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TURKISH KURDS.
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Examines history of this ethnic group, culture, politics, repression of, nationalist hopes, economics.... More...
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Paper Abstract:
Examines history of this ethnic group, culture, politics, repression of, nationalist hopes, economics.
Paper Introduction:
The Kurds are one of the largest stateless ethnic groups in the world. Their traditional homelands take in parts of several nations, but the largest number of Kurds (12-14 million) live in Turkey, primarily in the southeast. The Kurds of Turkey are not united in their desire for an independent nation. But all are in favor of a change in their status within Turkey where their language, culture, ethnicity, and minority status are not just officially nonexistent but, paradoxically, repressed. Yet until they acquire sovereignty, autonomy, federation status, or merely recognition as a legal minority within the nation, the Kurds will remain the Turkish nation's greatest political problem and its most serious impediment to European Union membership and other associations and developments that the government officially desires in order to achieve parity with other modern states.
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Some claimed that the return to civilian rule would improve chancesfor Kurdish rights. Totalassimilation was the only possibility considered by the government and, asthe nation's Minister of Justice put it in 193 , non-Turks "can have onlyone right in this country, the right to be servants and slaves" (Entessar81). "The Joy of theTurks, the Fury of the Kurds." U. "Unwinnable: Turkey and the Kurds." Economist 17 May 1997: 58-59. The Turkish government, however, fails to recognize the truth of itssituation. By 1984 "a one-sided war, the Turkish army against the Kurdishpopulation, had a new dimension [as] for the first time in 45 years,Kurdish rebels were shooting back" (Ciment 49). Although there are considerabledivisions among the Kurds themselves most Kurdish nationalists dream of astate that would include all the areas in which there is a Kurdish majorityand all the Kurds, no matter which languages they speak or religions theypractice. Thepresence of the Armenians, however, was presented as a threat to the newstate and, "fearful of the appearance of an autonomous Armenian nation onTurkish soil," Kurdish forces "under Turkish officers drove the Christianforces from eastern Turkey" (O'Ballance 14). After the sixteenth century the Kurds came "to the fore asimportant players in regional politics" during the struggles between thePersian Safavid dynasty and the Ottoman Turks (Entessar 3). But the desire for a Kurdish state is much stronger amongTurkey's Kurds than among the residents of Iran and Iraq where, thoughfrequently subject to considerable discrimination, "ethnic minorities havereceived official recognition" (Entessar 9). The ban on Kurdish languages was lifted in 1991 but, forexample, the Supreme Governor of nine south-eastern provinces continues "toreject even minor concessions to the Kurds" and believes "that Kurdish-language programs on television should remain illegal" ("Unwinnable 58).This hardline attitude is not uncommon and, as the Turkish army continuesits brutal policies in the East, the government gives very little in itsposition on Kurdish rights. New York: St.Martin's, 1996. In the guerrilla war in the East Turkey has claimed victory manytimes in recent years yet, "after the loss of at least 22, lives" in1997 it seemed "as unwinnable as ever"--in large part because themountainous region "might have been sculpted with guerrilla warfare inmind" ("Unwinnable" 58). The leadership of the rebellious groups"grew increasingly secular and nationalist in orientation" as Turkishnationalism also grew more aggressive and the Kurds were truly left with"outright rebellion and cultural suicide" as their only choices (Ciment47). Although the great majority of Kurds are Sunni Muslims a small numberpractice other faiths and there are large numbers of Shi'a Muslim Kurds inIran. After the military coup of198 the new government arrested over 33, Kurds and passed deathsentences against 122 PKK members, many of whom fled the country. Urban Kurds beganto organize and work for "economic change and development in the East" andwere careful "to work within the system and avoid public politicization oftheir movement," which was known as Doguculuk (Entessar 88). The early promise of democracy, the continued uprisings, and thebrutal repressions of the interwar period set the stage for Kurdish-Turkishrelations after World War II. 1999:4 . Even with Ocalan's capture and imprisonment the Kurds' areunlikely to abandon their struggle since they had primarily seen it as ameans of securing basic rights in the first place and, no matter whether anew leader is as violent as Ocalan or far less radical, the people's needswill not change. Numerous smallKurdish principalities flourished and survived within the Ottoman Empire.After the empire's disintegration following World War I, "the Kurdsintensified their struggle for self-determination" (Entessar 3). Gunter, Michael M. The new Turkish nation took an unrelenting attitudetoward any ethnic difference and as each rebellion was put down "massdepopulation was the reprisal" (O'Ballance 16). Traditionalleaders could no longer exert any influence and, "disgusted with theinadequacy of middle-class Kurdish parliamentarians" young Kurds began tobelieve a new radical approach was needed (Ciment 49). O'Ballance, Edgar. But MostafaKemal Ataturk, the leader of the new nation, conceived of Turkey as amodern, secular, democratic, and, he claimed, multiethnic state. There are over 23 million Kurds in the world today and the greatmajority live in the mountainous region, sometimes called Kurdistan,comprising southeast Turkey and northern portions of Syria, Iraq, and Iran. The economic corruption of former Kurdish leaders and the brutalsuppression of a legal, peaceful organization such as Doguculuk revealedonce again just how much democracy and fair treatment the Kurds couldexpect from Turkey or their own leaders. In the195 s numerous wealthy Kurds also migrated to the cities while the Kurdishpeople in general made themselves felt in general elections, including theelection of a number of Kurdish members of parliament. But all are in favor of a change in their statuswithin Turkey where their language, culture, ethnicity, and minority statusare not just officially nonexistent but, paradoxically, repressed. 1998: 44-45. Boulder, CO: Lynne Rienner,1992. In the seventh century the Kurds, along withmost of the region, were forcibly converted to Islam during the Arabconquests. The Kurds are an ancient people who trace their descent from theancient Medes who ruled what is now Iran until 55 BC when they wereconquered by the Persians. Yet a major survey of Turkish Kurds wasconducted in 1995 and the results showed that only 46 percent approved ofthe PKK's operations, and of the total surveyed, "a huge 89.7 percentwanted to have political and structural change in the state" (Gunter 129).This figure encompassed 13 percent who wanted autonomy within the state, 19percent who wanted reforms and increased participation in localadministration, while "a striking 42 percent wanted federation" (Gunter129). The Kurds are one of the largest stateless ethnic groups in theworld. The most prominentof the many new movements was the Kurdish Workers' Party (PKK) whichexisted in an early form in 1972 and was officially organized in 1978 underthe leadership of an Ankara university student named Abdullah Ocalan.Unlike other Kurdish groups, however, the PKK was, from the beginning,"dedicated to achieving its vague objective of 'Kurdish independence' bymeans of 'armed struggle'" (O'Ballance 146). But Ocalan's efforts also received little support because his statedgoals were so unrealistic. Entessar, Nader. Serious rebellions took place during the 192 s and the last was notquelled until 193 . Kaplan, and Stefan Lovgren. "Down But Far from Out." Economist 1 Aug. Works Cited Ciment, James. But the election of Prime Minister Turgut Ozal and hisMotherland Party in 1983, and their subsequent continuation of military lawand enormous military buildup in Kurdistan, convinced Ocalan and the PKKthat there was nothing to be gained from participation in ordinarypolitics. Kurdish Nationalism. The Kurds: State and Minority in Turkey, Iraq andIran. Those who escaped were simply able to set upcamp in Syria or Iran which, with "Kurdish minorities of their own," havelong wanted "the Turks to remain the chief target of the region's Kurdishnationalism" ("Unwinnable" 59). The Kurds and the Future of Turkey. New York: St.Martin's, 1997. In the 196 s and 197 s a largenumber of left-oriented Kurdish resistance groups were formed. The Kurdish Struggle 192 -94. New York: Facts on File, 1996. The Kurds speak three principal languages: Kurdi, Zaza, andKurmanji, which is the language of the majority of Kurdish people in Turkeyand, as "the literary language of the Kurds," is the "most prestigious ofall Kurdish vernaculars" (Entessar 4-5). News and World Report 1 Mar. Omestad, Thomas, David E. In 1995 the majority of Turkey'sKurds, according to the report, saw the PKK only as a way "of expressingtheir requests despite all the difficulties it is imposing on them andtheir belief that it will not be able to realize much of its aims" (quotedin Gunter 13 ). In one 1997 campaign, for example, the army sent5 , soldiers into a region of Kurdistan and after a month had managed tokill 29 Kurdish guerrillas. Yetuntil they acquire sovereignty, autonomy, federation status, or merelyrecognition as a legal minority within the nation, the Kurds will remainthe Turkish nation's greatest political problem and its most seriousimpediment to European Union membership and other associations anddevelopments that the government officially desires in order to achieveparity with other modern states. The Kurds of Turkey are not united in their desire for anindependent nation. But,unlike the Christian Armenians who gained from the European peacesettlement, the Islamic Kurds "lacked both a national approach andinternational support" and were incorporated into the new Turkish state(O'Ballance 12). Despite the change, however, Ocalan'scapture in 1999 was greeted by the Turkish government and people with joyand the hope that Kurdish terrorism had finally ended. Yet when a Kurdishpolitician linked to the PKK was let out of jail in 1997 "3 , people--mostly youngsters--turned out to meet him" and, as a local journalistnoted, "these are all PKK members of the future" ("Unwinnable" 59). These nations also want to escape beingtargeted by the PKK's terrorist organization which, under Ocalan'sleadership, "was responsible for more terrorist acts [3,575] than any othergroup in the world" from 1988 to 1998 (Omestad, Kaplan and Lovgren 4 ).The PKK has been widely discredited because of its indiscriminate terrorismand the fact that its "money comes from drug-dealing, extortion, andsmuggling refugees to Europe" as well as "shaking down" Kurdish immigrantsthere (Omestad, Kaplan and Lovgren 4 ). The Turks began to referto the ethnic Kurds as "Mountain Turks" who had merely lost their languageand culture and sought to eradicate all traces of their culture. But theTurkish government suspected them of plans for eventual rebellion orpolitical efforts at secession and ordered the arrest of the movement'sleaders in late 1959. Their traditional homelands take in parts of several nations, butthe largest number of Kurds (12-14 million) live in Turkey, primarily inthe southeast. None of the countries with Kurdish-majorityregions "had, or has, the slightest intention of letting chunks of its landbe chopped off to form another, rival, country" ("Down" 44). But the government adopted a laissez-faire approach to economicdevelopment in "the East," as the Kurdish regions came to be known, andmany of the Kurds' religious-civic leaders "grew richer by turningthemselves into commercial farmers and exploiting their leadership ofKurdish labor and control over Kurdish territory" (Ciment 49). Throughout the 198 s andthe 199 s the PKK mounted a double assault against Turkey--military andterrorist. Within a short time the Kurdsthemselves became the principal focus of "the desire of the country'sleadership to suppress all non-Turkish ethnic identities" (Entessar 81).The Kurds began to rebel in various areas and by the end of 1924 Kemal had"prohibited all Kurdish schools, organizations, publications and religiousfraternities" and the elite urban Kurds who had believed in the nationalistcause soon went into exile in French Syria or returned to Kurdistan (Ciment45). Yet theactivities of the PKK served to bring the Kurds' problems to internationalattention as nothing else had. Although the United States and the rest ofNATO consider Turkey an invaluable ally, and have, therefore, turned anofficial blind eye to the Kurds' problems, this new awareness led to a"shrinking" in Ocalan's demands as he began, in 1998, to admit to being"ready to settle for political and cultural rights rather than outrightKurdish statehood" ("Down" 45). The victorious European powers accepted in theory the idea ofseparate Armenian and Kurdish states, if the people wished. Clearly the Kurds of Turkey see a Kurdish state as a nearimpossibility, and may see it as offering more problems than solutions.The Turkish government can only solve its enormous problem by means of"constitutional and legal guarantees recognizing and protecting the Kurdishcultural existence" and elimination of all laws that specify "the exclusiveTurkishness of the state" (Gunter 132). S.
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