Political Intolerance in Turkey

[kurd-l at burn.ucsd.edu]

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.


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