1. "The coming clash over Kirkuk", the Turkish military has repeatedly warned Iraqi Kurds against changing Kirkuk's demographics and insisted that the inclusion of the city into the Kurdish autonomous zone is a question in which it intends to play a part. To underline the point, the military makes no effort to hide its plans to send troops if needed to thwart the Kurds' claim to Kirkuk.

2. "Turkey: Ankara Increasingly Preoccupied By Developments In Northern Iraq", Kurdish ambitions in Iraq have always been a thorn in Turkey's side, and Ankara has long warned that any attempt at creating a federal Iraq with an autonomous Kurdish north would prompt a swift response. Early election results from northern Iraq's predominantly Kurdish areas and persisting ethnic tension in the northern city of Kirkuk have now brought Turkey's concerns to new heights.

3. "Defining its Red Lines, Turkey Couldn't Do Anything In Southern Kurdistan", KDP leader Barzani recently noted that an independent Kurdish state would be formed. Faik Bulut who has traveled widely in Kurdish areas says that 90 percent of Kurds want this but 70 percent of the political establishment finds it unrealistic.

4. "Textbooks Should be Cleansed of Nationalism", History Foundation, Turkish Academy of Sciences (TUBA) and Human Rights Foundation of Turkey (TIHV) announce their proposal to cleanse textbooks of xenophobia, machismo and ultra-nationalism, after three years of intense research and study.

5. "Death Under Custody Confirmed", bones unearthed after confessions of former paramilitary JITEM member Aygan belongs to Murat Aslan, lost during custody 10 years ago. The IHD and the Diyarbakir Bar Association called on the prosecutors to take immediate action.

6. "Arrest reveals EU and US in alliance with Turkey", the arrest of one of the most prominent Kurdish officials by Germany, at the request of Turkey, signals a new era of co-operation between Turkey and the EU, within a framework set by the US.

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1. - The New York Times - "The coming clash over Kirkuk":

9 February 2005 / by Sandra Mackey*

As Iraqis turn from holding elections to writing a constitution, the make-or-break issue for their nation may be the city of Kirkuk. Situated next to Iraq's northern oil fields, Kirkuk is a setting for all the ethnic-sectarian conflicts that are the historic reality of Iraq - Muslim against Christian, Sunni against Shiite, Kurd against Arab. It is also home to the Turkmens, who are the ethnic cousins of the Turks and look to a willing Turkey as their protector. In their fierce competition for the right to claim Kirkuk, the Turkmens and the Kurds threaten to turn Iraqi internal politics into a regional conflict.

Kirkuk is the center of the Turkmen population in Iraq, while for Kurds, the city is a touchstone of their identity. Each group makes up something over a third of the city's population of 850,000. When the invasion of Iraq began in March 2003, Kurdish militias advanced southward from the Kurdish autonomous zone established in the northern third of Iraq in 1991 and entered Kirkuk. Since then the Kurds have used their position as American allies to bring in Kurdish families and thus bolster their demand that Kirkuk be incorporated in the Kurds' autonomous zone.

Their reason is emotional but also economic: Kirkuk is the key to oil fields that represent 40 percent of Iraq's proven petroleum reserves. At the least, those fields are an enormous bargaining chip in talks over the future Iraqi government; at most they provide the economic base for a future Kurdish state.

Intense hostilities between Kurds and Arabs date to the late 1980s, when Saddam Hussein pushed many Kurds out of the city and replaced them with Arabs. But it is the contest between Kurds and Turkmens that is the far more serious problem for the United States, because the only card the Turkmens of Kirkuk have to play against the Kurds is Turkey. It is a card Ankara is willing to allow them to put on the table.

Turkey holds its own claim to Kirkuk, which was taken from Turkey as a result of the 1923 Lausanne Treaty. Turkish nationalists still regard it as historically part of Turkey. Ankara also asserts guardianship over the Turkmen ethnic minority in northern Iraq. But what is mainly driving Turkey's interest in Kirkuk is the long-term problem of Turkey's own rebellious Kurdish minority, 20 percent of its population.

Since 1999, Turkish Kurds have attacked Turkey from bases in northern Iraq, in the Kurdish autonomous region. To Turkey's frustration, Iraqi Kurd officials turn a blind eye to their Turkish Kurd cousins' activities, while the Americans have been reluctant to move against the bases for fear of damaging their relationship with the Iraqi Kurds. The Turkish military has taken matters into its own hands by crossing the Iraqi border on occasion to battle the rebels.

But more ominous are Turkish fears that Baghdad will be forced to let the Kurds make Kirkuk part of their autonomous zone. For Ankara, this would be excessive Kurdish autonomy, its red line in Iraq.

The Turkish military has repeatedly warned Iraqi Kurds against changing Kirkuk's demographics and insisted that the inclusion of the city into the Kurdish autonomous zone is a question in which it intends to play a part. To underline the point, the military makes no effort to hide its plans to send troops if needed to thwart the Kurds' claim to Kirkuk.

Military intervention in northern Iraq is diplomatically risky for Turkey. Having just secured an agreement to open talks on membership in the European Union, Ankara will move with caution. Yet Turkey may see preventing the emergence of a potentially oil-rich Kurdish political entity on its borders as worth the risk. And Europe may regard keeping the Iraqi Kurds within Iraq's boundaries, thus promoting stability in the Gulf and in oil markets, as more important than keeping Turkey out of Iraq.

Though publicly circumspect, Washington sees Turkish military involvement as a looming possibility. It has quietly said that the Kurds will not be allowed to take control of Kirkuk. American military bases in northern Iraq are discreetly being reinforced. And the First Infantry Division, in charge of Kirkuk for the last year, has balanced the rights of the Turkmens and Arabs against those of the Kurds.

So Washington recognizes that the Kurds, further emboldened by their anticipated numbers in the new Iraqi parliament, could precipitate a crisis over Kirkuk. The question is whether the United States or the non-Kurdish members of the new Iraqi government can hold the Kurds in check - a difficult task considering the fervor, especially among younger Kurds, for an eventual Kurdish state.

This is one of the complications of the Iraqi election that the Bush administration has hailed as such a success. If the Kurds try to change the status of Kirkuk, the United States may find itself forced to turn its military power on them. But if America does nothing to hold Kirkuk, it may well find itself in another crisis. Only this one would not be confined to Iraq.

* Sandra Mackey is the author of "The Reckoning: Iraq and the Legacy of Saddam Hussein."

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2. - RFE/RL - "Turkey: Ankara Increasingly Preoccupied By Developments In Northern Iraq":

Kurdish ambitions in Iraq have always been a thorn in Turkey's side, and Ankara has long warned that any attempt at creating a federal Iraq with an autonomous Kurdish north would prompt a swift response. Early election results from northern Iraq's predominantly Kurdish areas and persisting ethnic tension in the northern city of Kirkuk have now brought Turkey's concerns to new heights.

PRAGUE / 9 February 2005 / by Jean-Christophe Peuch

Ankara, which fought an armed insurgency in its predominantly Kurdish southeastern provinces in the 1980s and '90s, has always considered the possible emergence of a Kurdish autonomous or independent province in northern Iraq as contrary to its interests.

Turkey has in the past used the Kurdish factor as a trump card in its uneasy relations with its Iraqi, Syrian, and Iranian neighbors. At the same time, it has long considered Saddam Hussein's aggressively anti-Kurd policy as a safeguard against the subversive activities of its own separatist militants.

But the U.S. military intervention in Iraq and the ensuing political chaos have disrupted this balance.

Hasan Unal, who teaches international relations at Bilkent University in the Turkish capital, tells RFE/RL that, in Ankara's view, the situation in northern Iraq has taken an alarming twist since the March 2003 U.S.-led invasion."The U.S. may eventually have to move against the PKK. But it is obviously preoccupied with fighting an insurgency [farther south] that is much more important to it." -- Joost Hiltermann, International Crisis Group

"The situation is much worse, from a Turkish viewpoint, since the Americans went in," Unal says. "And in the last few months, developments have been extremely unacceptable [for Ankara]. The reasoning behind all this is that the situation in northern Iraq is leading to the establishment of some sort of a Kurdish state."

Unal implies that Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan was wrong when he assumed that by lending limited support to the U.S.-led military intervention in Iraq, Turkey would be able to influence developments south of its borders.

Of particular concern to Turkey is the strong showing that Kurdish political parties made in the 30 January Iraqi parliamentary elections.

Early returns indicate that candidates running on a joint ticket made up of northern Iraq's main two political groups -- Jalal Talabani's Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK) and Mas'ud Barzani's Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP) -- are likely to grab a large number of seats in Iraq's future National Assembly. The assembly is due to elect the next interim government and oversee drafting a new constitution.

Although the Kurds constitute Iraq's third-largest community, the intricate voting process could push them into second place in parliament, ahead of the larger Sunni minority group.

To make matters worse for Turkey, PUK leader Talabani on 3 February insisted he should be Iraq's next prime minister or president.

Of equal concern to Ankara is the fate of the oil-rich northern Iraqi city of Kirkuk and its Turkic minority. Kurds, who were expelled from Kirkuk under Saddam's policy of forced "Arabization," have in recent months returned to the city, which they want to make their regional capital.

Estimates generally put the number of Iraq's Turkic population -- known as Turkomans -- at less than 500,000. But Turkish nationalists, who claim historical rights over the former Ottoman possessions of northern Iraq, maintain the region hosts 2 million Turkomans, mainly in and around Kirkuk, Mosul, and Arbil.

Kirkuk's Arab and Turkoman parties this week accused Kurdish political groupings of fraud in a regional vote that coincided with the 30 January national polls. Both ethnic groups have also been complaining over Kurdish attempts at retaking property lost during the 1970s, when Saddam ordered the city's nonethnic Arab population deported.

Although Kurds flocked to Kirkuk to be employed as oil workers in the 1940s, national censuses conducted after World War II show they made up only about one-quarter of the city's population, compared to more than 50 percent in surrounding areas.

On 30 January, an informal and nonbinding referendum on independence was conducted in northern and other areas to which the Kurds lay claim, such as Kirkuk. Results show more than 80 percent of voters favor secession from Baghdad.

In Unal's words, "Turkey no longer sees the disintegration of Iraq as a remote possibility, but more and more as a nightmare scenario."

Ankara fears the creation of an economically sustainable Kurdish autonomous province in Iraq -- or even worse, an independent Kurdish state -- may prompt the officially defunct Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) to take up arms and reignite a separatist conflict in its southeast.

In Unal's words, Turkey sees two red lines as far as its southern neighbor is concerned.

"One is Kirkuk," Unal says. "Developments around Kirkuk are very important to Turkey. Kirkuk never [was] a Kurdish city -- neither in [ancient] nor recent times. If the Kurds carry on [plans] to set up a Kurdish state of a very militant kind that would include Kirkuk, then the situation would probably concern Turkey even more. The other thing is the PKK. The Americans are, in a sense, sheltering the PKK in northern Iraq. They have given us all sorts of assurances that they would fight the PKK as soon as the first practical opportunities come up, but they haven't done so, and over the past few months they even have shown reluctance to fight the PKK. Again, this is something that is unacceptable from a Turkish viewpoint."

Following the 1999 trial of their leader, Abdullah Ocalan, PKK militants escaped to northern Iraq, where they continued to fight Turkish troops seconded by PUK and KDP peshmergas. Ankara claims some 5,000 of its Kurdish militants are hiding in the PUK-controlled mountains that separate northern Iraq from Iran and demands that the U.S.-led coalition take action against them.

But neither Washington nor its Kurdish allies have shown much willingness to move against the PKK, and consultations with U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice last week in Ankara failed to allay Turkey's concerns.

Joost Hiltermann is the Middle East project director for the International Crisis Group (ICG), a Brussels-based think tank that specializes in conflict prevention worldwide. He tells RFE/RL from his base in Jordan that none of the successors to the PKK -- such as the Kongra Gele Kurdistan, or Kurdistan People's Congress -- represents a threat to the U.S.-led coalition.

"The U.S. may eventually have to move against the PKK," Hiltermann says. "But it is obviously preoccupied with fighting an insurgency [farther south] that is much more important to it. [The PKK] is certainly not a threat to the U.S. or to anyone in northern Iraq. If anything, it is a threat to Turkish citizens and therefore to Turkey. But at the moment, I think, it is a minimal threat, a contained threat, and it is just a nagging issue that has not been resolved and ought to be resolved. It also justifies the maintenance of Turkish troops in northern Iraq. Turkey will keep troops in northern Iraq as long as the PKK is there. In a way you can understand them. But, on the other hand, it is a bit of a pretext."

Turkey's deputy army chief of staff, General Ilker Basbug, on 26 January said any unexpected developments in northern Iraq could open a rift between Ankara and Washington.

In a report released that same day, ICG analyst Hiltermann cautioned against a brewing conflict in northern Iraq that "could precipitate civil war, the breakup of the country and, in a worst-case scenario, Turkish intervention."

The Middle East expert says that although occasional Turkish threats to use force should be viewed as mainly rhetorical, there is still uncertainty over Ankara's possible responses to Kurdish claims over Kirkuk.

"There are a couple of issues that may make a [Turkish] intervention possible," Hiltermann says. "One is the existence of a strong lobby inside Turkey that would favor military intervention if the [Turkish minority] of Kirkuk were seen to be threatened. The other thing is the presence in northern Iraq of Turkish troops that could be easily deployed in Kirkuk. The question is really how much control the political leadership in Turkey has over its military forces."

But Unal of Bilkent University says Turkey has plenty of options before resorting to military force. He says, for example, Ankara could threaten to suspend its participation in the anti-Taliban campaign in Afghanistan or stop its logistical assistance to U.S. troops in Iraq in order to get its concerns heard in Washington.

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3. - Turkish Daily News - "Defining its Red Lines, Turkey Couldn't Do Anything In Southern Kurdistan":

KDP leader Barzani recently noted that an independent Kurdish state would be formed. Faik Bulut who has traveled widely in Kurdish areas says that 90 percent of Kurds want this but 70 percent of the political establishment finds it unrealistic.

ISTANBUL / 8 February 2005 / by Gül Demir

As people await the outcome of the elections in Iraq, the Kirkuk problem, which previously created tension, has grown because of mutual statements made by the sides involved.

First, Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK) leader Jalal Talabani stated that Iraqi Kurds wanted control of the prime ministry in the new government. Later Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP) leader Massoud Barzani noted that an independent Kurdish state would be formed. Turkey was not slow to react to these statements. Today Turkey is curious of what will happen in Kirkuk. The biggest concern is that the result of the elections will create chaos in Kirkuk.

American Undersecretary of Defense Douglas Feith stated that the Kirkuk problem could not be solved by a single group and said, “This problem should be solved within Iraq's territorial integrity.” What is the situation in Kirkuk? What will happen after the election results are released? Writer Faik Bulut talked exclusively to the Turkish Daily News about the elections in Iraq and the Kirkuk problem.

When asked about the risk of ethnic division in Iraq after the elections and its potential impact on the formation of a new Iraqi constitution, Bulut pointed out that there has always been the risk of ethnic and religious division since the beginning of the U.S. occupation in Iraq and it continues today. He continued, “There is a great risk in regions like Mosul and Kirkuk where there is ethnic variety because many foreign countries like Syria, Iran, Turkey and Arab countries, which have connections with Iraq, will intervene in the event of an ethnic or religious clash. Of course the U.S. and Kurds will intervene. One cannot expect such a situation to remain static. (With Shiites in the south, Sunnis in the middle and Kurds in the north) will Iraq be the stage of ethnic clashes? There is such a risk in the existing situation.”

When it came to asking whether Turkey had put enough effort into the Kirkuk issue, Bulut said that there were many mistakes and contradictions in Turkey's Iraqi policy. Despite Turkey saying, “It is a reason for war if Kurds enter Kirkuk or Mosul,” and defining its red lines, it couldn't do anything there. It couldn't talk about the core of the Turkmen issue. It couldn't give the initiative to the Turkmen by taking them from Turkey and making them work for example as security employees. It humiliated Talabani and Barzani by saying, “They are not states but tribal chiefs and peshmergas (Kurdish fighters) but on the other hand it had talks with them on the Turkmen issue. It couldn't clearly express what it wanted over the Kirkuk issue. Does it want oil? What percentage of the oil money does it want in accordance with the agreement signed in 1926? Does it want the whole of Kirkuk and Mosul? Because of that these issues were not clarified, and Turkey couldn't express its concerns in the international arena.”

“When Iraqi Kurds entered Kirkuk, Turkey saw them as threatening factors and produced the wrong policies. It couldn't create a policy towards the Kirkuk problem by becoming the friend of the Kurds in Iraq. It saw smaller groups as threatening sources instead of the states which occupied the region. Tensions increased when it turned its back on the Kurds whom it saw as the main threatening factor. These tensions were reflected in Turkmen and Kurdish clashes. It couldn't fulfill its responsibility to prevent ethnic clashes in Mosul, Kirkuk and Telafar. How many mistakes the Kurds have made there is another issue.

“We are talking about Turkey and I am speaking about Turkey's deficiencies. More importantly, provocative factors out of the state's control were overlooked in Mosul and Kirkuk. These factors are trying to provoke the Kirkuk issue through a nationalist and chauvinist approach. Briefly, this is a future danger for Turkey. Because of that Turkey couldn't determine its enemies and sources of threat, it couldn't determine a policy to follow. Turkey doesn't know Iraq well despite all its assertions. Its consultants and determining factors considered the issue from a narrow angle, Turkey lost its red lines and one may consider that it has lost Kirkuk too. Turkey also lost its peaceful role and effectiveness.”

Of course that brings one around to what the impact would be on Turkey of the formation of a Kurdish state as Barzani has mentioned. Bulut has visited Kurdish regions frequently and believes that 90 percent of Kurds dream of a Kurdish state that might also include Iran, Syria and Turkey. “But for 70 percent of Kurds, political establishment doesn't seem realistic. They always say that it is not realistic to form a state. In a statement that he made after the elections, Iraqi Minister of Foreign Affairs Hoshyar Zebari harshly criticized the petition for an independent Kurdish state signed by 170,000 people and sent to the United Nations, and said, ‘They are making things harder for us and we shouldn't take notice of utopias.' That means Kurds living there are adopting a realistic position. Also, I find all broadcasts and propaganda that a Kurdish state will be formed in Turkey wrong because when you look at the programs and strategies of both parties, you see that they are satisfied with federation. The war caused nationalistic winds to blow among the Kurds in the region and created an objective motivation. Kurds are growing closer to each other, there is solidarity among them. But this won't turn into a state over the short or the long term. Conditions will determine whether it turns into a state over the next 30-40 years. What is important is the impact of a federal and autonomous structure on Turkey. Is it necessary to overlook the fact that the Iraqi Kurdish region will become a magnet for Kurds in Iran, Turkey or Syria in order to eliminate these effects? Or will you make Turkey a magnet that other Kurds will covet? When the Kurds are given their democratic rights, the Kurds in Turkey will become a magnet for other Kurds. Ankara will become a place to be taken as an example. Things done by drawing red lines and threats will make the Iraqi Kurdish region a magnet. When we consider it objectively, the Iraqi Kurdish region is taken by other Kurds as an example. If Turkey wants to abolish the dangers of the Kurds and divisiveness, it must regulate its relations and develop projects to help economically and politically.”

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4. - Bianet - "Textbooks Should be Cleansed of Nationalism":

History Foundation, Turkish Academy of Sciences (TUBA) and Human Rights Foundation of Turkey (TIHV) announce their proposal to cleanse textbooks of xenophobia, machismo and ultra-nationalism, after three years of intense research and study.

ISTANBUL / 7 February 2005

Orhan Silier, head of the History Foundation announces that they have finalized their project “Human Rights in Textbooks” after three years of intense study and education.

The project is implemented under the European Commission and Open Society Institute grants. Results are presented to the Ministry of Education and public today.

“Thanks to modifications in course syllabuses in line with our proposals, education in general and textbooks will be freed of discrimination and have a peaceful and democratic spirit,” Silier expressed their expectations at the press meeting on Friday.

Results include recommendations on content and syllabus of school courses and on the school environment in general.

“Human rights to be intertwined in the education system”

The recommendations include:

* In textbooks, an essentialist and unhistorical outlook viewing world as a static entity should be abandoned.

* Textbooks should be neither didactic nor incomprehensive. Religious knowledge should not be taken for granted and a clear demarcation line should be drawn between the subjective and objective.

* Students should be provided access to and criticize the phenomena explained in textbooks without necessarily consulting to “a higher authority.”

Stereotyping the women; the other as an “enemy”

* Textbooks should illustrate a pluralist society perceiving difference as a legacy. Cultural varieties of Turkey should be reflected in course books in form of regional differences and names at least.

* Economic inequalities are to be perceived as source of social solidarity instead of being hidden from children.

* Civic responsibilities should be emphasized rather than a heroic devotion to nation.

* Human rights need to be analyzed in its historical context. Students should be aware of its development and expansion as a concept.

* A xenophobic perspective discriminating a cultural, religious or ethnic group should be abandoned. Stereotyping and discriminating women should come to an end.

Self-improving teachers

* “Peace Education” should replace “National Security” courses. More time should be allotted to world history and geography.

* A flexible syllabus in line with these principles is needed. Instructors should be provided with the available conditions for self-improvement. Revision of Education Faculties and Higher Education Board under these terms is necessary.

* Students should be self-expressive and have responsibility in a democratized school environment.

* ‘Right to good education’ principle requires well prepared textbooks with reasonable prices.

Story of the project

The project examines 190 textbooks used in primary secondary education under the mentioned criteria. Results were discussed in an international symposium in April 2004. Education for Instructors is provided in five provinces along with study groups formed in six different cities.

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5. - Bianet - "Death Under Custody Confirmed":

Bones unearthed after confessions of former paramilitary JITEM member Aygan belongs to Murat Aslan, lost during custody 10 years ago. The IHD and the Diyarbakir Bar Association called on the prosecutors to take immediate action.

DIAYARBAKIR / 7 February 2005

The Diyarbakir branch of the Human Rights Association (IHD) and the Diyarbakir Bar Association are pursuing legal action against about 30 people who had responsibility or negligence in the death of Murat Aslan.

Aslan was kidnapped and killed 10 years ago.

In a recent press conference, Selahattin Demirtas, head of the IHD Diyarbakir branch and Lawyer M. Sezgin Tanrikulu, head of the Diyarbakir Bar Association, said that, for the first time in Turkey, unearthed bones were proved to belong to a missing person through DNA tests.

Aslan's father, Izzettin Aslan, found his missing son where he was buried through the confessions of JITEM member Abdulkadir Aygan.

Aygan's confessions were published in the "Ulkede Ozgur Gundem" (Free Agenda in the Country) newspaper on March 11, 2004. Father Aslan was also present at the press conference.

"As the IHD Diyarbakir branch and the Diyarbakir Bar Association, we will pursue legal action against all the officials mentioned in the confessions of Abdulkadir Aygan.

JITEM members kidnapped him

Murat Aslan was born in 1969. Ten years ago, he was forced into a white Renault while he was walking in the Yenisehir district of Diyarbakir with two other friends.

He was taken to a mountain in Silopi where he was shot in his head and then burned. His body was found 15 centimeters below ground.

Murat's father Izzettin Aslan applied to every state and government offices or departments he could think of after his son was kidnapped, but could not get any information until March 11, 2004. The confessions of Abdulkadir Aygan were published that day in the Ulkede Ozgur Gundem newspaper.

According to the newspaper, Murat Aslan was kidnapped by JITEM members among whom was Abdulkerim Kirca, the Commander of the Paramilitary Police Intelligence Team. He was taken to the Diyarbakir JITEM, questioned, and then taken to the Silopi JITEM Intelligence Commandership.

After being tortured and questioned there, he was taken to near the Kortuk Village, where they poured gasoline on him and burned him to death.

After reading the newspaper, father Izzettin Aslan went to the Kortuk Village. Villagers told Izzettin Aslan that such an incident took place 10 years ago.

They said a shepherd witnessed the killing and went to the area a couple of days later to bury the burnt body. The shepherd also marked the grave with white stones. The villagers also told the father that the identity of the body wasn't known and the grave was accepted as a shrine in the region.

DNA tests proved the identity

After reaching these information, Izzettin Aslan applied to the IHD Diyarbakir branch.

* A group, formed with the help of IHD and the Diyarbakir Bar, together with the Silopi prosecutor, doctors and paramilitary police officials, found a human skeleton 15 centimeters below ground.

* Father Izzettin Aslan recognized his son's body from the chin and teeth structure.

* The bones were sent to the Istanbul Forensic Medical Institution for DNA tests. The DNA from the bones was compared with the DNA from the parents. The Forensic Medical Institution, in its September 9, 2004 report confirmed that the bones belonged to Murat Aslan.

Lawyers will demand that the inquisition be in line with UN Principles

Lawyers Tanrikulu and Demirtas said they will also demand that, through the inquisition, the "United Nations Economic and Social Committee's Principles on the Prevention and Investigation of All Extra-Legal, Arbitrary and Summary Executions," are put into use.

"All those responsible of such past incidents should be revealed and tried so that a high-standard democracy can work in the country," said Tanrikulu and Demirtas.

Following is a list of some of the 30 people who were in responsible positions ten years ago, against whom the IHD Diyarbakir branch and Diyarbakir Bar are seeking legal action:

Governor Hayri Kozakcioglu of the emergency rule, Lieutenant General Hikmet Koksal of the Paramilitary Police Corps, Commander Ismet Yediyildiz of the Diyarbakir Provincial Regiment, Commander Cemal Temizoz of the Cizre District Paramilitary Police, Abdulhakim Guven, Savas Gevrekci, Cemil Isik, Ali Ozansoy, Mustafa Deniz, Zeki Batuhan, Erdal Salincak, Selahattin Gorgulu, Ibrahim Babat, Abdulkerim Kirca, Adil Timurtas, Fethi Cetin, Murat Kirikkaya, Aytekin Ozen, Kurtulus On, Huseyin Tilki, Hanim eyaz, Yukse Ugur, Abdulkadir Ugur, Kemal Emluk, Nuri Ates, Tuna Yanardag, Cindi Acet (Acut) ve Abdulkadir Aygan.

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6. - Socialistworker.co.uk - "Arrest reveals EU and US in alliance with Turkey":

9 February / by Sait Akgul*

The arrest of one of the most prominent Kurdish officials by Germany, at the request of Turkey, signals a new era of co-operation between Turkey and the EU, within a framework set by the US.

Remzi Kartal is the vice president of Kongra-Gel, the only Kurdish force able to defend Kurdish rights against the semi-military Turkish regime. His arrest comes after a meeting last week in Ankara, Turkey, involving the interim Iraqi government and Turkish and US officials.

The meeting took place just before US secretary of state Condoleezza Rice’s visit to Europe, Turkey and the PalestinianWest Bank.

Further evidence for the alliance between the US and Turkey came from the Iranian authorities. They claim that the Turkish government has already agreed to let the US use four air bases to monitor Iran’s nuclear activities.

These airbases are all in the Kurdish region. Once again Western powers are using the “Kurdish card” to achieve their aims — letting Turkey get away with its earlier crimes, and further persecute the Kurdish population.

The EU is also aligning itself with Turkey, in return for having another foot in the Middle East.

* Sait Akgul is a Kurdish activist and Respect executive member