Foreign Correspondence

[fuagf]

How many years do people have to march for peace? Two years of Kurdish marches. Two years of so many.

Iraqi Kurds march for peace as raids by Turkey loom
· Direct talks urged to avert army strike on PKK rebels
· Turkish leaders defiant amid foreign criticism

Michael Howard in Dohuk .. * The Guardian, 19 October 2007

Thousands of protesters, including many school students, took to the streets of Iraqi Kurdistan yesterday to
denounce Turkey's decision to allow its generals to cross into northern Iraq to hunt down fighters of the
Kurdistan Workers party (PKK), which it accuses of carrying out attacks in Turkey from bases in Iraq. [...]

"We are not supporting the PKK. They have a fight with Turkey and it is not
our fight," said Shwan Abdullah, 15. "If the army comes in, they may never leave." [...]

Turkey's leaders, however, remained defiant yesterday. "Turkey is implementing the same
international rules that were implemented by those who linked the attacks on the twin towers to some
organisations" and sent troops to Afghanistan and Iraq on that basis, said the justice minister, Mehmet
ali Sahin, in a swipe at the Bush administration. "That's why no one has the right to say anything." [...]

Ankara, however, refuses to recognise the Kurds' regional government, saying it will talk only
to Baghdad, whose power to effect changes in Kurdistan without the Kurds' say-so is negligible.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2007/oct/19/turkey.iraq

Thousands of Kurds march for peace in Turkey .. 25 September, 2009

DIYARBAKIR, Turkey, Sept 25, 2009 (AFP) — Thousands of Kurds rallied here Friday calling for an end
to deadly fighting between the army and Kurdish rebels amid government efforts to end a 25-year insurgency.

Some 10,000 people -- relatives of Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) rebels killed in clashes -- marched
through Diyarbakir, the largest city in Turkey's mainly Kurdish southeast, shouting "Martyrs never die."

"Hear the cries of these mothers. We are saying that no policeman, soldier or guerrilla
should die. Let's live in peace," Hasan Pence, the chairman of a relative's support group, said.

Some 45,000 people -- most of them Kurdish rebels -- have been killed since 1984
when the PKK, blacklisted as a terrorist group by Turkey and much of the international
community, picked up arms for self-rule in Turkey's mainly Kurdish east and southeast.

"These people have fought for their language, culture and identity, and paid a price. If we are talking about
peace today, it is because of them," Pervin Buldan, a lawmaker from the pro-Kurdish Democratic Society Party, said.

For the past few months, the Ankara government has been working on a series of measures
aimed at improving the rights of the Kurdish community and eroding support for the PKK.

Details of the package have not been released, but the government has already
ruled out dialogue with the PKK or a general amnesty for the rebels, a key Kurdish demand.

Sceptics argue that a lasting settlement cannot be achieved if Ankara insists on rejecting contact
with the PKK and fails to draw up a clear strategy to convince the rebels to lay down arms.
http://www.institutkurde.org/en/info/latest/thousands-of-kurds-march-for-peace-in-turkey-1953.html