PEACE CONFERENCE ENDS UP WITH CONCRETE DEMOCRATIC SOLUTION CALLS
New Anatolian, Turkey
Jan 15 2007
Weekend’s media savvy conference entitled "Turkey seeks its peace,"
turned into a platform where almost all participants urged for
democratic solutions to the Kurdish problem, with strong or weak
emphasis on state’s role.
Address of Author Yasar Kemal, who had faced harsh criticism years ago
when he delivered a speech advocating the rights of Kurdish people
in a time uttering the word "Kurdish" was pernicious in the eyes of
the state, marked the conference and triggered a verbal attack in kind.
"We named guerilla as terrorist, and became a country fighting against
its own people," Kemal said, sparking debates. Head of a lawyer
association, Erdem Akyuz, met his words by saying, "he’d better say we
named separatist as intellectual," comparing Kemal with Nobel winner
Turkish novelist Orhan Pamuk, whose prize was belittled with claims
that he got it thanks to his words accusing Turkey of killing scores
of Armenians and Kurds.
Ruling Justice and Development (AK) Party deputy group leader Eyup
Fatsa and main opposition Republican People’s Party (CHP) Batman
Deputy Mehmet Nezir Nasiroglu distinguished guerilla from terrorist
but didn’t explain why they do so.
However both shared Kemal’s view on the fraternity between the Kurdish
and Turkish people.
The conference is also likely to face legal prosecution given the tone
and content of the speeches and participants’ ideological stance. A
court already issued an order to record addresses of now defunct Party
for Democracy (DEP) Deputy Orhan Dogan and Kurdish author Mehmet Uzun.
However Kemal’s words calling Kurds and Turks inseparable friends
for almost 1000 years was music to the ears of participants, mostly
pro-Kurdish politicians and academics from several universities
advocating peaceful solution methods rather than armed measures.
Most sincere support to Kemal came from another author, Vedat Turkali,
who said no one can distinguish Kurds from Turks in this country. He
also urged for dialogue between the two groups calling it the only
way to put an end to long war.
Diyarbakir Mayor Osman Baydemir, known to be a vocal advocate of
Kurdish rights despite several cases against him, rather changed
the air when said they have no luxury to wait for permanent peace
and urged the state to immediately take necessary steps regarding
its responsibilities as a welfare state. He also asked the state to
implement a extraordinary economic program unique to the southeast
to remove shortcomings and problems stemming from economic
underdevelopment.
Baydemir previously argued that the state should leave administration
of natural resources as well as several industrial facilities to the
local administrations in the southeast for quicker development.
Ahmet Ocal, Diyarbakir head of the Independent Industrialists
and Businessmen Association (MUSIAD), a finance group made up of
businessman describing themselves Muslim in the first place, also
supported Baydemir’s views by saying that revenues collected from
regional resources should be spent in the region. However he put
PKK’s unconditionally laying down arms and declaring it to the world
as preconditions putting emphasis on the security.
‘Ocalan has no great political power’
Touching on highly explosive issue of the charisma of Abdullah Ocalan,
inmate leader of the PKK, for the Kurdish people, sociologist Mesut
Yegen from Middle East Technical University (METU) said that the
Kurdish people doesn’t consider Ocalan as the utmost political power
representing them. "We see almost a million people during Nevruz
celebrations but only one tenth of it celebrates Ocalan’s birthday,"
he underlined arguing that there are several political figures
representing the Kurdish people.
Fuat Keyman from the Koc University said election threshold should
be lowered to 5 percent to open the way for Kurdish representation
in Parliament, calling it a primary measure to put an end to the clash.
From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress
