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
January 3/10, 1994 The Nation. 9
,tary breakdowns are impossible to determine, according to
human rights officials, because soldiers who shoot civilians
often later claim the dead were armed guerrillas. Among civilians
the reports of human rights abuses by the security
forces range from the burning of villages to the torture of detainees
and worse.
"I don't know where to begin," said M. Ali Dincer, a lawyer
who heads the Thrkish Human Rights Association's offiee
in Cizre, a city swollen with refugees. "There are so many
things we are scared of. We are scared for our lives, for our
families. The soldiers come and shoot us, and there is nothing
we can do. I can't even speak out. Cizre is a small place,
and I can easily be killed." Last August soldiers opened fire
on Dincer's office, compelling him to work out of his home.
Over the past two years Kurdish activists in the region have
been assassinated. Among the people killed-estimates exceed
530-were three officials from the Human Rights Association,
fifty-three members ofthe pro-Kurdish Democracy
Party, a Kurdish parliamentarian and at least thirteen journalists
(mainly from pro-Kurdish papers). Ankara denies that
its military is behind the killings, but the choice of victimsand
the fact that many have been taken away by men claiming
to be poliee or soldiers-raises doubts about those denials.
"In such situations, people start believing that there is
no way to gain rights except through an armed struggle," explained
Remzi Kartal, one of the seventeen Kurdish activists
in Parliament. When Kartal and the others were elected deputies
in late 1991, there was widespread hope that Kurdish complaints
would finally be heard. Then-President Thrgut Ozal,
who as Prime Minister had set up much of the repressive
apparatus in the southeast, had begun slowly to encourage
discussion of Kurdish issues. His Prime Minister, Suleyman
Demirel, had come to office that same year with promises to
respect "the Kurdish reality." But from the start of the Kurdish
parliamentarians' terms, they were ostracized, shouted
down and even physically attacked when they tried to speak
in Parliament.
Pressure to isolate the deputies has increased since Thnsu
Ciller, Thrkey's first female Prime Minister, came to power
in June 1993 amid much national and international fanfare.
1\\'0 months earlier Ozal had died, and Demirel had taken his
place, opening the way for Ciller, who had served as an economics
minister in the Demirel government. Ciller started off
with what appeared to be good intentions, suggesting that
Parliament debate the question of allowing Kurdish television
and radio broadcasts. But she did not take into account DemireI's
hard-line shift, nor the military's strength. Chastised by
Demirel and top generals time and again, she backed down
from many conciliatory statements in favor of the military's
line: briefly stated, no "concessions" to Kurdish demands.
Now Ciller affects a harsh rhetoric that claims Thrkey has
no Kurdish problem, only a terrorism problem. Her economic
aid package for the long-ignored southeast envisions things
like a soccer stadium in Sirnak (the town was virtually destroyed
by the military in August 1992) and livestock credits
for farmers (most grazing land has been put off-limits by the
army). Ciller has also suggested widening the anti-terror law.
Already the law defines terrorism so broadly that anyone calling
for almost any reform can be accused; Ciller's proposal
would restrain news coverage of the southeast and make it
even easier for people to be charged with "separatism."
Indeed, the government seems intent on closing off all democratic
paths for discussion of Kurdish demands. Last July
the People's Labor Party, the legal Kurdish party, whose representatives
sit in Parliament, was banned (it later reappeared
as the Democracy Party). In September a deputy investigating
the spate of mysterious murders in the southeast was assassinated.
In November the pro-Kurdish paper Ozgur Gundem
was ordered shut down for four weeks for publishing the views
of the P.K.K. Now the prosecutor in Ankara is trying to strip
the remaining Kurdish deputies of their immunity. This would
allow the state to try the deputies for treason, which can carry
the death sentence.
Yasar Kaya, former chairman of the Democracy Party, who
in October was imprisoned for two years for making proseparatist
speeches, told me: "I say that peace is possible between
Thrks and Kurds. But the Thrkish state has no viable
program. It keeps saying it can solve the Kurdish question by
military means. Thrkey has a history of using denial and oppression
to deal with its Kurds. We need constitutional guarantees
to protect Kurdish identity."
Kurdish activists hoped that President Clinton would use
Prime Minister Ciller's state visit to Washington in October
to urge Ankara to recognize Kurdish demands for cultural and
political freedoms. Kurds note that while Washington works
hard to protect the Kurds in northern Iraq-enforcing a "nofly"
zone as part of Operation Provide Comfort to deter another
attack by Saddam Hussein-it pays little attention to
their brethren across the border. In fact, some believe Ankara
struck a deal with Washington back in 1991, promising to continue
to lend its air bases for Operation Provide Comfort in
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