generalspeaking

Turkish Vengeance

Leave it to Turkey to declare Hamas a 'responsible government', and to fault Israel for its inhumane blockade of Gaza. Handily choosing to overlook the reality existing in Hamas's covenant that holds the Jewish State to be illegal and that it must and will be destroyed - by their violent hands. Extending that bid for violent annihilation toward all Jews. So much for Turkey's Islamist government's fair and neutral position on human rights.

But compel Turkey to deal with its own longstanding problem of a portion of its population representing 15-million Kurds who have long sought a homeland of their own, and recognition of themselves as a nation - inclusive of the Kurds who live on Turkey's borders within Iran, Iraq and Syria - and the perception is turned on its head. The Kurds who belong to the PKK, a militant group purporting to represent Kurdish aspirations, are terrorists plaguing Turkey.

For their aspirations there are no special considerations; Turkey will not countenance the very suggestion of dividing its geography and letting loose a portion that will help to comprise a country that the Kurds can finally call their own. They do, after all, represent the world's largest ethnic group without a land mass dedicated to themselves as a nation. Turkey's obdurate refusal to even consider autonomy for its Kurdish population does it little credit.

"No one should forget this: those that inflict this pain on us will endure far greater pain: those that think they will weaken our state with these attacks or think they will bring our state into line, they will see that the revenge for these attacks will be very great and they will endure it many times over." Turkish President Abdullah Gul

Turkey is livid with rage at yet another attack by PKK guerrillas. Ankara sees no connection between their relationship with a restive, aggrieved population that has historically suffered the insults of their language, customs, ethnic names and political activities being outlawed, and the plight of another country attempting to protect itself from the violence geared toward it by a neighbour. The connection lies in that both Hamas and the PKK are held by the international community to represent terrorism.

In Hamas's case it is its determination to destroy a legally-constituted state for the purpose of taking over the land upon which that state sits, and employing all methods of violence to terrorize and murder both that state's military and its civilian population. In the case of the PKK it is a militant group representing a legitimate portion of Turkey's population that wishes to acquire the dignity accorded a nation, preferably with a portion of the geography allocated to them.

Turkey is furious over ongoing violent attacks by the PKK in an expression of Kurds' frustration at the lack of movement on their demands. Three decades of conflict has resulted in 40,000 dead. The Kurds are now asking, not for a Kurdish state, their three decades'-long demand, but for greater rights and recognition for Kurds within Turkey. Their language and customs have long been illegal to practise in Turkey.

But they are just as fed up with strife as is Turkey. It is Turkey that remains unforgivably adamant that it will not recognize the requests for equality of the Kurds. If they are to remain under Turkish rule, they would like, at the very least, the same kinds of equality guarantees under the law that other Turks enjoy.
Saladin's heroism and leadership was a great inspiration for the rise of Kurdish nationalism during the Ottoman Empire

Labels: Traditions, Troublespots, Turkey

posted by Pieface @ Thursday, October 20, 2011