5
September 2003
2. "Press: "Kurdish leader's brother warns Turkey of "non-traditional war", The brother of jailed Turkish leader Abdullah Ocalan warned Turkey of a "non-traditional war" if it did not come up with a plan to resolve the Kurdish problem, the London-based Arab daily Al-Hayat reported Thursday.
3. "U.S. Glosses Over Iraq-Turkey Dispute", The United States glossed over a dispute between its Iraqi and Turkish allies on Thursday, saying it was confident it could find a solution if Turkey offered to contribute troops to deploy in Iraq.
4. "Erdogan returns half-satisfied from Germany", The chancellor declares support but German opposition turns out steadfast on its objection to Turkey's entry into the EU, saying the economic situation is not favorable and questioning Turkey's European identity.
5. "Turkey sets conditions for deploying forces in Iraq", Ankara said that its forces would be stationed in Iraq for a six month to one year term and deployment might been revised after the first term.
6. "Turkish Cypriot opposition join forces for Denktash's ouster; EU entry", Turkish Cypriot opposition parties agreed Thursday to cooperate before and after December's general election with the aim of reaching a settlement with the Greek Cypriots to reunify their island and join the European Union.
1. - Radio Free Europe - "Turkey: Kurdish Rebels Call Off Cease-Fire And Offer Timetable For Peace Talks":
PRAGUE / 4 September 2003
By Jean-Christophe Peuch
Turkey's most notorious guerrilla group, the Kurdistan Workers Party, this week announced the end of a five-year cease-fire with Ankara's armed forces. The announcement raises concerns about a resumption of large-scale military operations in predominantly Kurdish southeastern Anatolia. Observers generally blame Ankara's attitude toward Kurdish fighters and a lack of progress on legal reforms for Turkey's 12-million strong Kurdish minority for the group's decision.
Turkey's banned Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) says it has decided to call off a cease-fire because of Ankara's failure to abide by the agreement.
A PKK statement issued on 2 September through the pro-Kurdish, German-based Mezopotamia news agency said: "The unilateral truce has come to an end as of 1 September and the cease-fire can only continue on a bilateral basis."
The PKK -- which advocates political autonomy for Turkey's 12 million Kurds -- took up arms in 1984 to counter the increasingly anti-Kurdish policy implemented by Ankara following the 1980 military coup. The move triggered a 15-year guerrilla war that claimed an estimated 35,000 lives.
On 1 September 1998, Kurdish militants declared a unilateral truce -- the third since the beginning of their armed struggle. A few months later, imprisoned PKK leader Abdullah Ocalan called upon Kurdish guerrillas to leave Turkey and seek refuge in neighboring Iraq, Syria, and Iran.
Armed forays conducted by Turkish troops in northern Iraq with the blessing of local Kurdish groups have failed to eradicate PKK militants there. An estimated 5,000 guerrillas are believed to be still hiding in the Qandil Mountains that separate northern Iraq from Iran.
Last year, the PKK changed its name to the Kurdistan Freedom and Democracy Congress (KADEK) and announced plans to engage in a peaceful struggle for Kurdish rights. The group's leaders said at the time the decision was motivated by a reassessment of the international situation following the terrorist attacks of 11 September 2001.
Both Washington and the European Union have blacklisted the PKK as a terrorist group, despite claims by Kurdish guerrillas that they are freedom fighters. Yielding to Turkish pressure, a number of Western countries have outlawed the organization while tolerating the presence of Kurdish activists on their territory.
Although violence in Turkey's southeast has largely subsided following Ocalan's capture, sporadic armed clashes have continued, pitting Turkish troops against Kurdish guerrillas.
Ankara has never recognized the 1998 cease-fire and is now pressing the United States to crack down on PKK-KADEK militants based in northern Iraq.
In addition, Kurdish groups say, Turkey recently launched a series of military operations against guerrillas that have remained in its eastern provinces. Ankara denies the charge and blames the PKK-KADEK for a string of attacks on government officials and soldiers.
Kamuran Jikikan is the Paris-based Kurdish Institute's chief lawyer. He acknowledges a contradiction between KADEK's latest move and its pledge to fight for recognition exclusively through political means, but he says Turkey is to blame for the group's decision to call off the 1998 truce.
"[KADEK's] decision to put an end to the unilateral cease-fire is an answer to the Turkish authorities' stubborn refusal to start [peace] negotiations either directly or through mediators. Judging by the wording of the [KADEK] statement, one gets the impression that it is rather meant to force Turkey into engaging into a process that would eventually allow those 5,000 or so fighters who are still living in the mountains to return home," Jikikan says. "KADEK is already engaged in a political struggle through the Kurdish civil society. But it is true that [this week's statement] somehow contradicts the policy the group has been pursuing over the past four years."
Echoing Jikikan's comments, the pro-Kurdish "Ozgur Politika" daily on 2 September quoted Mustafa Karasu, a member of the nine-seat KADEK presidential council, as saying the group's main objective is to force Ankara into agreeing to a bilateral cease-fire. Karasu also reportedly said the end of the truce does not signal an immediate onslaught against Turkish forces.
"Over the next three months, we will struggle to achieve a bilateral cease-fire. From this point of view, we do not see [the end of the cease-fire] as a period of war," "Ozgur Politika" quoted the PKK-KADEK official as saying.
Ibrahim Dogus chairs the London-based Halkevi Kurdish and Turkish community center. He says the KADEK leadership has agreed on a 12-month "road map" with a view to opening peace talks with the Islamic-rooted government of Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan.
"This 'road map' [is made of] three stages. The first stage [begins] on 1 September 2003, and ends on 1 December 2003. What [the KADEK leadership] is demanding is that during these first three months the Turkish government put an end to military operations against Kurdish guerrillas, provide conditions for the return home of Kurdish villagers, grant political rights to the Kurdish people, and dissolve its paramilitary anti-guerilla units. So, basically, we will see whether the Turkish government is willing to [make peace] with the Kurdish people or, [on the contrary], restart the war. These three months will be very important," Dogus says.
Dogus says the "road map" -- which Ocalan reportedly initiated from his prison cell on Turkey's Imrali island -- also calls on Ankara to agree to confidence-building measures that would allow Turkey's Kurds to enjoy greater rights in their home country and pave the way for further democratization of Turkish society.
When it came to power in November of last year, Erdogan's Justice and Development Party promised to amend Turkey's legislation with a view to boosting its chances of entering the European Union. Among the demands put forward by Brussels are greater rights for Kurds and curbing the influence of Turkey's powerful military on domestic politics, especially on the Kurdish issue.
The Turkish parliament earlier this year voted several constitutional amendments meant to reduce the role of the National Security Council, Turkey's military-dominated main decision-making body, and allow greater rights for ethnic minorities.
Yet, Kurds and human rights group complain these reforms have had no practical effect yet. Furthermore, they point out, Turkey's judiciary last March banned the country's largest legal Kurdish political group -- the People's Democracy Party (HADEP) -- and initiated legal proceedings against another pro-Kurdish formation for allegedly threatening national interests.
Rochelle Harris is a spokeswoman for the Kurdish Human Rights Project, a London-based nongovernmental organization. She says continuing human rights violations in Turkey remain a major concern for Kurds in general, and for the PKK-KADEK in particular:
"The situation at the moment for the Kurds is that even though Turkey has passed a lot of reforms regarding the Kurdish language in broadcasting and so on, [these reforms] haven't been implemented on the ground, and there continues to be human rights violations in Turkey. And, obviously, the PKK has decided to address that in their own way," Harris says.
In a further attempt to boost its chances of joining the EU soon, Turkey last month decreed a partial amnesty law, which -- although it applies to all radical militants -- is primarily meant for Kurdish rebels.
The law, which has only a six-month validity, provides outright pardons for guerrillas that have not attacked Turkish targets in the past. Militants involved in violent actions should see their prison terms reduced if they provide information about their underground activities. Top PKK-KADEK leaders are excluded, however.
Kurds have denounced the pardon legislation -- dubbed "rehabilitation law" by the Turkish authorities -- as a ploy to dissolve the PKK-KADEK and refute Ankara's claims that hundreds of militants have already applied for pardons.
Rights activist Harris says the amnesty law is likely to miss its target, as did similar legislation in the past.
"There have been amnesty laws in the past, and they haven't worked. [Besides], it is not an amnesty law that [the Turks] have passed. What they have passed is a repentance law. What the PKK are demanding is an amnesty law, which would be a general amnesty, which would create a democratic platform for dialogue between the Kurdish population and the Turkish government. What they have right now is a kind of piecemeal measure that is not going to create that democratic platform," Harris says.
Kurdish lawyer Jikikan also believes the latest Turkish initiative is bound to fail: "It is the word 'amnesty' that is misleading. It is a repentance law that provides for a reduction of prison terms for those [militants] who confess. That explains why no one takes it seriously, and [PKK-KADEK] fighters will not surrender because they do not feel guilty. We are in a situation where people are at war and answering the actions of the Turkish army. This is the reason why [this pardon law] did not work. It did not work in its previous version, and it could not work in its second version. Turkish intellectuals and jurists knew it would turn out this way. They've said it, they've written it. KADEK was not alone in denouncing this law."
On 1 September, Turkish Foreign Minister Abdullah Gul signaled that Ankara -- which has maintained hundreds of troops in northern Iraq since the 1991 Gulf War -- would seek Washington's help in cleansing the Qadil Mountains of PKK-KADEK militants in return for its contribution to the U.S.-led stabilization force in Iraq.
The U.S. administration is pressing Ankara to consider dispatching up to 10,000 troops near Baghdad and other areas in central Iraq. No decision has been taken so far, and it remains unclear whether Turkish lawmakers will endorse any troop deployments.
Washington is desperate for help in its efforts to quell instability and violence in post-Saddam Hussein Iraq and has reportedly promised Ankara that it will consider some of its demands regarding Kurdish rebels.
Western regional experts believe U.S. policymakers are faced with a quandary -- either move against the PKK-KADEK and risk further instability in Iraq, or fail to meet Turkish demands and lose Ankara's support in its efforts to stabilize the country.
Kurdish militants do not believe the U.S. will move against the PKK-KADEK for fear of disrupting the current balance of forces in Iraq.
"We don't think U.S. troops will attack Kurds because Iraqi
Kurds have sided with [them] against Saddam and his regime,"
Halkevi chairman Dogus says, adding, "The Kurds are the United
States' most important allies in the Middle East at the moment."
2.
- AFP - "Press: "Kurdish leader's brother warns Turkey
of "non-traditional war":
BEIRUT / 4 September 2003
The brother of jailed Turkish leader Abdullah Ocalan warned Turkey
of a "non-traditional war" if it did not come up with a
plan to resolve the Kurdish problem, the London-based Arab daily Al-Hayat
reported Thursday.
"Our party is ready to carry out attacks in the various cities
and provinces and will not content itself with fighting in the mountains
and villages as it did in the early 1990s," said Othman Ocalan,
a member of the command council of the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK)
renamed KADEK.
"The war this time will not be traditional and it is Turkey that
will have to assume responsibility for civilian losses," he added
in an interview with Al-Hayat in his mountain base on the Iraqi-Iranian
border.
On Monday, KADEK called off a unilateral ceasefire which it had declared
in 1999 shortly after the capture of its leader, Abdullah Ocalan,
with the aim of pursuing a political solution to the conflict in the
country's restive, mainly Kurdish southeast.
The Kurdish rebels said they ended the ceasefire because Ankara had
failed to respond with reciprocal goodwill.
Most of the Kurdish militants -- believed to number about 5,000 --
are said to be hiding in mountainous northern Iraq.
3. - Reuters - "U.S. Glosses Over Iraq-Turkey Dispute":
WASHINGTON / 4 September 2003
The United States glossed over a dispute between its Iraqi and Turkish
allies on Thursday, saying it was confident it could find a solution
if Turkey offered to contribute troops to deploy in Iraq.
Iraqi Foreign Minister Hoshyar Zebari, a Kurd, said on Thursday that
neighboring states such as Turkey should not send troops because of
possible meddling in Iraqi affairs.
The United States, keen for allies to share the burden of occupying
Iraq, has been pressing Turkey to contribute, despite Iraqi Kurdish
sensitivities about a Turkish presence.
State Department spokesman Richard Boucher said the United States
attached much weight to the views of the Iraqi cabinet, which is part
of the U.S.-picked Governing Council.
But he added: "The arrangements that exist in Iraq ... are that
these things get coordinated. They get coordinated with the Iraqis
in the Governing Council. They get coordinated with the military.
They get coordinated between militaries."
"I express my confidence that that can be done in an appropriate
fashion should it come to Turkey being willing to provide troops,"
he added.
He declined to say whether the Iraqi cabinet, which is almost wholly
dependent on U.S. military force and money, had a veto over such major
decisions.
The United States, anxious to cut its losses in Iraq, is trying to
promote the Iraqi Governing Council as representative of the Iraqi
people.
4. - Turkish Daily News / Agencies - "Erdogan returns half-satisfied from Germany":
The chancellor declares support but German opposition turns out steadfast on its objection to Turkey's entry into the EU, saying the economic situation is not favorable and questioning Turkey's European identity.
ANKARA / BERLIN / 5 September 2003
Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan closed a three-day visit to Germany and returned home half-satisfied, with the government promising to support Turkey's bid to join the European Union and the opposition, as well as influential human rights groups, highlighting difficulties on Turkey's membership path.
Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder pledged Erdogan support for Turkey's EU bid and accused German opposition parties, who have been critical of Turkey's EU aspirations, for "cheap polemics" and exploiting the issue for their domestic political ends.
But German opposition parties were unwilling to alter their stance. Christian Democratic Union Party (CDU) leader Angela Merkel said she and Erdogan had a lot of disagreements during their meeting.
Merkel dismissed prospects for accession of Turkey into the EU and said the economic situation in the union was not favorable to let Turkey in.
"I told Erdogan that we appreciated reforms in Turkey. There is a long-lasting friendship between Turkey and Germany and we want to further advance it. But we must tell the truths. The economic situation of the EU is not favorable for Turkey's accession. It has nothing to do with Turkey's being a Muslim country," Merkel said.
But she nonetheless agreed to accept an invitation from Erdogan to pay a visit to Turkey.
Erdogan, on the other hand, underlined Turkey's determination to join the European Union and criticized Germany's conservative opposition for exploiting fears about Turkey for domestic ends.
He issued a plea to parties in Germany not to make an issue of Turkey's EU entry when campaigning begins for next year's European Parliament elections.
"I have a request," he told at the news conference following the meeting with Merkel. "Don't use Turkey's entry to the EU as an election campaign issue."
Leading conservative politicians in Germany have opposed the candidacy of the mainly Muslim country, whose population is expected to surpass Germany's, the biggest in the EU, within two decades.
"The core question is: 'Does Turkey belong in Europe, where are Europe's borders?'" Bavarian premier Edmund Stoiber told Sueddeutsche Zeitung on Wednesday, little more than two weeks before he faces a state election on September 21.
Germany's 2.6 million-strong Turkish community, mainly the families of "guest workers" who provided labour for Germany's expanding postwar economy, have traditionally supported Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder's Social Democrats.
Turkey's Islamic heritage, large population and distance from western Europe as well as its mixed human rights record have led to fears it would undermine the EU's foundations if it followed newcomers such as Poland and the Czech Republic into the bloc.
"There is a danger that this issue could be turned into an internal political issue," Erdogan said in a speech at the Friedrich Ebert Foundation in Berlin. "I do see this danger."
Erdogan rejected fears of a flood of emigration from Turkey and said the country shared fundamental values with other nations in Europe, including concern for human rights. He said prejudices about his country needed to be broken down.
"Our primary aim is to begin entry talks by the end of 2004 at the latest," he said, noting that the country had put in place a "revolutionary" program of reform to meet the conditions laid down by the EU for entry talks to begin.
In an unprecedented move, Erdogan also met representatives of human rights groups in Berlin and listened to their complaints about rights practices in Turkey.
Human rights representatives were satisfied with the meeting with
the Turkish prime minister but they told him that Turkey had a lot
to do to meet human rights standards of the EU.
5. - NTV Turkish - "Turkey sets conditions for deploying forces in Iraq":
4 September 2003
Ankara said that its forces would be stationed in Iraq for a six
month to one year term and deployment might been revised after the
first term.
Turkey has outlined its conditions for contributing troops to a US-led
stability force in Iraq on the first day of talks between US and Turkish
military experts in Ankara.
The Turkish General Staff said they would have to be assured that
the US took Ankara’s concerns over the activities of PKK/KADEK
seriously and took concrete steps to eradicate them in northern Iraq,
where the group has bases.
Among the other conditions set are that the Turkish forces should
not be under the control of the US though Turkish troops would work
in close co-operation and co-ordination them. Turkey also wants to
have any contingent of its troops stationed to the north of Baghdad.
The Turkish military also asked that security on the Dohak-Mosul-Kirkuk-Baghdad
road be increased as both Turkish troops. their equipment and food
would be conveyed along that route. It was also requested that the
people of the region invite the Turkish forces and that all groups
open their arms to them.
Another issue raised at the talks was the statement by the leader
of the PKK/KADEK, Osman Öcalan, in the Arabic El Hayat paper
calling for a roadmap for Kurds and threatening to carry the war to
Turkish cities if this was not done.
It was also reported that during Wednesday’s visit by General
James Jones, NATO’s Supreme Allied Commander in Europe, the US
General had asked Turkey to provide between 8,500 to 11,000 troops
for service in Iraq. Jones also is reported to have said that the
US shared Turkey’s views of the PKK and that the Pentagon would
take steps on the issue soon.
6. - EU Business - "Turkish Cypriot opposition join forces for Denktash's ouster; EU entry":
5 September 2003
Turkish Cypriot opposition parties agreed Thursday to cooperate before and after December's general election with the aim of reaching a settlement with the Greek Cypriots to reunify their island and join the European Union.
In a joint statement, the three major opposition groups promised not to form coalitions with other parties after the polls and, if they win a parliamentary majority, to oust Turkish Cypriot leader Rauf Denktash from the post of chief Turkish Cypriot negotiator in peace talks with the Greek south.
Denktash's hardline nationalist policies are widely regarded as one
of the major obstacles to reunification of the Turkish and Greek sectors
of the Mediterranean island, which has been divided for four decades.
Recent public opinion polls have suggested that the opposition could
win 60 percent of the vote in December.
The internationally recognized Greek Cypriot side is set to join the
European Union in May 2004.
The EU says it will admit only the Greek Cypriots if a settlement
is not reached in time.
The self-declared Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus (TRNC) is recognized
only by Turkey, whose 1974 occupation of northern Cyprus following
a coup in the south led to the current deadlock on the island.