flash bulletin

1. Turkey’s rebel Kurds go back to old name: PKK", MHA said the name-change would be effective from April 4, the birthday of PKK founder Abdullah Ocalan, now serving a life sentence for treason in a Turkish jail.

2. "Ten killed in Turkey Kurdish separatist violence", 9 Guerillas and 1 officer dead according to CNN Turk

3. "Women throw roses into River Seyhan for Öcalan", Women celebrated Kurdish People's Leader Abdullah Öcalan's birthday by laying roses into the River Seyhan.

4. "Kurds and disappointment", analysis by professor Dogu Ergil about the current state of the Kurdish Problem and the PKK

5. "Turkey’s Promises", Since the European Union finally agreed to start talks with Turkey about eventual membership, there have been disturbing signs that the Turkish government is flagging in its commitments to freedom of expression and human rights. A New York Times Editorial

6. "Austrian Journalist Bakutz Released", Austrian journalist Sandra Bakutz released from jail after an Ankara court's ruling on 30 March. She is pending trial on 1 June.

7. "EHCR Rules for Slain Cypriot Journalist", Authorities failed to "investigate the possibility that the murder had any link to his work as a journalist" the EHCR decided over the murder of Turkish Cypriot journalist Kutlu Adali in 1997. Turkey is to pay his widow 20 thousand euros.

1. - KurdishMedia/AFP - "Turkey’s rebel Kurds go back to old name: PKK"

ISTANBUL / 04 April 2005

Turkey’s armed rebel Kurdish movement has decided to revert back to its original name of PKK after two name changes in three years, a pro-Kurdish news agency reported on Monday.

The MHA news agency said a "congress" of 205 members of the organisation, considered terrorist by Turkey and many Western countries, met in "the mountains of Kurdistan" and decided to once again go by its original name of the Kurdistan Workers’ Party, whose Kurdish acronym is PKK.

MHA said the name-change would be effective from April 4, the birthday of PKK founder Abdullah Ocalan, now serving a life sentence for treason in a Turkish jail.

"Our congress (has) purged the PKK of its shortcomings and errors," a document quoted by MHA said.

The PKK, founded by Ocalan in 1978, waged an armed campaign against the Ankara government from 1984 to 1999, which claimed some 37,000 lives in souutheastern Turkey.

The group, which describes itself as marxist-leninist, proclaimed a unilateral ceasefire in September 1999 after Ocalan was captured in Nairobi, tried and sentenced to death. The sentence was later commuted to life in jail.

The PKK was dissolved in April 2002 and renamed itself KADEK (Congress for Demoracy and Freedom in Kurdistan) to "pursue the struggle for Kurdish liberation."

In November 2003, KADEK too said it was dissolving itself, taking on the name KONGRA-GEL (Kurdistan People’s Congress) and renouncing separatism.

In June 2004, it announced the end of its unilateral truce. Fighting has resumed since in parts of southeast Turkey, but on a far smaller scale than in the 1990s.

Officials Monday said nine PKK militants and one soldier died in clashes in southeastern Sirnak province over the past five days.

.2. - REUTERS - "Ten killed in Turkey Kurdish separatist violence"

TUNCELI / 04 April 2005

The Turkish military has killed nine Kurdish rebels in a five-day operation in the south-east of the country, CNN Turk television said on Monday.

The private channel said a soldier had also been killed by a mine blast and one rebel had surrendered in a large-scale operation backed by helicopter gunships.

Officials said last weekend that there had been fighting between security forces and rebels in Sirnak province near the border with Iraq.

Kurdish militants launched an armed campaign for an ethnic homeland in 1984, and more than 30,000 people, mainly Kurds, have died in fighting.

The violence has subsided since 1999, when rebel commander Abdullah Ocalan was captured; but fighting has escalated since the rebels called off a unilateral ceasefire last year, accusing Turkish authorities of failing to meet their political demands.

Ankara refuses to talk to the armed militants, who have withdrawn largely to northern Iraq.

3. - DIHA - "Women throw roses into River Seyhan for Öcalan"

ADANA / 04 April 2005

Women celebrated Kurdish People's Leader Abdullah Öcalan's birthday by throwing roses into the River Seyhan.

Due to Abdullah Öcalan's birthday, a group of women dressed in authentic traditional costumes came together over the Taskköprü (Stone Bridge) over the River Seyhan and laid down flowers. Gülistan Dehset of the Democratic People's Party (DEHAP) said, "Today is the birthday of Dear Abdullah Öcalan, the leader of Democratic Confederalism. Today is the peoples' birthday. We are celebrating the birthday of Mr Öcalan by handing over roses to the River Seyhan".

Celebrations took place in many cities and villages including Izmir and Urfa.

4. - Turkish Daily News - "Kurds and disappointment"

04 April 2005 / By Dogu Ergil

We are a nation that often confuses results with reasons. However, we are not unique in this flaw, otherwise there would be no social science or social theory. Yet, when a nation collectively chooses to deal with results without pondering on reasons, problems mount up, changes shape and, at times, turn into intractable conflicts. Then super or superior powers are blamed for the creation of these problems that have exceeded our ability to contain them. Three such problems block our path to healthy relations with the rest of the world: The Cyprus, the Armenian and the Kurdish problems. There are enough experts to offer meaningful assessments for the first two. Allow me to address the latter.

When one studies what may be called the “Kurdish problem” with a historical perspective (from the 1880s through 1940s) there is enough documentation in the archives in the form of reports by governors, inspector generals and military commanders, in addition to special investigators, that show objective reasons that have hardly been noticed by officials who thought they could rule a vast country like Turkey from an Ankara through direct orders. Well, they were wrong. Almost all reports repeat the same point with approximately five-year intervals written after turmoil and recurring riots in the east. These reports allude to the poverty of the local people due to large landlordism (aga-lik) and their dependence on the local notables (clientelism) that allows neither entrepreneurship nor individualization that could be the basis of democratic involvement. The second issue is tribalism that drives a wedge between communities who are in constant competition over pasture and cultivable land. The keen competition among tribes has developed a harsh militant attitude against the “others” that evinces itself in the form of armed conflict among tribes and riots against the central authority as well as cultural patterns like blood feuds (vendetta) and honor crimes.

Rather than eliminating these pre-capitalistic and anachronistic socio-economic formations consonant with its vision of transforming a traditional society into a modern one, the republican elite found it more expedient to form alliances with the agas, tribal chieftains and local sheiks to maintain the rural status quo for the sake of security and stability. Of course this poor strategy betrayed its expected purpose. Dispossessed and dissatisfied, local Kurdish populations followed their leaders in their rebellion against the government who tried to tighten the reigns of local notables in order to implement the centralist policies of the new nationalist regime. All rebellions were crushed brutally.

In the 1960s Kurdish intelligentsia sought their place in the mainstream leftist movement of Turkey to no avail. Neither the leftist movement succeeded in creating a more pluralist democracy due to the lack of popular support (Turkey is a haven of small enterprise and proprietorship), nor the ruling elite gave it a chance to do so. The 1971 military coup swept through the country like a bulldozer and left nothing standing other than the official view and official organization of the state. Incipient expression of Kurdish identity was one of the targets of official wrath that wiped out all buds of democratic organizations. The last organization left standing was the one that took on the challenge of an armed struggle, ultimate hardship like living in the mountain caves and wandering from one country to another looking for opportunities to hit back and hurt.

This illegal armed organization headed by a university dropout, a peasant boy fashioned after Stalin proved to be the leader of a rural movement that wanted to get rid of the traditional socio-economic structure that dwarfed the region as well as the central authority that neither acknowledged their cultural identity nor communicated directly with the people in order to improve their lives. The name of the organization was the KurdistanWorkers Party (PKK). It carried on a guerilla type of warfare with militia up to 15,000 at its heyday between 1984 and 1999 until its military defeat and capture of its leader Abdullah Ocalan (Apo).

Apo apologized to the people of Turkey for the destruction and lives lost in the armed struggle he led for a decade and half and declared his strategy foul. Instead he proposed to work for and to dedicate his life to the building of a democratic republic instead of the bureaucratic republic, which he saw as the cause of problems. He ordered his militia to leave Turkey and wait for his orders in North Iraq. Since February 1999 Apo has been on an island prison in the Marmara Sea. He kept the paramilitary wing of the PKK intact to bargain for his life and to use it as a rump card in return for obtaining concessions from the government for his organization and his followers.

How representative is Apo and his organization of the Kurds of Turkey, who are estimated to be approximately 15 million? My own research into the attitude of the Kurds realized at the height of armed struggle (1994-1995) revealed that the PKK was a locomotive intended to go to the last station: independent Kurdistan. Only about 10 percent of Kurds wanted to go along to the last terminal station with the PKK. The rest got on and off the train pulled by the PKK at different stations like cultural rights, self-respect, good governance, liberties, more income, employment, better healthcare and educational services etc. This data afforded clues to differentiate the militant/terrorist from the sympathizer, which the government never acknowledged. For the ruling elite of Turkey, the Kurdish intransigence was a security matter and only stringent measures could eradicate it. The complex nature of the matter was neither understood nor guided policy implementation. This was indeed an indication of the eclipse of rational politics.

On the Kurdish side, although a small portion of Kurds support the PKK, and the majority of whom do not vote for political parties (HEP, DEP, HADEP, DEHAP consecutively) that it has given life to, this organization has become the symbol of Kurdish defiance to submission and condemnation to poverty and underdevelopment. Many families have lost their sons in the course of struggle led by the PKK and young women identify with it as an instrument of women's emancipation because the organization also defied the traditional authorities and social relations they upheld in the region. Yet the PKK brought more misery and pain to the Kurdish people in Turkey because the journey it started as a staunch Marxist-Leninist organization evolved into Kurdish nationalism that runs counter to the latter and more reasonable proposal of Apo: A Democratic Republic that would be the guarantee of pluralism, multiculturalism and good governance.

The inbuilt contradiction in nationalism is that it never ceases to breed and sharpen other nationalist groups. Just as much as Turkish nationalism is intent on Turkifying the whole population, it has created a strong sense of Kurdish nationalism of irredentist inclinations, Kurdish nationalism, in turn, is reinforcing Turkish nationalism. A pluralist democracy built on culture of tolerance and reconciliation finds it very hard to flourish in this environment. It is no wonder that Apo had to abandon this “democratic republic” thesis and came up with a surprising revelation last week: a “stateless democratic confederation.” Don't you try encyclopedias or theory books; there is no such thing either in constitutional law or international relations books. It seems that this “people's leader” as he calls himself, “claims the honor of declaring this brand new invention” (Ozgur Politika, March 22, 2005) which is no more than falling back to his declaration of an independent Kurdistan. However, carving a Kurdistan out of Turkey does not satisfy him. He wants similar formations to appear in neighboring Syria, Iraq and Iran as well. Then, these smaller statehoods will unite as a confederation that in turn will be a part of a concentric confederation with states out of which they have emerged. Yet, there will be no statehood over this agglomerate. How about it?

You may not be speechless with the brilliance of the revelation or the invention, but the four Kurdish (DEP) former M.P.s who have suffered through a ten year prison term until recently are waiving this proposal in their hands as the most democratic offer put forth by the Republic of Turkey. You expect them to be wiser after ten long years of contemplation especially after observing that while there are about eight million voters of Kurdish origin in this country only 2 million vote for a Kurdish (nationalist) party that falls short of the 10 percent national election threshold. Kurds simply do not see Kurdish nationalism as a panacea to their problems, they vote for other parties whom they believe may serve them better in practical life.

What happens in the end is the stark truth that those Kurds who are still loyal to the PKK and its leader cannot put their weight and energy behind the reformation and democratization of the system. By not doing so their expectations of normalization, by which they can have more rights, less discrimination and more power sharing is delayed. This delay is perceived as victimization and feeds into a vicious circle of defiance and the system's resistance of accommodating them.

What a pity! The six million Kurds who remain aloof to the PKK inspired political climate is either unorganized or are intimidated by this organization. At the same time that lack the encouragement of the government to create a different political climate, organization and leadership. Thus, they remain ineffective to check and neutralize the influence of the PKK and its irrational reflexes. Millions of Kurds remain unrepresented in the void of organizations and leaders who would defend their cultural identities as well as their legal rights just because they are equal citizens but at the same time assure the government and the public at large that they are loyal citizens of the country and they do not pose a danger to the unity of the nation. Thus far Ms. Leyla Zana and her comrades who are preparing to launch another Kurdish political party by consuming existing DEHAP and other organizations affiliated with the PKK really do not offer a fresh alternative which the country is so much in need of. Instead they follow the instructions of a political leader in prison who has replaced the traditional tribal system with a political one and offering irrelevant recipes by relying on an armed guerilla force that has no place in a democracy. With this eclipse of the mind, how in the world can Kurds expect to have an honorable and equal place in a democratic system which they consciously or (more likely) unconsciously refrain from contributing to its making.

5. - New York Times - "Turkey’s Promises"

04 April 2005 / Editorial

Since the European Union finally agreed to start talks with Turkey about eventual membership, there have been disturbing signs that the Turkish government is flagging in its commitments to freedom of expression and human rights.

After his election in 2002, Prime Minister Recip Tayyip Erdogan said the right things about democracy and human rights. He showed courage in enacting measures that were opposed by Turkey’s powerful military and that led to Turkey getting its date - Oct. 3 - to begin talks on E.U. membership.

Turkey has made notable progress toward respecting the rights of its citizens since the awful 1980’s and 90’s. But that progress was marred by the vicious beatings by police officers breaking up an International Women’s Day demonstration last month, a sign that violent repression lingers, and by Mr. Erdogan’s pursuit of political satirists in the courts.

The government also shows signs of failing to keep its pledge to help more than 300,000 Kurds who were expelled from their villages by security forces more than a decade ago. Most are scratching out marginalized, impoverished lives in urban slums, and only a very small fraction have gone home. One of the main reasons, Human Rights Watch reported last month, is the menace they face from government-installed paramilitary guards, who have been attacking and in some cases killing returning refugees.

The government needs to call off these guards and do more to help returnees rebuild their shattered villages, homes, schools, roads, water supplies and sanitation systems. All this costs money, but help would be available if Turkey committed itself to meeting international standards. The European Union and the United States, which need a stable and democratic Turkey, can help by stepping up their scrutiny, as well as their support for Mr. Erdogan’s government.

6. - Bianet/RSF - "Austrian Journalist Bakutz Released"

ISTANBUL / 05 April 2005 / BIA

Ankara court rules release of jailed Austrian journalist Sandra Bakutz. A reporter for Austrian radio Orange 94.0 and German weekly "Junge Welt", she was charged with "belonging to illegal organization".

International media freedom organization Reporters Sans Frontieres urges the Turkish authorities go one step further and drop the charges she faces of "belonging to an illegal organization".

"This young Austrian journalist has wasted enough days in prison," RSF said, adding, "Her release should be definitive, as the authorities have failed to support the charges against her."

The 30 March hearing at the Ankara Court for Heavy Penalties began at 2:00p.m. (local time) in the presence of many Turkish and Austrian journalists and an RSF representative. Judge Orhan Karadeniz presided.

Although Prosecutor Salim Demirci produced no hard evidence, the court accepted his presentation of the charges, while rejecting his request for Bakutz to remain in custody. Speaking in German, Bakutz rejected the charges. She was represented by more than 20 lawyers.

A reporter for Austrian radio station Orange 94.0 and the German weekly "Junge Welt", Bakutz was arrested on her arrival at Istanbul's Atatürk airport on 10 February, on a charge of "belonging to an illegal organization". On 16 February, she was transferred to Istanbul's Pasakapisi detention centre, and then to Gebze prison, 50 km south of Istanbul. Finally, on 1 March, she was transferred to Ankara's Ulucanlar prison, where she remained until the 30 March hearing.

There will be no restrictions on Bakutz's movement while she awaits trial. She still faces the possibility of a 10 to 15-year prison sentence.

7. Bianet/CPJ - "EHCR Rules for Slain Cypriot Journalist"

Authorities failed to "investigate the possibility that the murder had any link to his work as a journalist" the EHCR decided over the murder of Turkish Cypriot journalist Kutlu Adali in 1997. Turkey is to pay his widow 20 thousand euros.

NEW YORK / 05 April 2005

The European Court of Human Rights rules on Monday that Turkish authorities did not conduct an effective investigation into the July 1996 murder of journalist Kutlu Adali in Cyprus and ordered the government to pay 20,000 euros (US $26,000) in damages to his wife.

Ilkay Adali sought damages in 1997 from the Turkish government, which maintains effective control over the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus (TRNC). She claimed that Turkish or TRNC authorities ordered the killing, but the court said there was not enough evidence to conclude that security agents were involved in the murder.

Adali, a political columnist with the leftist daily Yeni Duzen who opposed the division of Cyprus, was shot to death outside his home in the island's divided capital of Nicosia on July 6, 1996. He had received work-related threats prior to his murder.

The court, based in Strasbourg, France, faulted the investigation. It concluded that there was "no real coordination or monitoring of the scene of the incident by the investigating authorities, the ballistic examination carried out by the authorities was insufficient, and the investigating authorities failed to take statements from key witnesses."

The court said authorities failed to "investigate the possibility that the murder (. . .) had any link to his work as a journalist" and that much of the inquiry "was conducted only after the applicant's case before the European Court had been communicated to the Turkish government."

Officials at the Turkish embassy in Washington, D.C., and the Turkish mission in Strasbourg did not immediately return calls seeking comment. Alice Bouras, a spokeswoman for the court, told the Committee to Protect Journalists today that the government of Turkey has not indicated yet whether it would appeal the ruling.

The court is a pan-European body with authority to override domestic courts when they fail to address human rights abuses. A summary of the Adali ruling is available at .

Some 35,000 Turkish troops are stationed in the self-proclaimed Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus, founded after Turkey invaded the northern half of the Mediterranean island in 1974. The island remains divided into a more prosperous ethnic Greek section in the south and an isolated and impoverished ethnic Turkish sector in the north.

Nicosia is also divided in two, with one side controlled by the internationally recognized Greek-Cypriot authorities and the other by the Turkish government.

Turkish Cypriot nationalists who are opposed to reunification of the island periodically threaten journalists in northern Cyprus for advocating greater contact or integration with southern Cyprus.