Editor,

On the 13th of June, Gulcin Ozgur was taken from her home in Turkey and
detained at police headquarters. The reason? She had publicly reported
being tortured during previous detention for failing to carry an ID card.
She was stripped naked, hosed with pressurized cold water, suspended by the
wrists and threatened with death. She is 15 years old. As the November
election draws closer and we hear the candidates bicker, posture and jockey
for position, we do not hear anything about Gulcin Ozgur. In fact, we do
not hear about human rights at all. We can blame the politicians for the
deafening silence on what seems to be a political non-issue, or we can
blame ourselves.

Each political issue is sticky one and politicians want to dodge as many of
them as they can in order to avoid taking a position. Their philosophy is:
"Why take a stand when no one seems to care anyway?" China, Turkey, and
Guatemala can seem very far away, especially when we have so many concerns
about our own families, our own schools and our own jobs. Yet, in a world
of increasing global interdependence, what goes on in these countries will
affect us sooner or later regardless of location. Beyond that, we must
remember that everyone, no matter where they are, is entitled to be treated
with respect of their individual human rights. The right to think and say
what one feels, without fear of imprisonment or torture, is basic and
undeniable.

Without international pressure from governments like our own, human rights
abuses will continue. It is up to us to make human rights a campaign issue
in 1996. Politicians take their cues from us and we must remind them that
we do care about human rights and will not tolerate silence on this issue.
Without our voices, Bill Clinton, Bob Dole and the rest of the people who
represent us in Washington will continue to wipe their brows with relief
and say, "Just one less thing I have to worry about."

Jesse Christensen
Amnesty International-USA
Nederland, Colorado Op-ed piece


----
American Kurdish Information Network (AKIN)
2623 Connecticut Avenue NW #1
Washington, DC 20008-1522

Tel: (202) 483-6444
Fax: (202) 483-6476
E-mail: akin at kurdish.org
Home Page: http://burn.ucsd.edu/~akin
----

The American Kurdish Information Network (AKIN) provides a public service
to foster Kurdish-American understanding and friendship




From kurd-l at burn.ucsd.edu  Sat Aug 31 16:34:59 1996
From: kurd-l at burn.ucsd.edu (kurd-l at burn.ucsd.edu)
Date: 31 Aug 1996 16:34:59
Subject: PKK Cease-Fire Is Officially Over
Message-ID: <bac1c849.199608311503.LAA11001@l>

From: Arm The Spirit <ats at etext.org>

CNN - In other World news... - August 16, 1996

Rebel Kurds declare end to cease-fire

ANKARA, Turkey (AP) -- A Kurdish guerrilla group declared an 
end to a cease-fire offer, the Germany-based Kurdish news 
agency DEM said Friday.

The Kurdistan Workers' Party decided to end the eight-month 
truce after Turkey failed to call off its crackdowns on 
separatist rebels, DEM reported.
  
More than 21,000 people have died in fighting since rebel 
Kurds began their campaign for autonomy in southeast Turkey
12 years ago.


 ++++ stop the execution of Mumia Abu-Jamal ++++
   ++++ if you agree copy these lines to your sig ++++
     ++++ see http://www.xs4all.nl/~tank/spg-l/sigaction.htm ++++

-----------------------------------------------------------------
Arm The Spirit is an autonomist/anti-imperialist information
collective based in Toronto, Canada. Our focus includes a wide 
variety of material, including political prisoners, national 
liberation struggles, armed communist resistance, anti-fascism, 
the fight against patriarchy, and more. We regularly publish our 
writings, research, and translation materials in our magazine and
bulletins called Arm The Spirit. For more information, contact:

Arm The Spirit
P.O. Box 6326, Stn. A
Toronto, Ontario
M5W 1P7 Canada

E-mail: ats at etext.org
WWW: http://burn.ucsd.edu/~ats
FTP: ftp.etext.org --> /pub/Politics/Arm.The.Spirit
ATS-L Archives: http://burn.ucsd.edu/~archive/ats-l
-----------------------------------------------------------------




From kurd-l at burn.ucsd.edu  Sat Aug 31 16:35:28 1996
From: kurd-l at burn.ucsd.edu (kurd-l at burn.ucsd.edu)
Date: 31 Aug 1996 16:35:28
Subject: KDP Asks Saddam To Invade Kurdistan
Message-ID: <bac1c849.199608311502.LAA10991@l>

From: Arm The Spirit <ats at etext.org>
Subject: KDP Asks Saddam To Invade Kurdistan!

CNN - Iraq attacks Kurdistan to quell Iranian-backed faction
Aug. 31, 1996

BAGHDAD, Iraq (CNN) -- Saddam Hussein ordered his troops
Saturday into Kurdistan to crush Iranian-backed separatists 
holding parts of the mountainous enclave.

Hundreds of tanks and armored cars were reported attacking 
the town of Irbil in northern Iraq. "There is heavy shelling 
everywhere," a United Nations guard posted in Irbil said.  

The U.N.'s Mohsin Habib added that residents were scurrying throughout 
the city, looking for shelter. "The shells are falling within 100 meters
of our office location," he said.

Iraq's deputy prime minister, Tariq Aziz, said the "limited
military operation" was in response to an appeal by the 
Kurdistan Democratic Party, one of two Kurdish factions vying 
for supremacy in the "safe haven."
  
Aziz's statement was carried by the official Iraqi News 
Agency, monitored in Cyprus.  In one newscast, Iraq blamed the United States 
and Iran for what it called "dangerous infringements on Iraqi sovereignty."

The Iraqi intervention could heighten tensions between 
Baghdad and allied forces policing the region since the end 
of the Gulf War in 1991. It could also heighten tension 
between Iraq and Iran, which fought a ferocious war between 
1980 and 1988.

Fighting broke out Friday between Kurdish rebels and Iraqi
government forces in the northern Iraqi enclave. The 
Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK), which is backed by Iran, 
said Iraqi troops launched a massive tank-led offensive on Irbil, 
one of Kurdistan's main cities.
  
The group said its guerrillas were resisting, but that the 
advancing Iraqi troops had reached the outskirts of the city. 
Iraqi Kurds form a 3.5 million ethnic minority seeking
independence from Baghdad. 
  
The PUK appealed for urgent help from Western coalition 
forces based in Turkey and the Gulf region, and reported 
"scores of civilians casualties." Others were fleeing in 
droves, it said.

Earlier, after receiving reports of Iraqi troop movement, the 
White House said the United States had made it clear to Iraq
the "seriousness" of such activity.


 ++++ stop the execution of Mumia Abu-Jamal ++++
   ++++ if you agree copy these lines to your sig ++++
     ++++ see http://www.xs4all.nl/~tank/spg-l/sigaction.htm ++++

-----------------------------------------------------------------
Arm The Spirit is an autonomist/anti-imperialist information
collective based in Toronto, Canada. Our focus includes a wide 
variety of material, including political prisoners, national 
liberation struggles, armed communist resistance, anti-fascism, 
the fight against patriarchy, and more. We regularly publish our 
writings, research, and translation materials in our magazine and
bulletins called Arm The Spirit. For more information, contact:

Arm The Spirit
P.O. Box 6326, Stn. A
Toronto, Ontario
M5W 1P7 Canada

E-mail: ats at etext.org
WWW: http://burn.ucsd.edu/~ats
FTP: ftp.etext.org --> /pub/Politics/Arm.The.Spirit
ATS-L Archives: http://burn.ucsd.edu/~archive/ats-l
-----------------------------------------------------------------




From kurd-l at burn.ucsd.edu  Sat Aug 31 18:58:27 1996
From: kurd-l at burn.ucsd.edu (kurd-l at burn.ucsd.edu)
Date: 31 Aug 1996 18:58:27
Subject: A Witness To Habitat II
Message-ID: <bac1c849&v01540b00ae4e2315ab25@[>

From: akin at kurdish.org (AKIN)

The following is a commentary written by Lucy Sharratt, a Political Science
major currently attending Carleton University.

This past June, 1996 I traveled to Istanbul to participate in the United
Nations Conference on Human Settlements, Habitat II. I participated as a
member of Youth For Habitat II Canada, along with 30 other Canadian youths.
We journeyed across the world to effect change in the international
negotiations on environmental and social justice issues. I was unaware of
the human rights abuses in Turkey until I met an official * of the
Mesopotamian Cultural Center (MCC). From this individual, and other people
at the center, I learned about the Kurdish struggle. I know that I left
Istanbul with more information about the real political situation in Turkey
than most other Habitat II participants.

The Conference site of Habitat II was heavily guarded by the police. Inside
the Non Governmental Organizations (NGO) Forum, the secret police were
everywhere. I understood what this police presence really meant when the
official of the MCC was forced to flee in genuine fear for life. This MCC
official was recognized by a secret policeman, and left accompanied by
members of the Foreign Press, whose presence assured temporary safety. That
same day I met this individual at the Mesopotamian Cultural Center. My
friend Shaen and I followed the directions we were given and were surprised
to find ourselves in a bright cafe with music, paintings, and many people
talking. We sat in the official's office and were told about the MCC, why
it existed, and the horrors that the Turkish authorities had put this
individual (along with family members) through. There is a war in Turkey,
being waged by the Turkish government against the Kurdish population. The
Turkish government is attempting to annihilate Kurdish identity, and the
courage of the Kurdish people. The Turkish state is brutish, violent, and
desperate. However, Kurdish culture is so strong and vibrant that the
government has resorted to killing thousands and burning their villages.
Kurds are also being arrested imprisoned without due process, and once
detained many undergo torture.

Violence and fear are the reality for most Kurds, as is the severe poverty
of dispossession. Denial and ignorance are daily part of life in Turkey for
those without information on, or contact with, the Kurds. During Habitat
II, Istanbul was caught in a delicate balance of restrained police and the
possibility of intensified state brutality. Their balance was tipped to the
latter when police violently broke two demonstrations during the two weeks
of the Conference. The NGO Forum was shocked when a silent sit-in by
families of Kurds who had disappeared was torn apart by police, and when
another labor protest was also crushed. I do not know what it is like to
live in constant fear, to struggle every second for my life, my culture and
my people, and, with that knowledge and experience, to continue to struggle
for justice and peace. But I do know that this strength and courage is
possible, and that peace and justice are also possible. I have learned this
from my friends at the Mesopotamian Cultural Center.

(* Names of officials at the Mesopotamian Cultural Center have been
withheld to ensure their safety.)

August1,1996


----
American Kurdish Information Network (AKIN)
2623 Connecticut Avenue NW #1
Washington, DC 20008-1522

Tel: (202) 483-6444
Fax: (202) 483-6476
E-mail: akin at kurdish.org
Home Page: http://burn.ucsd.edu/~akin
----

The American Kurdish Information Network (AKIN) provides a public service
to foster Kurdish-American understanding and friendship




From FIC at OLN.comlink.apc.org  Mon Aug 26 08:34:00 1996
From: FIC at OLN.comlink.apc.org (FIC at OLN.comlink.apc.org)
Date: 26 Aug 1996 08:34:00
Subject: GAMA: iraq-iran
Message-ID: <6Fc6fbZJGIB@oln-205.oln.comlink.apc.org>

Content-type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii

        GLOBAL ALTERNATIVE MEDIA ASSOCIATION - GAMA - PRESENTS:
        -------------------------------------------------------
                news provided via our member "infoPool"
                --------------------------------------

SOURCE: INA
HEAD:   iraq accuses iran of violating its sovereignty by bombardment in
        north

      baghdad, aug 24 (ina-pool) iraq friday accused iran of violating
 its sovereignty and international norms by shelling residential
 quarters in the kurds-controlled northern iraq in support of one of
 the two fighting factions.

      reports here said that fightings between two kurdish rivals of
 kurdish democratic party (kdp) and the patriotic union of kurdistan
 (puk) continued in the cities of iraqi kurdish area where various
 kind of weapons were used.

      the iranian artillery started destructive bombardment of the
 residential quarters in qaseri, choman, galala and haj omran, the
 report said.

      it was reported that the iranian bombardment in support of the
 attack of jalal al-talabani, head of puk, targeted the village of
 sedikan and inflicted considerable damages on residential houses and
 public properties of the kurds. more than 100 people have been
 killed.
      [end] mi

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