12
March 2003
2. "Court: Kurdish Leader's Trial Not Fair", Europe's top human rights court on Wednesday upheld a complaint by Kurdish rebel leader Abdullah Ocalan that he did not receive a fair trial in Turkey.
3. "KADEK: Elections cannot save AKP", KADEK Presidential Council member Mustafa Karasu congratulated Siirt people who boycotted by-elections on Sunday, saying that the election did not have a meaning other than electing Tayyip Erdogan as a deputy. Karasu also congratulated women who celebrated the Women’s Day at streets asking for peace and solution.
4. "Hatreds Steeped in Blood", when the war in Iraq begins sometime soon, one of the messiest and most dangerous battles may be across from here in northern Iraq. And it won't even involve the Iraqi Army.
5. "Kurds brush up on human rights", about 70 Kurdish leaders met Saturday to learn how to forgive Iraqi soldiers.
6. "EU to admit only Greek Cyprus as UN talks fail", the European Union will press ahead and admit only the Greek sector of divided Cyprus after the breakdown of United Nations-led talks on reunification at The Hague in the early hours of yesterday morning, the European Commission said yesterday.
7. "Attempt to Unify Cyprus Before Entry Into EU Fails", talks to unify the divided Mediterranean island of Cyprus collapsed today after rival Greek and Turkish leaders failed to agree on a U.N. power-sharing agreement.
8. "War run-up squeezes Kurdish economy", a Kurdish political leader is appealing to the United States this week for emergency financial aid in the face of a near-total embargo from Baghdad and a sealed border with Turkey that have left his government strapped for cash.
1. - AFP - "European rights court condemns Turkey in Ocalan case":
STRASBOURG / 12 March 2003
The European Court of Human Rights on Wednesday condemned Turkey
for violating the rights of Kurdish rebel leader Abdullah Ocalan, who
is serving a life sentence for treason in a Turkish island jail.
The court in Strasbourg ruled that Turkey had violated articles of the European Convention on Human Rights that guarantee the right to a fair trial and prohibit torture. By six votes to one, the court said that Ocalan had not been tried by an "independent and impartial tribunal" and that his rights had again been violated when he was sentenced to death.
"To impose a death sentence on a person after an unfair trial was to subject that person wrongfully to the fear that he would be executed," the court said in its ruling, saying the sentence amounted to a "form of inhuman treatment."
Ocalan, who was captured in Kenya by Turkish authorities in February 1999, was given the death penalty for treason in June that year. But his sentence was commuted to life in prison without parole last year when Turkey abolished capital punishment as part of reforms designed to boost its chances of joining the European Union.
Ocalan is currently the sole inmate of a jail on the Marmara
Sea island of Imrali south of Istanbul. His separatist Kurdistan Workers'
Party (PKK) declared an end to its 15-year war for self-rule in southeast
Turkey in 1999 in favour of a democratic resolution to Kurdish grievances.
The conflict, which has claimed about 36,500 lives, has since then significantly
abated. 
2. - Associated Press - "Court: Kurdish Leader's Trial Not Fair":
BRUSSELS / 12 March 2003
Europe's top human rights court on Wednesday upheld a complaint
by Kurdish rebel leader Abdullah Ocalan that he did not receive a fair
trial in Turkey.
``The Ankara State Security Court, which convicted the applicant, had not been an independent and impartial tribunal,'' said the European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg, France.
On some of the other 11 complaints lodged by lawyers of the jailed rebel leader, the court ruled in Turkey's favor. It rejected charges that Ocalan's conditions of detention were inhumane or that he had been illegally detained.
Both sides have three months to lodge an appeal.
The panel of seven European judges awarded Ocalan $110,000 in costs.
Ocalan was snatched by Turkish commandos in Kenya in 1999 and flown to Turkey. Since his trial he has been the only inmate on the prison island of Imrali.
Turkey blames Ocalan for leading a 15-year insurgency against Turkey that left 37,000 people dead. The rebels declared a cease-fire after his capture.
At his trial in 1999, Ocalan was sentenced to death. The sentence was commuted to life in prison last year when Turkey abolished capital punishment, but an appeal by opponents of Ocalan is pending in a Turkish court against that ruling.
In answer to Ocalan's lawyers' complaints against the death sentence, the court found there had been no violation of articles in the European Convention of Human Rights guaranteeing the right to life and prohibiting ill-treatment.
However, the judges voted 6-1 that the imposition of the death penalty following an unfair trial was a violation.
Turkey will not have to make any immediate changes to
Ocalan's situation pending an appeal. If the verdict is upheld by the
European Court's Grand Chamber, Turkey would be under pressure to grant
a retrial.
3. - Kurdish Observer - "KADEK: Elections cannot save AKP":
KADEK Presidential Council member Mustafa Karasu congratulated Siirt people who boycotted by-elections on Sunday, saying that the election did not have a meaning other than electing Tayyip Erdogan as a deputy. Karasu also congratulated women who celebrated the Women’s Day at streets asking for peace and solution.
MHA/FRANKFURT / 11 March 2003
Participated by telephone in the “Acilim” program on Medya
TV, KADEK Presidential Council member Mustafa Karasu commented on the
election in Siirt and the Kurdish women in action.
“As long as Gul was prime minister Erdogan stayed silent and did not lose his influence much. Everyone talked all at once. Therefore he was demanded to be in power. The election in Siirt does not have another meaning other than that. The willpower of the Kurdish people was clear in 3 November elections. DEHAP was the number one party in Siirt. Moreover AKP lost some power, it could not be an answer to the expectations,” said Karasu.
The Council member pointed out that more than half of the Siirt people had boycotted the election and AKP had got votes only from the village guards. He also said that the election could not save AKP and it would be abandoned after it fulfilled its function. “US wants to use AKP. US wants to create an Islamic force in the Middle East therefore it approaches AKP with sympathy,” added Karasu. He stressed that though AKP got support from abroad it could not stay in power for a long while.
“Women deepen the democratic revolution”
Karasu also congratulated the women on behalf of KADEK. Describing the uprising of the Kurdish women as a big revolution, Karasu stated that Kurds had displayed a leading role for the first time since the Med Empire.
“Kurds can be proud of themselves, they can have self-esteem. The Kurdish women’s leading role is not an ordinary action, it has started a freedom movement from which all the society will gain,” said the Council member.
Drawing attention that the women’s movement had deepened
the democratic revolution, Karasu continued with words to the effect:
“For a nation to be a nation it must be democratic in the real
sense of the word. The women’s movement adds it a vaccine of success.
It deepens the democratic revolution. There are still feudalism in some
parts of Kurdistan. Therefore the free women’s movement is a movement
that strengthens the Kurdish nation. It develops consciousness. Can
such a people be made slave? The free women’s movement is a leading
force of the Kurdish national democratic revolution. But it is wrong
to limit the movement with it, it also has a universal aspect. It has
an international aspect. We as KADEK make a call. Women must claim President
Apo actively. They must raise voice against the solitary confinement
and increase their participation in the actions.”
4. - The New York Times - "Hatreds Steeped in Blood":
DIYARBAKIR, Turkey / 11 March 2003 / by Nicholas D.
Kristof
When the war in Iraq begins sometime soon, one of the messiest and
most dangerous battles may be across from here in northern Iraq. And
it won't even involve the Iraqi Army.
In the so far unsuccessful haggling to bribe Turkey into the coalition, the U.S. acquiesced in the deluded Turkish plan to intervene in Kurdish lands in northern Iraq. So Turkish Army trucks are rumbling along toward Iraq on roads in this rugged and remote area of southeastern Turkey, carrying tanks and artillery and pausing only to confiscate film from journalists who photograph them.
Many Kurds hate Turks with the kind of enmity steeped in blood and ripened by centuries of antagonism, and in the confusion of war some Kurd will surely seize the opportunity to toss a grenade into a truck full of Turkish troops. That's when Turkish and Kurdish units will begin slaughtering each other.
The unfolding mess in northern Iraq is a reminder that if we invade Iraq, we are stepping into an immensely complex region of guns, clans and hostilities that we only dimly understand. The White House thinks it can choreograph the warfare, but if we can't control effete gavel-wielding diplomats on the familiar turf of the United Nations, how will we manage feuding troops with mortars in the mountains of northern Iraq?
The nightmare is that the Turks, Kurds, Iraqis and Americans will all end up fighting over the oil fields of Kirkuk or Mosul. The Americans plan to get there first to seize the oil fields and avert a broader conflict, but in the chaos of war that may not be possible. Turkey is terrified that Iraqi Kurds will emerge from a war with access to oil to finance a viable Kurdistan — which they say could become a base for more Kurdish terrorism in Turkey.
"If Kurds try to advance to Kirkuk or Mosul, then nothing can stop the Turks, not even the Americans," said Ilter Turan, a political science professor at Bilgi University in Istanbul.
Haluk Sahin, a prominent Istanbul journalist, added: "If American security is so important that it will fight 10,000 miles from home, then what about Turkish security? For Turkey, this is right across our border."
"Kurds are always in conflict," explained Mursel Karacam, a 40-year-old chestnut vendor in Istanbul, as he plied me with fresh-roasted nuts. "We would go in and teach them how to be civilized, how to live in peace."
Oh? Teach the Kurds peace at gunpoint? Some Turks seem to have the same problem as some Americans — they have been so traumatized by terrorism (whether by Kurds or by Al Qaeda), they are determined to go abroad with guns blazing, without recognizing that artillery may not always help, and without acknowledging that the rest of the world does not accept the nobility of their intentions.
The U.S., desperate to get basing rights for its troops in Turkey, agreed that Turkey should enter northern Iraq — which is like hiring the Bloods to patrol a Crips neighborhood. Then Turkey's Parliament turned down the proposal for up to 62,000 U.S. troops anyway, despite our bribe of $6 billion in direct aid. At this point, the White House would probably like to see more democracy in Iraq and less in Turkey.
Frankly, it's just as well the Turks turned us down. That vote consolidated Turkish democracy, which we need to encourage as a model for the Islamic world. And as part of the deal, we would have escorted the Turkish foxes into the Kurdish henhouse.
Unfortunately, as the Turkish military convoys show, the foxes are planning to visit the hens anyway — even though the U.S. now discourages unilateral Turkish intervention in Iraq. We need to make the point much more firmly: whether Turkey accepts the U.S. troop presence or not, it's hard to think of a worse idea than Turkey's moving into Kurdistan, unless it would be Turkey's simultaneously providing "peacekeeping" in Armenia.
Tensions are growing, with Iranian-armed fighters entering Kurdistan and threatening to fight not just Saddam but also the Turks. Our allies could be too busy disemboweling each other to take on Saddam's troops. And the U.S., as one American living in Turkey puts it, "has no clue of the hatreds it's walking into."
When the White House looks at Iraq, all it sees is hidden
weaponry. It never notices the seething complexities in which we are
about to embed our young men and women.
5. - The Christian Science Monitor - "Kurds brush up on human rights":
About 70 Kurdish leaders met Saturday to learn how to forgive Iraqi soldiers.
RIZGARY / 11 March 2003 / by Gretel C. Kovach 
Kader Hassan Kader, a tribal elder from a small village along the
border between Iraqi Kurdistan and the "other Iraq," had a
long memory and a taste for revenge. In 1988, his sister and older brother
disappeared, along with more than 100,000 others, during Saddam Hussein's
Anfal campaign to destroy Kurdish village life.
They were never heard from again, and are thought to be buried in mass graves along the southern desert near Kuwait.
Mr. Kader says he was sure that when he saw the first Iraqi soldier defecting or fleeing during a probable war, "I would kill him instantly." But by midday, after he and about 70 other leaders from 21 villages listened to a seminar on human rights and refugee assistance, he changed his mind.
"Now I see that it is better to be merciful," says Kader, the creased lines of his face attesting to the burden of his years. "I will return to Mansoor Al Khan and do my best to convince my people. I will tell them that we have gained nothing from the war, and that we can benefit from leaving the fighting behind."
A coalition of Kurdish nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) made their first attempt Saturday to convince the villagers bordering Saddam Hussein's Iraq to respect human rights and avert a blood bath of revenge.
At the Nakada Primary School in Rizgary, just a couple of miles from the border with Baghdad-controlled Iraq, a lawyer pleads for restraint in a classroom full of men in black and white turbans and baggy balloon pants, their loafers caked in mud from the unpaved streets of their villages.
"We have to respect every prisoner," says Sarwar Ali, pacing in front of a chalkboard listing human rights principles. "We must show that we are serious about peace, even concerning Ansar [Islamic militants fighting against the secular Kurdish government.] Otherwise we will act contrary to our best interests."
Members of Ansar al Islam have set Kurdish fighters on fire while still alive, mutilated their bodies, and displayed them on their website. The name draws rumbles from the crowd and the question, "Are Ansar fighters human beings?"
But the villagers seem ready to treat Iraqi soldiers humanely. They also agree to open their homes to ordinary Arab citizens fleeing from fighting in the south.
"If Saddam Hussein leaves, we will invite all the Arabs and have a big party," interjects one attendee, eliciting approving laughter from the crowd.
"Saddam wanted to divide the Kurds from the Arabs, the Kurds from other Kurds, the Shia from the Sunni," says Hero Anwar, a program manager for REACH, a local Kurdish NGO that organized the village network and helped host the seminars.
"He was afraid that if the people think together, maybe they will be powerful enough to oppose him. He made us become enemies against each other. But we all suffered under Saddam, and now we want to help the others," she says.
The human rights training is just one aspect of a multipart program. With funding from the British government, and NGOs, the leaders of 89 villages are learning first aid, including the treatment of chemical wounds, and securing spare rooms for potential refugees.
Many in the crowd wonder aloud how they would care for the refugees when they are having trouble feeding their own families. A sheep that used to sell for 700 dinars now earns just 300, or less than $30.
In the next week, the seminars will be repeated in several more border towns. The hope is that the elders will organize teams that will separate soldiers from civilians and assign rooms. Each family is expected to care for another family, housing a total of 2,000 refugees with food and other assistance from aid groups.
The lecturer hands out a survey and asks the crowd, "Are you ready to assist the refugees?" Shouts from the crowd insist: "We are ready, we are very ready."
Changing hearts will be as important as securing extra blankets. Mohamed Kareem Shaswar says that 150 people in his village perished in the Anfal campaign. But even he says he saw the wisdom of the lawyers' advice. "We will give these criminals to be judged by God first and by the court second. I will not kill them with my own hands," he says.
The seminar organizers drew on Kurdish traditions of generosity
and respect for elders to get their message across. Mahmoud Hama Aziz
agrees that the younger men would follow his lead. "In our tradition
if an old man shows forgiveness, the others will follow him."
6. - The Financial Times - "EU to admit only Greek Cyprus as UN talks fail":
ANKARA - ATHENS / 12 March 2003 / by Leyla Boulton,
Judy Dempsey and Kerin Hope
The European Union will press ahead and admit only the Greek sector
of divided Cyprus after the breakdown of United Nations-led talks on
reunification at The Hague in the early hours of yesterday morning,
the European Commission said yesterday.
At the same time, it said Turkey's chances of starting EU accession talks had been jeopardised by its refusal to sign up to the UN plan. Jean-Christophe Filori, Commission spokesman, said: "It appears to us very difficult that accession negotiations can start with Turkey in this situation."
The Commission's comments contradict previous positions held by senior EU officials, who only last December at the Copenhagen summit insisted on giving a date to Turkey to begin accession negotiations, saying these were not linked to breaking the 29-year-old deadlock over the divided island of Cyprus.
Fifteen hours of talks led by Kofi Annan, the UN secretary-general, broke down after Rauf Denktash and Tassos Papadopoulos, the Turkish and Greek Cypriot leaders, declined to approve a UN-drafted plan for a united Cyprus. "We have reached the end of the road," Mr Annan said.
Failure of the initiative suggests Cyprus may have become the first casualty of the Iraq crisis, as the Turkish government focused almost entirely on the probable US-led war against Iraq.
Turkish diplomats said Recep Tayyip Erdogan, leader of the governing Justice and Development Party, found it impossible to make a compromise over northern Cyprus at this point, as he grappled with political reforms, negotiating an International Monetary Fund loan and deciding what steps to take after parliament blocked a US request to base over 62,000 troops in Turkey.
Despite that packed agenda, Abdullah Gul, who resigned as Turkish prime minister yesterday to make way for Mr Erdogan, still held out hope for a settlement. He said Mr Annan had "not closed the door completely". Diplomats said much would depend on the outcome of any war against Iraq and how it affected Turkish domestic politics.
In northern Cyprus Mr Denktash may have bought some time, but he faces parliamentary elections next December against the background of growing calls by a pro-EU, pro-settlement Turkish Cypriot opposition party that could form the next government.
"Mr Denktash is now a leader without a people," said Mehmet Ali Talat, who recently swept local elections on the pro-EU ticket. Turkish Cypriots may try to call a referendum on the UN plan, despite Mr Denktash's rejection of it.
Among Greek Cypriots, opinion is divided over whether a deal is possible, if not before April 16 when the accession treaties will be signed, then before Cyprus joins the EU in May of next year. "It wasn't the last opportunity," said a Greek official. "The momentum is still there because of Turkey's European aspirations and there is still time for another UN initiative that would have strong backing from the EU."
Mr Papadopoulos agreed at The Hague to make it easier for Turkish Cypriots to work in the south, where wages are three times higher than in the north.
But with Greek Cypriots assured EU membership, attitudes
may harden in the south. "It could be that we are coming closer
to a permanent partition," said Philip Savvides from Eliamp, a
Greek think-tank. "It is not certain the international community
will want to put so many resources again into trying to get a settlement."
7. - The Washington Post - "Attempt to Unify Cyprus Before Entry Into EU Fails":
12 March 2003 / by Alex Efty
Talks to unify the divided Mediterranean island of Cyprus collapsed
today after rival Greek and Turkish leaders failed to agree on a U.N.
power-sharing agreement.
"We have reached the end of the road," U.N. Secretary General Kofi Annan said in a statement after an all-night negotiation session with leaders of the two sides and their backers.
Annan had used Cyprus's impending entry into the European Union to pressure Greek Cypriot President Tassos Papadopoulos and Turkish Cypriot leader Rauf Denktash to agree on a federation plan that would bring the two sides together under a weak central government.
The talks stumbled over Turkish insistence that their breakaway Cypriot state win full recognition and Greek demands that refugees be allowed to return to homes in northern Cyprus. The island was split after Turkey invaded in 1974 in the wake of an abortive coup by supporters of union with Greece. The breakaway state in the north, about one-third of the island, is recognized only by Turkey, which maintains 40,000 troops there.
The U.N. effort failed, but officials in Greece and Turkey said they would continue trying to resolve the problem. "We have made positive efforts toward a solution in Cyprus, and we will continue to do so," Turkish Prime Minister Abdullah Gul said at a news conference today.
In Athens, Greek Foreign Ministry spokesman Panos Beglitis blamed the impasse on Denktash. However, he said the failed talks were "not the end of the road."
Annan brought the two Cypriot leaders to The Hague on Monday to try to get a commitment to hold a referendum on his plan.
"The Annan plan is not acceptable," Denktash said, saying that the proposal to allow a limited return of Greek refugees would require 100,000 Turkish Cypriots to leave their homes. The Greek community contests that figure.
Denktash also rejected Annan's proposal that the plan be put to the people in separate referendums.
Annan said Papadopoulos had accepted the plan with the provision that gaps in federal legislation and security be filled in "so that the people know what they are voting on."
Annan left open the possibility of resuming the talks. "My plan remains on the table," he said. At the same time, he said he was instructing his special envoy to Cyprus, Alvaro de Soto, to close his office on the island and return to New York to prepare a full report.
The European Union restated its position that only the
internationally recognized Greek Cypriot state will join the EU if there
is no agreement on reunification. "The accession treaty will be
signed by Cyprus as we know it today," EU spokesman Jean-Christophe
Filori said.
8. - UNITED PRESS INTERNATIONAL - "War run-up squeezes Kurdish economy":
12 March 2003 / by Eli J. Lake
A Kurdish political leader is appealing to the United States this
week for emergency financial aid in the face of a near-total embargo
from Baghdad and a sealed border with Turkey that have left his government
strapped for cash.
"We are already feeling the pinch," said Barham Salih, prime minister of the Kurdistan Regional Government for Suleimaniyah, in an interview yesterday. "Trade has dwindled and the oil-for-food program is all but terminated. Economic pressures are becoming really grave."
Mr. Salih, who arrived in Washington Saturday, has met with key Bush administration officials in an appeal for $50 million for the government serving the section of northern Iraq protected by U.S. and British fighter patrols. He met yesterday with Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for Near East Affairs Ryan Crocker. On Monday he met with the Pentagon's No. 3 civilian official, Doug Feith.
Northern Iraq's normal sources of income have largely dried up in recent months.
U.N. workers in the oil-for-food program, which helps distribute money for food and medical assistance to northern Iraq from the country's oil revenue, began leaving the Kurdish territory last month.
Saddam Hussein began restricting trade from Baghdad to the north over the summer, and more recently has clamped down on the smuggling that resulted. "Only the most die-hard Kurds are continuing to smuggle goods from the rest of Iraq," a Kurdish diplomat in Washington said yesterday.
Turkey has also closed its border with northern Iraq in
preparation for war, denying the Kurdish parties revenue from trucks
smuggling oil from Iraq. The only reliable link to the outside world
remaining for the Kurds is its border with Iran.