Bulletin de liaison et d'information - Institut kurde de Paris

REVUE DE PRESSE-PRESS REVIEW-BERHEVOKA ÇAPÊ-RWISTA STAMPA-DENTRO DE LA PRENSA-BASIN ÖZETi
~ THE INDEPENDENT FRIDAYlSOCTOBERl~3
Turkish army
blocks moves to
Kurdish reform
DIVISIONS are deepening in
Turkey over a solution to the
country's ever-bloodier Kurdish
revolt as proponents of
purely military suppression try
to crush any talk of political reform.
Heavy pressure from the
Turkish armed forces and
President Suleyman Demirel
this week blocked hesitant
steps by the Prime Minister,
Tansu Ciller, to debate a plan
for local autonomy and cultural
rights that helped defuse
Basque sèparatism in Spain.
"Twice she has had to take
back her promises. They just
don't want the Kurdish problem
to be even discussed," said
Remzi Kartal, spokesman for
the group of 17 Kurdish na-
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tionalist deputies in the 450-
seat Turkish parliament. "Left
to herself, Ciller might want to
do something. But she doesn't
have the strength."
Mrs Ciller's attempt to reopen
the debate on the KurdS:
reflects a small but persistent
body of Turkish and foreign
opinion in the Turkish capital,
Ankara, that Turkey's Kurdish
policy is heading into a
bloody dead end. Nearly 2,000
people have been killed since
the last golden opportunity for
peace, a two-month ceasetire
that collapsed amid mutual ,recriminiations
in May.
"We must not block this discussion
[of political alternatives].
Let's not do to Ciller
what was done to [Turgut)
Ozal," wrote Hurriyet editor
Ertugrul Ozkok, recalling all
the obstacles that were thrown
into the path of the late Turk~
ish president's attempts at reform,
including the right for
Kurds to speak their own language,
granted in Aprill991.
Turkish officials insist there
is no discrimination against
the country's 12million Kurds"
about one in tive of the population,
of whom about half live
in the mainly Kurdish southeast
of the country.
Officials now speak of Turkey
as an ethnic mosaic, economic
programmes for Kurd-.
ish areas and decentralisation.
But their response has always
lagged behind events. Even'
setting aside unanswered questions
about 60 members of the
main Kurdish nationalist
party murdered in the,past two
years, moderate Kurdish leaders
now demand at least the
right ~oKurdish broadcasting,
education and the full recogmtion
of a Kurdish identity
equal to the Turkish majority.
"It is a lie that Kurds are
first-class citizens. Only if
Kurds deny their origin can
. they do what they want," said
Melik Firat, a Kurdish parliamentarian
from the ruling
True Path Party, referring to
senior officials of Kurdish origin,
including the Foreign
Minister, Hikmet Cetin.
Mr Firat - the grandson of
Sheikh Said, hanged in 1925
for leading one of many Kurdish
rebellions - spoke bitterly
of a spumed attempt to propose
some 70 Kurdish members
of the Turkish parliament
as a forum for discussion. "It's
like talking to a wall," he said.
Hard1ine Turks and the
army, which sees itself as the
guardian of a unitary Turkish
state set up by Kemal Ataturk
in the 19208,reject any dilution
of the nation's Turkish ethnic
identity. Fanned by muchpublicised
Kurdish rebel
atrocities, the bulk of Turkish
opinion is also hardening
against Kurdish demand,s.
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