1 - Institut kurde de Paris

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RÎchard Cowper, recently in Semdinli, reports on a violent 'opening to this year's guerriIia campaign
Turkish army' takes. initiative >inwar '.against .Kurds
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east. leader of the PKK and reputed to
For the ftrst time this year the live In the capital of nelghbour- -
security forces, act1ng on Intelli- Ing Syria, has been quoted as
gence Information, are attempt- saying that this year he will take
ing to operate seek.and-destroy the war Into Turkish cities and
missions rather than simply tourist resorts ln the west, some
reacting to attacks from the PKK, of which have large- Kurdish
estimated to have over 1,000 immigrant populations.
well-armed guerr\1las at 'Ita dis- So far there have been no
posallnslde Turkey and In camps major attacks outaide the south
. In Iran, Iraq and Syria. east, but on May 1 security forces
But apart from one pitched bat. surrounded and killed two PKK
tie In April ln which troops killed' guerrillas In an Istanbul slum-,
20 guerrillas and ,lost four sol- house In the district of Okmey.
diers, the Turkish security forces danI. .
so far appear to have met with The authorities argue with
only limited success. A mainly some conviction that a terrorist
conscript army still has to bear campaign in the cities wllJ be
the brunt of the security role and much harder to organise than In
of the 55.000 or so men believed the wild mountainous countryto
have been put In the field spe- side of the south east where the
cifJcally to deal' with the PKK, PKK has a level of support from
most are relatively inexperienced the local population, the majority
soldiers. of whom are Kurds. But senior
A tour through the region from army commanders are said to be
-mountalnous.Semd1nU In the far treating the threat seriously -
south east (wedged In by Iraq on last summer there was a KUrdIsh
one side, Iran on the other), to attack on an Istanbul' police sta-
Sllrt, north of the border with tion.
Syria and the capital of Diya. The chances of the Kurds ever
bakir to the west, Is to travel winning a national homeland In
through classic guerrilla country. Turkeyare tiny. But In a country
The valleys and plains bristle where one - fifth of the popula'
with army camps, police cheek- tion Is said omclally not to exist
points and military airports, and Is not allowed under penalty'
whlle the hllls and mountains; of imprisonment to speak ita own'
rising In places such as Hakkarl language, print or read. books In
to over 14,000 feet, offer summer Kurdish or even to organise culgrazing-
-for countless flocks of tura1 groups, the Issue has the
sheep and provide a home to potential to remain a bloody.
eagles' and guerr\1las allke. thorn In the side of the Republic
Mr Abdullah Oecalan, .the. for decades to come. .-'
lnddenII durtng 18111 .
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IRAQ
SYRIA
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ernment became' deep!')'" eoncerned
that Iranlan-baçked Kurd.
ish successes in north eastern
Iraq might lead to the setting up
of an Independent but Iran!an
- controlled Kurdish state on
Its own borders. This, they
feared, might have inspired a far
larger number of Its own Kurds
to' join the PKK and closer military
links with Ita new Kurdish
nelghbour ..
kaqi suceess against Iran and
Ita own Kurdish guerr\1las has
convinced Ankara that the dan.
ger hss all but disappeared, but
the PKK st1ll poses a powerful
threat to a government searching
for a military and political solu.,
. Whm the Turkish PKK
launched its 'fIrst' attacks 'in
August 198t' the authorities and
the army were caught totally
unprepared and soldiers with no
experience 'of ftghting a ~errUla
war were widely seen to have
been Incapable of dealing with
the problem.
The' authorities have, now set
up special police commando units
which have organlsed an intelligence
network and launched a
vll1age militia protection movement
which Is said to have 10,000
armed members.
.. In July last year the G0vernment
appointed Mr Hayrl Kozak.
doglu, an ex.Istanbul pollce chief
with an Intelligence background,
to co-ordlnate policy In the south
tlon to a pl"9blem which has
plagued It since the founding of roads, dectr1dty, teleV1ston and
the Republic In 1923. ' , irrigation to the country's most
The Turkish Government's, underdeveloped region was also
attitude to Kurdish nationalism' set In train.
st1ll seems largely conditioned by But much,of this. was anath-.
Its 19th century experience in ema to the military. 'They forced
dealing with breakaway move- the' social democrat goyemmei1t
ments. Throughout the 70-0dd of Mr Bulent Ecevlt to Impose
years of the Republic It has there- martial law in April 1979 and
fore strongly discouraged any moved steadily to crush any v\si.
form of local or ethnic ident1f1ca. ble manifestation of Kurdlshness,
tion. , throwing all identifiable Kurdish,
When Kurdish nationallsm leaders (including one of Mr
erupted as a serious polltical Ecevlt's ministers) Into gaoL'
force In the 19708, the clvlllan The military in effect staked
government turned a bUnd eye to everything on a polley of viosome
of ita manifestations; allow- 'lence. The response, after several
Ing Kurdish language newspa. years of more moderate leadeni,
pers and music cassettes to circu.' was the appearance of the violent
late semi.cJandestlnely, even ,in PKK as a powerfuls\ngJe force In
the big cities. A policy of eco- what had been a highly divided
nomic development to bring political scene.
FEARS EARLIER this year that a.
power vacuum In Kurdish north
eastern Iraq, might add a dangerous
new dimension to Turkey's
own war against Kurdish guerrillas
have now disappeared. '
But if the opening months of
,..this year's Kurdish guerrilla cam.
PaIgn In Turkey are any Indica.
tion, 1988 could be the bloodiest
year yet In the bitter four- year
Independence struggle of the
Marxist Kurdish Workers Party
(PKK). ,
The PKK started Its attacks at
the end of March, as the winter
snows began to give way to
spring. Since then almOst 100 pe0ple
have been killed In the 11
wild ana mountalno.us south
eastern provinces which are st1ll
under a state of emergency. The
death lOllln this often fratricidal
and little reported guerrilla war
has risen to over 1,000 In the last
four years.
There Is no general rebellion
among Turkey's Kurdish popula.
tion and It Is generally agreed
that there 'Is no chance of the
PKK alone winning its struggle
to create a separate state. Turkey
Is home to about half the 20m
Kurds who live ln a region where
the borders of Turkey, Iran, Iraq
and the Soviet Union converge,
and there is little evidence of
close military co-operation
between the PKK and much
stronger iraqi and Iranlan Kurd.
Ish guerrilla groups.
But InMarch the Turkish Gov-
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