The Kurds Are Still in the Way

Insight on the News, July 26, 1999 by Jamie Dettmer

An old Kurdish proverb has it that blood can't be washed away by blood but only by water. Will the Kurds now take heed of that piece of wisdom? More importantly, will the Turks? The sentencing to death on June 29 of Abdullah "Apo" Ocalan, founder of the outlawed Kurdish Workers' Party, or PKK, caught no one here in Turkey by surprise. From the moment of his February capture in Kenya--a feat pulled off with Washington's assistance--it was all but inevitable that a Turkish court would condemn Apo to hang.

Turkey's all-powerful army, the overweening guardian of an arthritic Turkish statehood that is creaking under both internal and external political and economic challenges, demanded his blood. And so too did the relatives of the more than 5,000 soldiers killed since the PKK launched an armed struggle 15 years ago in their bid to secure a separate state in southeast Turkey for the Kurds. The parents and relations of dead soldiers made their presence felt both during the trial on the prison island of Imrah, some 35 miles south of Istanbul, and in the media. Invited to give evidence, they insisted "Imrah should be Ocalan's grave." Voices of dissent or caution in the political establishment were few in this country that values social and intellectual conformity and marginalizes (and, at times, punishes) political dissent. Relatives of the thousands of Kurds who have been killed were not heard.

The separatist chieftain himself probably expected no other decision but the death sentence, and that despite his plea to be spared the rope, his pledge to help solve the Kurdish problem and his warning that if executed "a lot of blood will flow in Turkey, and this could lead to a military coup" His offer to help negotiate a settlement ("For peace and brotherhood I am ready to serve the Turkish state, and I believe that for this end I must remain alive" he told the court at the start of the month-long trial) was dismissed out of hand by Turkish politicians of all stripes--a dismissal that was parroted by Turkey's timid media.

Whether Ocalan was sincere about the olive branch he held out during a trial unusually swift by Turkish standards isn't clear. Most of the Turkish press is united in believing he was just trying to save his skin. But even if that may have been the case, the death sentence meted out to Ocalan almost certainly represents a major mistake by the Turkish authorities, whether or not Parliament decides to approve the PKK leader's execution, a prospect far more likely now that the nationalists are a key partner in the coalition government.

The long-running Kurdish conflict and the way Turkey has confronted it, and has been distorted by it, is rightly a source of acute anxiety for Western governments and for friends of Turkey overseas. Turkish repression of the Kurds--until recently Kurds could be arrested for speaking Kurdish, and there still are restrictions on the use or teaching of the language--should have no place in a regional power that is seeking European Union membership, nor should the extensive, brutal human-rights violations committed by the Turkish armed forces and police.

Until the last few years the military has been able to confine the war to the southeast of the country--far away from the prying eyes of the American and European media. To keep the conflict a regional one always has been a main aim of Turkey's security apparatus. Out of sight, out of mind. But the long Kurdish intifada has seen a mighty Kurdish diaspora. Istanbul now is the largest Kurdish city in the world, and Kurd communities are large and strong across Europe, most particularly in Germany. In the shape of bombings in Istanbul and street protests in Germany, the war has been spreading slowly. On the day Apo was arrested in Kenya and extradited to Turkey, riots erupted in several European cities. The chances now have been increased that elements in the PKK leadership who have been pressing for a widening of the war will have their way. Ocalan himself has favored a more rural approach, one that makes use of the PKK's logistical strengths and exploits to the maximum the presence of the organization's camps in nearby Syria and Lebanon.

His way may be the past way. The PKK now can boast a great hinterland of support in Germany and in some other European countries, both in terms of sympathizers and cash contributions. Kurdish communities have become more radicalized, and the death sentence on Ocalan will not help to slow that process. In short, watch out for terrorist acts to increase in Istanbul and Ankara and for tourists to be earmarked. Bombings in Europe--even in the United States--cannot be ruled out.

As the war spreads and is internationalized, Turkey will come under more pressure from the West to find a peaceful solution and to recognize that the Kurds have some legitimate grievances. Judging by the past, the Turkish state establishment will resent this, accuse foreigners of manipulation, dig in and allow the Turkish security apparatus to do its worst. The consequences? A speeding up of the cycle: A worsening of the conflict, continued Western frustration, intensifying Turkish irritation and more heavy-handedness by Ankara triggering greater acts of terror by the PKK.