On May 28, Turkish citizens went to the polls for a second round of voting in the presidential election. On the ballot, Recep Tayyip Erdoğan and his Justice and Development Party (AKP) were challenged by a six-party opposition alliance purporting to stand for an alternative politics embracing all Turks regardless of political views, religious affiliation, ethnic background…
This post was originally published on Latest – Truthout.
This content originally appeared on Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty and was authored by Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty.
This post was originally published on Radio Free.
For civil society and rights defenders, five more years of the Turkish president and his radical backers are a daunting prospect
On Sunday, Recep Tayyip Erdoğan was declared the winner of Turkey’s presidential runoff elections. According to numbers reported by the state-owned Anadolu news agency, more than 27 million voters cast their ballots in favour of Erdoğan, who has been at the country’s helm for more than two decades. He entered the second round in the lead in the polls, and was expected by most to emerge victorious. Although Erdoğan captured slightly more than half of the vote, more than 25 million people also mobilised to vote against him.
The elections were being held under deeply unfair conditions, with an opposition set up to fail. Istanbul’s mayor, Ekrem İmamoğlu, was recently sentenced to more than two years in prison and banned from holding public office for insulting members of the supreme election council. This left the opposition unable to nominate its maybe most promising candidate. This was all amid biased media coverage, relentless smear campaigns against the eventual opposition candidate, Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu, threats, manipulation and a crackdown on civil society, such as the arrest of 126 Kurdish lawyers, activists and politicians at the end of April in Diyarbakır.
Constanze Letsch is a former Turkey correspondent for the Guardian and has recently finished a PhD on urban renewal in Istanbul
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Continue reading…This post was originally published on Human rights | The Guardian.
In Langkawi, Malaysia, between the 23rd – 27th of May – HAVELSAN, a global leader in high-technology products and innovative solutions, successfully captivated the attention of attendees at LIMA 2023, the prestigious defense and maritime exhibition. The event showcased HAVELSAN’s cutting-edge C4ISR solutions, simulators and training systems, and homeland security solutions, solidifying its position as […]
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This post was originally published on Asian Military Review.
Our team has noticed over the past year or so that when we cover global politics, particularly in relation to Turkey, Ukraine, and Russia, our coverage often elicits comments from self-proclaimed anti-imperialists. Recently, some of this criticism has intensified in relation to articles we’ve put out about Imran Khan and Kurdistan. We’re no strangers to criticism, but we’ve noticed a pattern to comments that crop up repeatedly. We’d like to respond as a team to this pattern of criticism, and make our position clear.
These claims centre around the apparent belief from a group of people that all our coverage of international politics should be doggedly anti-US with no exceptions. They believe such a position to be inherently anti-imperialist. The problem with this is that these anti-imperialists believe state actors like Putin and Erdoğan – vocal critics of US domination – should be supported in their efforts to dismantle US hegemony. This is in spite of the documented atrocities both have visited on ethnic minorities in their respective countries.
For example. one author has dedicated an entire article to claiming that the Canary is intentionally pushing “Anglo-American empire” propaganda with our coverage of both Khan and Turkey. On social media, we’ve been accused of taking “Qatari blood money” over this. The Canary has also been said to be “deliberately omitting” US imperialism from our Pakistan and Turkey coverage, and trying to shape a “US/West-friendly perspective”. We’ve also come in for repeated attacks, historically, for criticising Russia and its invasion of Ukraine.
At the Canary, we believe this to be a deeply dangerous set of beliefs that harms the people caught up in geopolitical battles. We are not oblivious to the fact that other emerging powers wish to exert their influence in Pakistan, Ukraine, Turkey, and other areas. However, criticism of populist figures is not an open invitation to Western war hawks to charge into countries that have already been ruined – and also formed, in the case of Pakistan – by genocidal powers. Our politics has always been, and will always be, guided by a commitment to reporting on the people caught up in these battles, not the states that wage them.
We’ll now respond more specifically to two instances where recent reporting has been criticised by so-called ‘anti-imperialists’.
We’re proud to support Kurdish people in their struggle for freedom, and we have a long history of doing so. Critics have claimed that supporting the revolution is tantamount to supporting the US. They say this is because the Kurds’ tactical coordination with the US in the struggle to defeat Daesh amounts to a “US-backed illegal occupation.” To call the autonomous administration an ‘occupation’ is a mind-bendingly warped take on the reality of revolutionary struggles in North and East Syria.
What would critics have done if they had been living in Kobanî during the Daesh siege? Would they have watched their community die, rather than accept the limited US support on offer? Military coordination with the US has been a survival tactic for the revolutionary forces of North and East Syria. The movement knows that US imperialism is opposed to their revolution, and only supports them militarily when it aligns with US interests. The coordination with the US remains a contradiction for Rojava’s radicals, but one they are all too aware of. One of the impressive things about the Kurdish Freedom Movement is its ability to remain true to its revolutionary spirit while sitting with the contradictions that arise from the practical reality of the struggle.
It is a grim reality that our critics – who claim they are steadfastly against US imperialism – ignore the bloody authoritarianism, colonialism, imperialism, and racism of Putin, Assad, Erdoğan, and the rest. It cannot be acceptable to align one’s politics with blood-soaked dictators at any cost – particularly when that cost is ignoring the struggles of oppressed communities fighting for their survival.
As radicals, we need to be allies to people struggling for freedom globally, not to states. We need to remember the spirit of revolutionary internationalism, and to do what we can to materially support our comrades who are fighting against imperialism around the world.
We have also received criticism of our coverage of Khan’s arrest in Pakistan. This criticism is from the same purported ‘anti-imperialist’ crowd mentioned above, who argue that by criticising Khan (who has nominally opposed US influence) we’re implicitly advocating for US influence and control in the region. Criticism in itself is not our issue, but such bad-faith analysis rankles.
If commenters cannot understand why articles written by Pakistani people living in Pakistan, and edited by Pakistani editors, are critical of Imran Khan beyond ‘you want to prop up Western neo-imperialism’, then we cannot help you.
Some criticism has also claimed that, in spite of writers and editors working from what they know and experience, our education in the West invalidates our reporting on Pakistan. We would argue that colonisers devalued or outright eradicated native centres of learning and processes of knowledge production. Colonisers created a hegemony of Western languages and epistemology, forcing Black and Brown people to speak their language and study in their systems in order to be heard. As a result, Black and Brown people had to become proficient with the colonisers’ tools in order to advocate for our humanity. So we jumped through all the hoops, only to be told by ‘anti-imperialists’ that their education makes us too privileged to speak for our own people.
Accusing us of lacking anti-imperialism is laughable, but more than that, it is dripping in colonial racism. The Canary is one of few politics-focused media outlets in the UK where people of colour make up the majority of its editorial team. The people of colour who work and write at the Canary routinely risk their safety and wellbeing in confronting and demonstrating the violence of settler colonial states like the UK and the US. It is not by being ‘pro-intervention’ that they ended up on no-fly lists and Prevent’s radar.
We will not allow such criticism to go unchecked, because it is exactly the kind of bad-faith reading which seeks to dismiss valid critique with misinformed and baseless accusations. At best, such analysis of our coverage is purposely obtuse. At worst, it’s blatantly racist, diminishing the right of people from the Global South to tell their own stories and be an authority on their own struggles. It disregards the working class and multiply-marginalised people caught up in these struggles across the world. Instead, it originates only from the contrarian interests of people untouched by colonialism and racism.
By The Canary
This post was originally published on Canary.
Human rights groups have said law enforcement in Turkey tortured alleged looters in the wake of the devastating February earthquake. A joint report by Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch (HRW) accused police and armed forces of using the state of emergency as a “license to torture”.
The groups interviewed 34 people in total, including 12 victims of torture. They also reviewed video of 13 cases of violence perpetrated by police against 34 individuals. Four of those cases involved Syrian refugees, and the report said the “attacks bore signs of additional xenophobic motivation”.
The report found that in the majority of cases, police didn’t take the victims into formal custody. Instead, law enforcement officers immediately beat them or made them lie or kneel down while kicking, slapping and swearing at them for prolonged periods. Only two cases led to investigations.
In one case, police arrested Turkish man Ahmet Guresci in the Altınözü district of Hatay, along with his brother Sabri. The officers tortured Ahmet, including attempting rape with police batons, before he died in hospital while in custody. Sabri claimed the officers had said:
There is a state of emergency, we will kill you… We will kill you and bury you under the rubble… We’re going to say the public lynched you.
The report said police released Sabri pending investigation. At the same time, three officers were suspended pending their investigation.
In another particularly harrowing case study explored by the report, police tortured a group of five Kurdish men before leaving them to die.
The Kurdish group had travelled to help with search and rescue efforts on 11 February. They said police took them from the site of a collapsed building to a nearby tent, where the police then accused them of looting.
Officers beat and assaulted them numerous times, both in the tent and after taking them to a police station, before stripping them to their underwear. They then forced the group onto a minibus before dropping them off around midnight about 10km outside of the city. The temperatures were below zero at the time. Police then doused them in water before forcing them to crawl on the ground and abandoning them.
All five survived, although one was hospitalised with a serious eye injury.
In a response before the report was published, the Turkish justice ministry said it had “zero tolerance” for torture. However, the justice ministry also told the Amnesty and HRW that their findings were “vague claims devoid of a factual basis”. In response, the groups pointed out that the department was dismissive without responding specifically to any findings.
Amnesty and HRW said all the incidents occurred in the 10 provinces covered by the state of emergency. However, most were concentrated in Antakya city, in Hatay province. This was one of the areas worst hit by the earthquake.
Emma Sinclair-Webb, HRW associate director and Turkey director, told Agence France-Presse (AFP) the 13 cases documented by the groups represented just the “tip of the iceberg”. Meanwhile, Hugh Williamson – Europe and Central Asia director at HRW – said they were a “shocking indictment of law enforcement practices”.
Esther Major, senior research advisor for Amnesty International’s Europe office, told AFP:
We recognise the size of the catastrophe that has happened, but within that context, a state of emergency must not lead to lawlessness and impunity, to torture and other ill-treatment.
Amnesty had earlier released an annual report containing broad condemnations of Turkey’s human rights record throughout 2022. It included a case of prison guards allegedly torturing an inmate, who later died.
Featured image via Global News/YouTube
Additional reporting by Agence France-Presse
By Glen Black
Last week the third largest party in the Turkish parliament, the People’s Democratic Party (HDP), announced that it would run in the elections on 14 May under the umbrella of a new party, the Green Left Party (YSP).
𝗛𝗗𝗣 𝗹𝗮𝘂𝗻𝗰𝗵𝗲𝘀 𝗶𝘁𝘀 𝗲𝗹𝗲𝗰𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻 𝗰𝗮𝗺𝗽𝗮𝗶𝗴𝗻 𝘂𝗻𝗱𝗲𝗿 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝗯𝗮𝗻𝗻𝗲𝗿 𝗼𝗳 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝗚𝗿𝗲𝗲𝗻 𝗟𝗲𝗳𝘁 𝗣𝗮𝗿𝘁𝘆
“𝘞𝘦 𝘢𝘳𝘦 𝘩𝘦𝘳𝘦 𝘵𝘰 𝘨𝘳𝘰𝘸 𝘢𝘯𝘥 𝘴𝘱𝘳𝘦𝘢𝘥 𝘤𝘰𝘶𝘳𝘢𝘨𝘦 𝘢𝘨𝘢𝘪𝘯𝘴𝘵 𝘧𝘦𝘢𝘳.”
https://t.co/hgUJjHSqVH
— HDP Europe (@HDP_Europe) April 2, 2023
The HDP is the largest party in an alliance of left-wing political parties called the Labour and Freedom Alliance. The HDP is facing a legal case demanding its closure, so it will use the Green Left Party’s ticket. The parties in the Alliance will be working together in the upcoming elections. And they’re are not putting forward a presidential candidate.
They are up against the fascistic People’s Alliance – led by Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP), which is allied with the extreme right Nationalist Movement Party (MHP), amongst others. Erdoğan – in office since 2002, and president since 2014 – is the People’s Alliance’s presidential candidate. He called a referendum in 2017, in a successful move to massively increase his presidential powers, and has been widely criticised as a dictatorial, authoritarian ruler.
Erdoğan’s biggest rival is the Nation Alliance. This is a six-party bloc which includes the Republican People’s Party (CHP). The CHP is Turkey’s second-largest electoral party. Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu of the CHP will be the Nation Alliance’s presidential candidate.
There is every likelihood that Erdoğan could lose substantially in the elections. Turkey is in the midst of a massive recession. Additionally, many people in Turkey blame Erdoğan for not taking more steps to help those affected by this year’s earthquake. In fact, the media has linked Erdoğan and his cronies to corruption in the construction industry that compromised building safety.
The YSP isn’t your average parliamentary party. It’s part of a movement that wants to overcome the nation-state itself. The party seeks to lay the groundwork to decentralise state power in Turkey. Further to this, they want to enable local communities to build structures of radical democracy.
The new party is just the latest electoral manifestation of the radical ideology of the Kurdish Freedom Movement. The HDP is by no means the first political party the Turkish state has criminalised, and the practice of refounding institutions under a new name to avoid repression has a long history.
The HDP is running under the YSP’s ticket out of necessity. The Turkish state has imprisoned at least 6000 HDP members since 2015. The state is trying to close down the party, in order to prevent them from being able to take part in the elections.
The HDP has been successful in local elections in Turkey’s largely Kurdish southeast. In response, the Turkish state has forcibly replaced the HDP’s elected mayors with state appointees, known as ‘kayyums’.
The party insists on the principle of co-leadership, and co-mayorship. This anti-patriarchal practice means that no man can hold a position of power on his own. The HDP has faced legal challenges from the Turkish state as a result of demanding co-leadership. In fact, the state has criminalised the practice of co-mayorship.
Since its foundation in 2012, the HDP has played an essential part in a movement for radical democracy. The democracy they demand is much broader than the sham offered by modern-day nation-states. In Bakur (the part of Kurdistan that lies within southeast Turkey), the HDP played a key role in the Democratic Society Congress (DTK). The DTK, now criminalised by the Turkish state, linked neighbourhood and village assemblies together with women’s organisations, trade unions, and ecological alliances in a region-wide confederation.
In the west of Turkey, the movement established the People’s Democratic Congress (HDK). The HDK is currently still legal, and is part of the Labour and Freedom Alliance.
These assemblies are attempts at bringing together Turkey’s left-wing and people’s movements. They want to create a base of power that is independent of the institutions of the state. For example, the DTK established a network of co-ops in an attempt to establish a non-capitalist cooperative economy in Bakur. These co-ops, however, were soon expropriated by the state.
The ideological inspiration for both the HDK and DTK is democratic confederalism. This is a paradigm of the Kurdish Freedom Movement, stemming from the prison writings of Kurdistan Worker’s Party (PKK) co-founder Abdullah Öcalan. The Turkish state has held Öcalan in solitary confinement for over 24 years
Here’s what Öcalan had to say about nation-states:
the foundation of a state does not increase the freedom of a people.
He continued:
nation states have become serious obstacles for any social development. Democratic confederalism is the contrasting paradigm of the oppressed people. Democratic confederalism is a nonstate social paradigm. It is not controlled by a state.
And added:
democratic confederalism is the cultural organizational blueprint of a democratic nation.
Öcalan puts forward the concept of the ‘democratic nation‘ as a viable alternative to the all-encompassing power of the nation-state. In a democratic nation all the groups that make up society are guaranteed their own autonomy. They are represented within a directly democratic system.
The Green Left Party echoes Öcalan’s concept of establishing a democratic nation. In its inaugural declaration, YSP spokeswoman Çiğdem Kılıçgün Uçar said:
We will remove this government [and] establish the Democratic Republic
She continued:
A Democratic Republic is possible with a Democratic Nation. The Democratic Nation is the democratic expression of a society in which all ethnic, cultural and religious identities coexist equally and freely and their existence is constitutionally guaranteed.
The Green Left Party wants to decentralise Turkey, in order to enable people to make decisions at a local level.
Additionally, Uçar said that the party wants to rewrite the Turkish constitution:
We are ready to write a new democratic constitution in accordance with Turkey’s multi-identity, multi-cultural, multi-faith, multi-lingual structure, to write a constitution for all society with democratic participation and social negotiation!
Co-leader İbrahim Akın said that the YSP wants to transfer authority, so that the people can be involved in managing themselves through local assemblies. He said:
We are coming to build a strong local democracy in which the separation of powers is extended to the local level, the transfer of authority and resources to local governments is secured, and local participation mechanisms function.
We will strengthen local governments based on democracy and equal representation with the will of the people participating in management and decision-making processes through assemblies, city councils, platforms, professional organisations and democratic mass organisations.
The YSP’s statement says that the party stands in opposition to the state’s militaristic foreign policy, against male domination, and with LGBTI+ people, workers, and disabled people. It will continue the practice of co-leadership, and will act to defend nature and combat poverty. According to Uçar:
We will build a new life where ecological assets are protected against the domination of nature and gender by the male-dominated capitalist system
There is much that those of us who are outside Turkey can learn from the movement that the YSP is part of. It is a movement that has chosen to engage in electoral politics, but one that has never let go of its revolutionary vision, or its critique of the state.
One thing is for sure – Erdoğan and Turkey’s fascist right will fight tooth and nail against these ideas. That fight has already seen thousands of people imprisoned, and many have lost their lives too. Against this backdrop, the stand taken by the YSP is a brave one.
Please note that the quotes from İbrahim Akın and Çiğdem Kılıçgün Uçar are taken from an unofficial translation.
Featured image – HDP campaigning in London in 2018, via Philafrenzy/Wikimedia Commons (cropped to 770x403px)
By Tom Anderson
This post was originally published on Canary.
The Military Radar and Border Security Türkiye Summit took place in Ankara between 21-22 March 2023. Several military institutions and defense companies attended the summit where HAVELSAN was the platinum sponsor. The main subject of the Summit was Border Security and how current technologies help to provide that. At the summit, HAVELSAN’s President & CEO […]
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This post was originally published on Asian Military Review.
Turkey will go to election on May 14, after President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan called a snap poll, reports Susan Price, and the pro-Kurdish People’s Democratic Party (HDP) will likely be forced to participate in the election under a different party name, due to a politically-motivated trial against it.
This post was originally published on Green Left.
Kurdish football team Amedspor will make a complaint to the Türkiye Football Federation and the Union of European Football Associations (UEFA) over a series of racist attacks by Turkish football supporters this week. Amedspor comes from the city of Diyarbakır (known as Amed in Kurdish), in Southeast Turkey.
On 4 March, fans of rival team Bursaspor – from the city of Bursa in Southwest Turkey – gathered outside the Kurdish team’s hotel and shouted racially motivated insults. Throughout the match between the two teams on 5 March, Busaspor fans hurled missiles, firecrackers – and even a knife – at the Amedspor players, and displayed racist banners.
Despite all this, the referees chose not to postpone the game.
13 clubs representing left-wing football fans across Turkey wrote an open letter about the incident. They said:
As fans who are searched for before the match, we know very well that it is not possible to bring even a plastic bottle into the stadium, let alone explosives and injurious and dangerous substances.
They continued:
To view what happened as the incompetence of a few officials and making a statement that ‘we have punished those who did not fulfill their duties’ is to cover up the incident.
The fans pointed out that the banners were explicitly anti-Kurdish:
Similarly, the banners opened in the stands are checked by the police every week and if found ‘appropriate’, they are allowed inside. It is a fascist threat to show the banners of a white Taurus and a hitman, symbolizing the unsolved murders committed in the ’90s, and to turn a blind eye to that.
The ‘white Taurus’ (or Toros) was the Renault car that became associated with JİTEM (Gendarmerie Intelligence and Counter-Terrorism). JİTEM used the vehicles in the 1990s to abduct and murder people.
The Amed Bar Association made a statement in support of Amedspor. Association president Nahit Eren told a press conference:
We are aware of the message that is meant to be conveyed by the display of these symbols, which with all their darkness are embedded in the memory of Kurdish society, during a football match. These threats are meant to create an atmosphere of fear.
Nahit pointed out that, in the wake of the earthquake, Amedspor is a source of pride and inspiration in the city:
Amedspor inspires people in our city and in many parts of the country with its success and sportsmanship.
However, he said that this pride isn’t shared by the Turkish authorities:
Unfortunately, this feeling created by Amedspor is not resonating and supported by the authorities, especially in our city, and Amedspor’s already limited opportunities are being restricted, with penalties and exclusion being imposed. We cannot say that the events of the last two days are independent of this attitude of the public authorities towards Amedspor. However, everyone should know that Amedspor is not alone and that the entire institutional dynamics of our city and its supporters across the country will continue to support the team.
This is by no means the first time that Amedspor has borne the brunt of racist attacks. In fact, the Boycott Turkey campaign wrote in January:
Amedspor members and fans are not only targeted at home, but also by assassination attempts and attacks from far-right fans across the country. The team’s treatment by the state and the nationalist right-wing reflects the attitude towards Kurdish people and liberatory politics as a whole.
The Canary reported in January 2023 that:
One local player has received a lifetime ban from competing for expressing his political beliefs. While the Turkish military’s brutal repression against cities in Bakur was still ongoing in 2016, former Amedspor midfielder Deniz Naki received a 12-match ban for dedicating the team’s win against Bursaspor to the people who had been killed by Turkish state forces. He also had to pay a fine, and received a suspended prison sentence. He later received a lifetime ban for views he expressed on social media.
It’s clear that Amedspor is being targeted by both the Turkish state and the far-right, and that the displaying of banners alluding to the massacres of the 1990s was intended to create an atmosphere of intimidation and fear.
This attack is doubly shocking in the wake of Turkey’s devastating earthquake, which has caused disaster in Turkey’s Southeast. But what’s also clear is that Amedspor and their supporters refuse to be intimidated.
You can read more about the attacks on Amedspor here.
Campaigners are calling for a boycott of Turkey, including Turkish football. You can find out more here.
Featured image via Screenshot/247-Sports-HD4K
By Tom Anderson
This post was originally published on Canary.
New York: New York City Mayor Eric Adams has praised New York Police Department’s (NYPD) Muslim Officers for their humanitarian efforts to help the flood-hit Pakistanis and earthquake victims in Turkey.
The Mayor said that he has witnessed the Muslim Officers Society always helping people in trouble without discrimination.
The New York Police Department’s Muslim Officers Society and the Middle East Turkish Society are continuing their relief activities to help the victims of the earthquake in Turkey.
Eric Adams inspected the packing and departure of relief supplies at the NYPD’s central warehouse.
Addressing a joint press conference on this occasion, Mayor Eric Adams said that Turkey continues to host Tunisian and Syrian refugees, and today, more or less 20 million Turkish citizens are affected by the earthquake
In these circumstances, the role of MOS is commendable.
On this occasion, the Consul General of Turkey in NYC, Reyhan Özgür, said that the spirit of Muslim officers to help their Turkish brothers and sisters has boosted our courage.
In the next few days, these relief materials will be delivered to the earthquake victims.
The second vice president of the Muslim Officers Society and the representative of the Middle East Turkish Society said that some relief materials have been sent to the earthquake victims in Turkey.
100 pallets containing various essential items are ready and will be dispatched soon.
A large number of MOS volunteers are actively participating in the packing of relief supplies.
The representatives of the Muslim Officers Society gave a briefing to the mayor about the relief activities which were appreciated by the Mayor NYC.
The post MOS is all set to dispatch tons of relief goods to earthquake victims in Turkey first appeared on VOSA.
Court rules that her suit was wrongly thrown out and domestic courts should have shown greater rigour
The European Court of Human Rights has condemned Turkey for failing to protect the private life of a prominent Turkish actor who had been secretly filmed kissing another celebrity at her home in footage broadcast on television.
Birsen Berrak Tüzünataç, a film and soap opera star, won the marathon case at the ECHR, which ruled that Turkey had violated the European convention on human rights by dismissing her legal complaints.
Amid the devastating earthquakes our nation has encountered, as HAVELSAN, we have been acting with the responsibility of mobilizing all of our sources strengthening search and rescue activities with our smart technologies, and standing with our people in this terrible natural disaster. Since the first day of the earthquake, HAVELSAN became part of the search […]
The post HAVELSAN’s UAVs, BAHA and POYRAZ, Become Search and Rescue Teams’ Assistants in Türkiye Quake appeared first on Asian Military Review.
This post was originally published on Asian Military Review.
Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan is weaponising the triple earthquake disaster in south-eastern Turkey (north Kurdistan/Bakur) and north-eastern Syria (east Kurdistan/Rojava) against the Kurdish population by blocking and delaying emergency responses, reports Peter Boyle.
This post was originally published on Green Left.
Canary guest writers Koçer Nurhak and Vala Francis bring us an exclusive report on the situation in Kurdish areas of Turkey after the recent earthquake.
On Monday 6 February, a 7.7 magnitude earthquake struck the city of Pazarcık in the Maraş region of north Kurdistan, south-east Turkey. It was followed by a 7.6 magnitude earthquake in Elbistan, in the same region, several hours later. Hundreds of aftershocks have continued to hit the area. At the time of writing (Monday 20 February), another two earthquakes registering 6.4 and 5.8 magnitudes struck Hatay, a badly damaged southern city on the border with Syria. They brought down many of the buildings still standing after the first two earthquakes, and trapped more people underneath collapsed buildings. Together, the earthquakes have killed over 46,000 people. Tens of thousands of people are still unaccounted for. Collapsed and severely damaged buildings have displaced millions more.
People have expressed widespread condemnation of the state amid the aftermath. This is directed at its misuse of billion of dollars in earthquake relief funds, as well as not ensuring buildings meet essential regulation requirements. There is also far-reaching anger at the delayed response by state aid agency AFAD (Disaster and Emergency Management Presidency). On top of this, the Justice and Development Party (AKP)-led Turkish government has arrested construction contractors as it seeks to recover a damaged reputation before elections in May.
However, the situation in Kurdish areas of Turkey is particularly dire. The Canary spoke to people on the ground in Kurdish villages in the area. One contact in the region told us that the government’s approach was not just “mismanagement” but “intentional murder on a mass scale”.
When discussing the recent earthquakes, there is important historical context. Elbistan, the epicentre of the second earthquake in south-eastern Anatolia, is geographically and culturally split. On one side are Turkish Sunni Muslims, and on the other are Kurdish Alevis, who follow a Zoroastrian faith. Both the town and surrounding villages are divided between east and west. Kurdish villages are spread through flat plains and the steep Nurhak mountain across the eastern side of the district. In higher altitude areas, snow remains all year round. The hard-to-reach mountain range is a strategic ally to decades of revolutionary groups.
Decades of religious and ethnic persecution by the Turkish state have led to massive displacement of the Kurdish Alevi population. Huge numbers have fled to Europe after violent massacres. In England and Scotland, up to 70% of the Kurdish diaspora is Alevi, with many families originating from Elbistan. The systematic underdevelopment of the Alevi areas in Elbistan is stark: the tarmac disappears when driving from one Turkish village off the central highway to a Kurdish Alevi village. Unsurfaced roads connect most such villages.
The trauma of the earthquake sits atop layers of painful history in Alevi areas. The Maraş massacre took place in 1978, and it stands in living memory as testament to the Turkish state’s genocidal policies. Far-right Islamic nationalists, including those connected to the paramilitary Grey Wolves of the MHP Party (Nationalist Movement Party), killed between 100 and 500 people. Neighbours killed their neighbours, with many victims knowing their attackers. Groups went house to house, raping and murdering Kurdish Alevi women and men with particular brutality. People cut unborn children out of their mothers and tortured the elderly.
The MHP party still rule as part of today’s coalition government, and the forced migration of Kurdish Alevi people in Elbistan and Pazarcık goes on.
Now, the state is using the earthquake as an opportunity to complete this policy. Every Kurdish Alevi person whose family is from Elbistan feels that their home is in Elbistan, even if they live on the other side of the continent. They feel like strangers elsewhere. Now, however, it’s unclear what they would return to.
The Canary spoke to a volunteer from another city in occupied North Kurdistan, situated within south-eastern Turkey. As voices critical of the government are met with serious retribution by the state, we have kept his details anonymous. After contacting AFAD and receiving no response, he contacted one of the Peoples’ Democratic Party’s (HDP) crisis coordination centres four days after the earthquake. They sent him to Elbistan. He told us:
Kurdish people from all over Bakûr (north Kurdistan) have come to help, as well as a group from the diaspora in Europe.
The first day we arrived, we were really affected psychologically. We thought maybe a few houses had fallen, but actually in some streets, no buildings are still standing. At least 30,000 dead bodies haven’t been recovered from beneath the rubble in Elbistan. The families who haven’t found their loved ones bodies don’t want to leave the city without them.
State organisations across the region have responded slowly. Often, they aren’t even present.
The Turkish military has maintained its position of war against the Kurdish people throughout the relief efforts. Military and other state forces seized trucks filled with aid, or otherwise blocked them from reaching their destinations. They didn’t deploy for search-and-rescue operations during the first 72 hours, for example, which is the most critical period for finding living victims of an earthquake.
Nonetheless, unionised workers, students, activists, and people from across society are connected to civil structures in the Kurdish regions and across Turkey. And they have worked with the HDP to advance independent relief efforts. The volunteer told the Canary:
Clothes, food, women’s hygiene products, blankets, tents – all the aid that came to Elbistan is from the HDP crisis coordination centres, which exist in every city where HDP has a strong presence. They’re collecting the donations and resources from society, here and around the world.
Even Turkish Red Moon only has a few tents in the town centre, giving soup to the people. Some of the villages are very far, there’s no tarmac roads, and there is snow – we could reach them once or twice but not return because we don’t have suitable vehicles.
However, survivors of the earthquake and volunteers face harrowing conditions.
The volunteer told the Canary of a video from Elbistan that showed a woman’s body on the side of the street, frozen and covered in snow. While many people survived the initial earthquakes, they died before rescue because of a lack of machinery and resources. However, the state is now using heavy machinery to clear away the rubble – including bodies that rescuers could not reach. “No-one knows where they are taken,” the volunteer said.
He added:
There are very strong aftershocks in the night. A couple hours ago there was a 5.5 magnitude tremor. 90% of people here are staying in tents now, but they are returning to the damaged buildings to stay warm. At night the temperature goes down to -20C. We know that if we sleep in the damaged buildings, if it collapses, then we wont be rescued for days. So when we sleep, we wear several jackets, layers of socks, and blankets to keep ourselves warm.
Cholera and scabies transmission has already started. So we are not using tap water due to the cholera. The survivors need food and medicine.
The government announced a three-month state of emergency in the ten affected regions. This was allegedly to better respond to the disaster, and also to quell unrest and ‘looting’. People from Bakûr told the Canary that the government really made this decision to enable military control of society there, as it allows the government to make decisions without proper democratic procedure. It has made similar decrees close to previous elections, from the 1980 military coup to the 2018 election.
Previous local and general elections saw the HDP receiving numerous positions in local and national governance. In response, the state replaced its elected officials with so-called ‘trustees’ – kayyim – and stripped many HDP MPs of parliamentary immunity. People do not elect Kayyims as officials. Therefore, normal regulations do not hold them accountable. As a result, in south-east Turkey they have expropriated millions in funding. They are also used as a tool to eradicate the democratic process in regions they oversee.
Meanwhile, policies of arbitrary detention and military intimidation constrict life in north Kurdistan and across Turkey. Even in the immediate aftermath of the earthquake, the state arrested left-wing and Kurdish journalists as part of its continuous crackdown on critical voices.
The volunteer told the Canary:
A big problem is that Pazarcık has had a kayyim installed on the 16 February.
Pazarcık is the central coordination point for the surrounding areas – including Elbistan. The volunteer said that the supply of food has now run dry, with:
only enough to feed volunteers remaining – there isn’t enough for all of the survivors.
They [the government] are seizing the aid that has already been accumulated by the crisis coordination and civil society structures to redistribute under their own [AKP’s] name. We don’t know who they will give it to, and we don’t trust that it will be given at the needed time, especially to Alevis. So we are hiding some vital resources, like food, in our own tents to redistribute.
The aid coming from different countries is getting AKP stickers and Erdogan’s face printed on them to give an impression that the state is organised and is helping the people. It’s a form of psychological warfare and manipulation.
HDP'nin Pazarcık'ta bulunan Koordinasyon Merkezi'ne kayyum atanmasına ilişkin HDK önünde yapılmak istenen açıklamaya polis saldırdı.
— Amed Dicle (@ameddicleT) February 16, 2023
The above tweet reads: The police attacked the statement that was intended to be made in front of the HDK (People’s Democratic Congress) office regarding the appointment of the kayyim to the HDP crisis coordination centre in Pazarcık. In the video, people are saying: (Women) “This murderous state will be held accountable. You killed our people”. (Police) “We know who killed the people. You cannot say the state is murderous. Shame on you”. (Crowd) “We resist and we win!”
The long-term consequences of the earthquake are bound up with the political suppression of society. Survivors have barely begun reconciling their unbearable grief. Yet they already have to face the state’s occupation within Turkey, and across the fragmented borders and political terrain of northern Syria, preventing resources from reaching those that need it. This is part of the government’s bare-faced and unaccountable corruption.
Nonetheless, volunteers are persistent in their efforts. The Canary‘s contact in Elbistan told us that, soon, he would go home to rest for three days. Then he will leave again, to wherever the HDP tell him help is needed. In his place, another group from another region of Kurdistan will come to help.
Organisation is the cornerstone of society in northern Kurdistan. It has persisted throughout devastating crises, mobilising networks of aid prior to and immediately after the earthquake. But the road to rebuilding homes and infrastructure, as well as autonomy in a social and political sense, is arduous. This is just the beginning.
The volunteer told the Canary:
In the town, when the Turkish people saw that we are calling each other “heval” [‘friend/comrade’ in Kurmanci], that we came from Botan [a south-eastern region], they started calling us ‘terrorists’. But we already agreed before hand that we would continue to support people regardless of the reactions against us for being Kurdish.
From Europe, send donations to Heyva Sor a Kurdistanê (Kurdish Red Crescent) via PayPal here. This money will reach people on the ground in the most effective way possible. Financial support to on-the-ground groups are the most immediate need. However, after that, solidarity will be necessary. Kurdistan and the peoples of Turkey and Syria will require grassroots and institutional solidarity against the Turkish state’s militarism and fascism.
Featured image via T24 – YouTube
By The Canary
This post was originally published on Canary.
Two weeks have passed since a 7.8-magnitude earthquake devastated south-eastern Turkey and northern Syria. Latest figures estimate that 41,020 citizens have died in south-east Turkey alone. Meanwhile, according to the United Nations, 8.8 million people have been affected in Syria and more than 5,800 have been killed.
Many people remain under the rubble. This is because in president Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s fascistic Turkey, this earthquake is highly political. A vast number of areas affected in the south-east of Turkey are Kurdish. And many regions have seen very little state help with rescue operations.
Turkey’s Kurdish population has been repressed since the establishment of the Turkish state in 1923. Authorities have murdered or disappeared thousands of Kurdish people over the decades. They’ve also burned down or decimated their villages and imprisoned many more thousands.
The Canary has previously reported on how critics of the Turkish government have placed responsibility for the number of earthquake deaths on Erdoğan. They have also criticised his government for both its handling of the rescue operation itself and the way it has allowed the construction of buildings that, because of their location, were susceptible to earthquakes. Since 1999, Turkey has imposed an earthquake tax on homeowners. It has pocketed billions of dollars which, seemingly, it hasn’t put to use at all.
The province of Hatay, with its majority-Arab population in a majority-Turkish country, was close to the epicentre of the earthquake. The state has neglected Hatay’s residents, too. In particular, those who live in the majority-Alevi Armutlu district said that they had been left to their own fate. On top of this, Erdoğan’s AKP government had previously revoked its decision to list six neighbourhoods of Hatay’s İskenderun district as ‘disaster risk areas‘. It had listed them in 2013, but removed them again in early 2022.
On Sunday 19 February, Turkey announced that rescue efforts had ended in all but two provinces: Kahramanmaras and Hatay. Agence France Presse (AFP) reported that in Antakya, authorities had banned people from entering their homes since the earthquake struck. They’re now telling residents to empty their houses before the buildings are demolished. But people are calling for their loved ones’ bodies to be recovered first.
In the city of Adıyaman alone, more than 200 buildings have collapsed and 11,000 people have lost their lives. JINHA women’s news agency reported that due to late search and rescue efforts, dead people – who could potentially have been found alive – are being brought out from the rubble. JINHA said:
Some buildings have been largely destroyed by the earthquakes; however, no measures have been taken for these buildings and they may collapse at any moment. These buildings pose a threat to the people living in the city. In order to prevent more people from dying, urgent measures must be taken for these buildings.
Meanwhile, in the city of Elbistan, citizens said that the state has largely forgotten them. It left survivors homeless, in freezing conditions, with no electricity or drinking water. A JINHA journalist interviewed a woman in the town:
The woman told us that no rescue team came to their district and many people froze to death under debris. “Our building also collapsed but no one was in it… Aids arrived here very late. No rescue team has come here. I lost 30 relatives. If rescue teams came earlier, many people would be alive now. What we experienced was a cataclysm.”
Residents said what gave them hope was the solidarity they experienced from people outside the area, who travelled from other regions to help them with rescue operations.
Immediately after the earthquake, Turkey blocked Twitter, which was essential to both survivors trapped under the rubble and those involved in the rescue operation. A government official said at the time:
This had to be done because in some accounts there were untrue claims, slander, insults and posts with fraudulent purposes.
But in Erdoğan’s Turkey, those who criticise the president, his AKP government, or its policies, can – and usually will – be investigated and arrested. This is particularly true if you happen to be Kurdish. The Canary has previously reported that:
Everyone is charged with “membership of a terrorist organisation”. But these are not terrorists. These are lawyers, journalists, MPs, co-op members, and human rights activists. Their crime is being Kurdish and supporting radical democracy in the face of president Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s fascistic regime.
Turkey is also known as the world’s largest prison for journalists. So it’s unsurprising that while people are still under the rubble, the Turkish state is busy arresting even more people – this time for spreading supposed disinformation on social media. On 20 February, Turkey’s General Directorate of Security announced that it was investigating hundreds of people and had made a number of arrests. JINHA reported:
The General Directorate of Security said in the statement that it had identified 775 people accused of making provocative posts, and legal proceedings had been initiated against 441, “The chief prosecutor had ordered the arrest of 24 of the 129 detained people.”
It’s also unsurprising that the US has used the opportunity to announce that it is giving a new $100m aid package to Turkey, its NATO ally. US secretary of state Antony Blinken is currently on a visit to Turkey. He is expected to talk about military deals – namely, the fact that fascistic Turkey wants to buy F16 fighter jets off the US.
But to those directly affected on the ground in Turkey and in Syria, it’s blatantly clear that money being donated for earthquake relief isn’t reaching them. The Canary recently reported on how areas of Syria aren’t getting aid. In Afrin, which is occupied by Turkey, the situation is especially dire. The Canary‘s Tom Anderson wrote:
The catastrophic impacts of the earthquake for people in Afrin will certainly be made worse by the effects of the five year long occupation of the region by the Turkish state backed Syrian National Army (SNA).
Meanwhile, Fikret Ebdelo, an official in Shahba canton in Aleppo, has stated that:
In Afrin, many people have been in rubble for more than a week and no humanitarian aid is allowed to be sent to the city. The Turkish state did not allow people to send humanitarian aid to the earthquake victims. It rejected the humanitarian aid sent by the Autonomous Administration [of Rojava] and did not allow the people to receive this humanitarian aid on time.
Ebdelo went on to say that the Syrian government has also blocked aid to the Shahba region. The area hosts thousands of people who have been displaced from Afrin due to the Turkish occupation. She said:
Shahba is also badly affected by the earthquake; many people have lost their lives and many houses have collapsed. Sovereign states always develop their policies according to their own interests. Since the first day of the earthquake, the Autonomous Administration of North and East Syria [Rojava] has been sending humanitarian aid and relief supplies to the Shahba canton affected by the earthquake; however, the Syrian government has been blocking the transfer of this aid.
Erdoğan will, no doubt, be using the earthquake to convince his country that he’s capable of uniting his nation. He will also use the disaster to improve his strained relations with his NATO allies. But for citizens who have been displaced, or whose loved ones have perished under buildings, this event is yet another example of just how dangerous Erdoğan and his government really are.
Of course, money is still desperately needed to help with the rescue operations in the region. Comrades are asking that you think carefully before donating to those mainstream organisations that are appealing for your cash. Instead, they ask you to donate to Heyva Sor – the Kurdish Red Crescent – which has spent years on the frontline of the Syrian civil war. You can donate here.
Featured image via JINHA women’s news agency
By Eliza Egret
This post was originally published on Canary.
On Monday, February 6, a 7.8 magnitude earthquake struck southern Türkiye and northwest Syria in the early hours of the morning. It was followed by another 7.5 magnitude earthquake hours later, as well as over a hundred aftershocks in the days that followed. It is the deadliest and most powerful earthquake to hit Türkiye since 1939, and to hit Syria in more than 800 years, and the death toll is…
This post was originally published on Latest – Truthout.
The victims of the devastating 7.8-magnitude earthquake in Turkey and Syria need your help now. The surviving families and children and those rescued alive from the rubble are in serious danger in affected wintertime impoverished regions. Refugees in other places fleeing their war-torn homelands are also suffering. International aid agencies are grossly insufficient for these immediate humanitarian necessities.
What are you Big Business Titans doing sitting on massive pay, profits, and tax escapes? Awakening your consciousness for your fellow human beings may be a modest form of redemption. Further, you have access to logistics specialists, delivery systems, communication facilities, and many other contacts and resources. You get your calls returned! Fast!
Tim Cook, you have been making $833 a MINUTE (plus lavish benefits). Remarkably, your compensation is not even in the top ten of operating company CEOs. Moreover, your own cultivated sense of envy knows that there are Hedge Fund Goliaths, who in some recent years, made off with over $2,500 per MINUTE on a forty-hour week.
Tim, you and the Apple corporation are known to pay few taxes given what tax attorneys and tax accountants do for you (especially with Apple taking advantage of foreign tax havens while receiving the fruits of Washington’s free government R&D over the years). Your company has so much leftover money, flowing from the deprivation of a million serf laborers in China, and so few productive outlets for this mass of capital that you have set records for stock buybacks—over $400 billion in the last decade.
You and Apple and the Hedge Fund Titans are not known for your charitable giving as a percent of your adjusted gross income. Yet, if asked “Do you believe in the Golden Rule?” you would probably say “Yes”—at least in public.
Use your wealth and newfound empathy to organize direct relief for these earthquake victims and other major refugee areas such as the starving children of Somalia. Deliver food, medicine, clothing, shelter, mobile clinics, and many other available airlifted essentials. Hire skilled people to make it happen. Give your new organization a prominent logo for permanence and for setting an example for other super-rich to emulate.
Your isolation from the public expectation that you enter the above engagements in a significant way is quite remarkable. That should trouble you and your public relations advisors.
Just this week National Public Radio (NPR) featured a startling compilation of what producers of movies and TV shows believe appeals to their viewers. It is no longer awe or envy of the ‘rich and famous.’ It is no longer the Horatio Alger myth. It is encapsulated in NPR‘s headline: Why “eat the rich” storylines are taking over TV and movies.
As Bob Dylan sang, “the times, they are a-changin’.”
NPR reporter Kristin Schwab related:
Hollywood’s depictions of the wealthy—and perhaps societal attitudes toward them—have changed.… The moment isn’t random. Think about the extreme economic events we’ve been through. There’s the pandemic, when essential workers kept the country running while the richest 1% amassed a huge sum of wealth—twice as much as the rest of the world put together (her emphasis), according to the non-profit Oxfam. And before that was The Great Recession, which is how we got the term “the 1%.”
Mr. Cook, Apple is reportedly making a contribution to the Turkey/Syria relief effort. Are you personally making a contribution? Your Big Business Titan comrades may think they can get away with gated, cold-blooded mentalities. They may be right about that if the mass media doesn’t turn its steely gaze toward their hoards of gold and question their “don’t give a damn” attitude.
Maybe they just can’t help themselves—so busy are they counting their lucre. Here is an idea: ask them to ask their grandchildren, 12 and under, what they want them to do. Absorb their moral authority and MOVE FAST TO HELP THOSE IN NEED!
This post was originally published on Common Dreams.
Around a dozen Kurdish people launched a protest on Wednesday inside the European Parliament. 15 February is the anniversary of Turkey’s capture of Kurdistan Worker’s Party co-founder Abdullah .
Protesters halted the debate session for three hours. Members of the European Parliaments (MEPs) left the chamber as banners were unfurled bearing ‘s image, and demonstrators shouted slogans critical of Turkey’s President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan.
One MEP told Agence France-Presse (AFP) that the protesters were on an upper deck above the Strasbourg chamber, some sitting on a balustrade and dangling their legs above the parliament’s floor.
Demonstrations for the Freedom of were in held in Rojava in northeast Syria and in Kirkuk in Iraqi Kurdistan. Protests were also held all over Europe, including in Rome, Geneva, Lausanne, Paris and Greece.
A freedom for conference was held in London, at the House of Lords. Over 120 people also took part in an annual long march for his freedom. This year marchers walked from Switzerland to France.
Six Basque trade unions released a manifesto demanding release. They underlined his vital role in peace negotiations:
The current Turkish government run by Erdoğan held negotiations with Öcalan for two and a half years, during which the Kurdish leader proposed a gradual plan to achieve peace, from confidence-building measures, through a disarmament process under international surveillance, to a permanent political solution to the Kurdish question. Although the negotiations broke down in 2011, Öcalan’s proposals, included in his “Road Map”, continue to be of the utmost importance to address and seek a negotiated solution to the so-called ‘Kurdish question’
The statement continued:
The demand for Öcalan’s freedom is vital to break the military logic of the conflict and thus divert attention towards peaceful negotiations and towards a democratic resolution of the Kurdish conflict
Ocalan was arrested in Kenya by Turkish agents on February 15, 1999 and sentenced to death in June of the same year. Now 73, his sentence was reduced to life in prison in 2002 and supporters continue to demand his release. His capture involved collaboration between the Turkish state and several other states. The Kurdistan Freedom Movement calls it the international ‘conspiracy’.
According to the International Initiative “Freedom for Abdullah Öcalan—Peace in Kurdistan!”:
On 15 February 1999, a new phase in the war against the Kurds and other communities raised its head with the NATO-led abduction of Kurdish people’s leader Abdullah Öcalan from Nairobi, Kenya. A series of actors in Europe and in the Middle East as well as the US were behind this operation.
The statement continued:
The US and Europe, who led this operation against the Kurdish people’s leader, continue to legitimize the colonization and occupation of Kurdistan and condemn any resistance to it as terrorism, and are the ones that brewed this genocidal fascist regime. This is because the Turkish state paves the path for them to further ecocide, genocide, capitalism and colonialism in the region. The indigenous peoples’ existence is a resistance to these.
is currently imprisoned on the island of has written at least 12 books in prison. His ideas inspired the Rojava revolution, ongoing in northeast Syria since 2012
Internationalists released a video statement to commemorate the anniversary. The international volunteers had joined the revolutionary struggle in Rojava.
The life and philosophy of Abdullah Öcalan inspired millions of people to fight for democracy, ecology and women’s liberation. As Internationalists, we came to join the Rojava Revolution because we found inspiration within the revolution that is based on Öcalans philosophy. As internationalist members of YPG/YPJ [peoples’ protection units], we condemn the conspiracy. But however they try to attack our longing for freedom, they will never be able to take what we found here: hope.
Abdullah Öcalan’s ideas continue to ignite hopes for revolution and freedom, despite nearly two and a half decades in prison. His supporters see his liberation as essential for bringing an end to Turkish fascism, and achieving peace in Kurdistan.
You can find out more about the UK Freedom for Öcalan campaign by clicking here.
Additional reporting via Agence France-Presse
Featured image via Screenshot/ANF Firat
By Tom Anderson
This post was originally published on Canary.
Rescue teams have begun winding down the search for survivors as the focus switched to tackling a dire humanitarian disaster caused by the earthquake that has left more than 40,000 people dead in Turkey and Syria.
Syria, already wracked by 12 years of civil war, is of particular concern. The United Nations (UN) held an emergency meeting on Monday 13 February on how to boost aid to rebel-held areas. Syrian president Bashar al-Assad, isolated and subject to Western sanctions, called for international assistance to help rebuild infrastructure in the country. The UN estimates that more than five million people have been made homeless.
UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said Assad has agreed to open two more border crossings for aid. One is in Bab Al-Salam and another in Al Raee, both between Türkey to northwest Syria. More than four million people live in these rebel-controlled areas of northwestern Syria. But before the earthquake struck, almost all of the crucial humanitarian aid for the region was delivered through a single conduit – the Bab al-Hawa crossing. Guterres said:
Opening these crossing points – along with facilitating humanitarian access, accelerating visa approvals and easing travel between hubs – will allow more aid to go in, faster.
However, the situation is very complex. The United States and the UK have led the way in sanctioning Syria after concerns that the state was a “sponsor of terrorism”. But sanctions aren’t the only barrier to aid being delivered to survivors.
In the face of a steadily rising death toll, both the US and UK have announced a temporary easing of sanctions. While these exemptions may ease the pressure, as the Guardian reported:
analysts say the demands of the Assad government and the effects of the war are the main factors complicating aid deliveries into the already tense north-west, and the US move is more about reassuring banks and other institutions that they will not be punished for rendering assistance.
Assad’s government has demanded that it be able to control aid coming into the country. When asked if Syria would let the UN deliver aid from crossing points not accessed via Turkey, Syrian ambassador to the UN Bassam Sabbagh avoided answering directly. Instead, he said that the government would aid deliveries:
to all Syrians in all territory of Syria.
The director of the Middle East Institute’s Syria programme pointed a finger at Assad’s government. Charles Lister said Assad’s insistence on controlling deliveries across Syria hampered aid efforts, and this insistence:
appears to have virtually crippled the United Nations’ willingness, not ability, but willingness to essentially act forthright and in a bold way, and just provide earthquake recovery anyway, across the border.
Lister contended that whilst sanctions may impact aid entering the borders of Syria, the distribution of aid within Syria is a broader issue:
Sanctions is a complete side point, virtually irrelevant in terms of the flow of humanitarian assistance.
Of course, anger has grown over the sluggish international response to aid. Sanctions are still likely to be an ongoing problem for aid routes, as Declassified explained:
Last November the UN called on states to lift "catastrophic" sanctions on #Syria which are "perpetuating and exacerbating the destruction and trauma suffered by the Syrian people since 2011".
Yesterday, the UK government confirmed its sanctions will remain in place. pic.twitter.com/i44fNmScH4
— Declassified UK (@declassifiedUK) February 16, 2023
Al-Jazeera showed how “anger and desperation” is growing, particularly in northern Syria:
“People are dying without any aid.”
Anger and desperation grows in rebel-held areas of Syria with the slow arrival of aid after earthquakes devastated the region
— Al Jazeera English (@AJEnglish) February 15, 2023
Abdelmajid Al Shawi, an earthquake survivor, said:
We want our voice to reach the whole world but where is the aid?…Find us a solution. Where is this aid coming from? Let’s see. Aid is never going to come here.
Raed Saleh, head of the White Helmets Rescue Force, said:
It has never happened before that there was an earthquake and the international community and the UN don’t help – this has never happened before anywhere in the world. The United Nations failed drastically, this shouldn’t have happened this way. There must be an investigation into these shortcomings.
And Clare Daly, member of the European Parliament, warned that many thousands more may die in the aftermath of the earthquake:
The people of Syria were abandoned before the earthquake ever hit,its economy and reconstruction battered by Western sanctions. The UN Syria humanitarian programme last year was only 47% funded. Aid agencies are screaming for sanctions to be lifted, or thousands more may die. https://t.co/IEwYXHjb0y pic.twitter.com/Wpe6DwNNQK
— Clare Daly (@ClareDalyMEP) February 15, 2023
Meanwhile, Byline Times journalist Richard Medhurst pointed out that of the few countries sending aid to Syria, many of them were themselves under sanctions:
Iran— itself under sanctions— one of the first to send aid to Syria.
Iraq, Tunisia, Algeria, Russia, all developing countries or under sanctions, yet still sending help. That really says it all.— Richard Medhurst (@richimedhurst) February 7, 2023
UN humanitarian affairs chief Martin Griffiths was to give a presentation to the UN Security Council on the situation in Syria after visiting the region over the weekend. He said on Twitter:
We have so far failed the people in north-west Syria.
They rightly feel abandoned.
He added that it was the international community’s obligation “to correct this failure as fast as we can.”
The people of Syria have been forced to contend with the effects of civil war for many years. Aid’s entanglement with diplomacy has compounded the earthquake’s devastation, leading to international reticence. As Noor Noman, a journalist for MSNBC, said:
There is no doubt that Assad has committed egregious human rights’ violations, but the story is never that simple. We are being myopic and simplistic if we convince ourselves that we can reduce what’s happening in Syria to a hero-villain or righteous-immoral narrative (and there is the question of the extent to which America has moral high ground to stand on).
We must avoid the urge to cast heroes and villains. Such binary narratives forget the people of Syria, who must not be abandoned. Noman continued:
Sanctions are not resulting in the atomization of the Assad regime, they are only hurting and killing ordinary civilians. The only humane response the West can offer right now is to do everything in its power to allow, support and enable the flow of resources to the Syrian people.
Time is of the essence, and we must all do what we can to urge efficient and swift aid directly to people in Syria. Otherwise, this tragedy could yet become another example of the lack of international support and solidarity for communities in the Global South.
Featured image via YouTube screenshot/BBC News
Additional reporting by Agence France-Presse
New York: The Council of People’s Organization (COPO) has dispatched a container of relief goods to the earthquake victims of Turkey and Syria through Turkish Airlines from US.
The relief items include food items, warm clothes, blankets, shoes, medicines and surgical stuff.
On this occasion, the head of COPO Muhammad Rizvi said that the New York Police Department’s Muslim Officers’ Society (MOS) and other organizations have been participating in all the activities.
Muhammad Rizvi and officers of the Muslim Officers’ Society of the New York Police were also present on the occasion of the loading of trucks.
The post COPO dispatches relief goods to the earthquake victims of Turkey, Syria via Turkish Airlines first appeared on VOSA.
This post was originally published on VOSA.
Turkish dictator President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan is using the earthquake disaster as a weapon in his ongoing war on the Kurdish people, according to Zerebar Karimi.
This post was originally published on Green Left.
We get an update from Damascus, Syria, on last week’s devastating earthquakes, as the United Nations warns the death toll in Turkey and northwest Syria will top at least 50,000. The U.N. also says the earthquake rescue phase is “coming to a close” and that efforts are expected to turn to providing shelter, food and care to survivors. Millions have been left homeless by the deadly quakes that…
This post was originally published on Latest – Truthout.
Gulfer Olan, the co-chair of the Federation of Democratic Kurdish Society (Australia) explains that the twin earthquakes that have devastated Kurdish towns and cities in Turkey and North and East Syria (Rojava) but the Turkish and Syrian governments have not been providing the desperately needed emergency aid desperately needed.
Thousands of collapsed buildings, widespread destruction, and deep anguish were reported alongside over 2,300 dead and thousands more injured after a pair of earthquakes—an initial 7.8 tremor on the Richter scale in the early morning and another that measured 7.5—devastated Syria and Turkey on Monday.
Amid dozens of aftershocks—and the quakes being also felt in Cyprus, Israel, Lebanon, Egypt, and the Occupied Palestinian Territories—the full scale of the destruction and the ultimate death toll remains unknown, though early estimates of the dead and wounded were rising by the hour.
According to Turkey’s Hurriyet Daily, President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan described the quakes as the most severe in the nation since 1939.
The first quake occurred just after 4:00 am local time in Kahramanmaras province, north of Gaziantep, near the Syrian border, while the second took place in the southeastern Turkey.
One television crew was reporting on the first quake in the city of Malatya, when the second one hit:
\u201cThis TV crew was broadcasting live when a second magnitude 7.5 earthquake hit Turkey \u2935\ufe0f\u201d— Al Jazeera English (@Al Jazeera English) 1675678564
According to Al-Jazeera:
Rescuers were digging through the rubble of levelled buildings in the city of Kahramanmaras and neighbouring Gaziantep. Crumbled buildings were also reported in Adiyaman, Malatya and Diyarbakir.
The death toll in government-held areas of Syria climbed to 339, according to Syrian state media, with deaths reported in the cities of Aleppo, Hama, Latakia and Tartous.
Around the globe, human rights champions and political leaders offered sympathy to those impacted by the disaster and vowed emergency assistance to both Turkey and Syria.
\u201cThinking about all who will be impacted by this devastating earthquake.\u201d— Rashida Tlaib (@Rashida Tlaib) 1675650440
Agnes Callamard, head of Amnesty International, said her organization was “in deep sorrow” following news of the disaster.
“We extend our deepest condolences to all those who have lost loved ones, and call for the Governments and international community to provide speedy search and relief,” Callamard said.
Filippo Grandi, High Commissioner for Refugees at the United Nations, said, “We at UNHCR stand in solidarity with the people of Türkiye and Syria affected by today’s devastating earthquake and are ready to help provide urgent relief to the survivors through our field teams wherever possible.”
This post was originally published on Common Dreams.
On Monday 9 January, people demonstrated in Cardiff and London to commemorate the three people killed by gunman William Malet last December at the Kurdish Cultural Centre in Paris.
The Canary recently reported that those who died on 23 December were “Abdurrahman Kizil, singer and political refugee Mir Perwer, and Emine Kara, a leader of the movement of Kurdish women in France”. Glen Black wrote:
Police arrested Malet after the murders, and charged him on 26 December. Malet told investigators at the time that he had a “pathological” hatred for foreigners and wanted to “murder migrants”. As well as killing Kizil, Perwer, and Kara, Malet wounded a further three people. The suspect had a violent criminal history. At the time of the murders, he had just left detention for attacking a Paris refugee camp with a sabre in 2021.
Thousands attended the funeral in Paris on 3 January, and French police attacked the mourners.
The attack comes ten years after Turkish intelligence agent Ömer Güney assassinated Sakine Cansız (Sara), Fidan Doğan (Rojbîn), and Leyla Şaylemez (Ronahî) in a similar attack in Paris. Kurdish freedom movement news agency ANF Firat wrote that there has been no justice for Sara, Rojbîn and Leyla in the ten years since. According to ANF:
justice remains far and so does truth
The Kurdish People’s Democratic Assembly of Britain (NADEK) held a demonstration outside the French embassy in London on 9 January, where they remembered both massacres.
People tweeted news from the demonstration:
Members of the Kurdish community in London protested outside the French Embassy today to demand the French government open 'secret files' that will shed light on the Turkish state's involvement in the assassinations of three Kurdish women activists in Paris on 9/10 January 2013. pic.twitter.com/Qpl4NvPbbW
— @Hevallo (@Hevallo) January 9, 2023
We have joined our comrades outside of the French Embassy to protest against the killings of Kurds in Paris#TwitterKurds #SakineFidanLeyla #mirperver #eminekara #adburahmankizil pic.twitter.com/JgpCQbGNi5
— Bristol Kurdistan Solidarity Network (@BristolKSN) January 9, 2023
Ten years on, there has been no justice for Sakine, Fidan and Leyla or any of the thousands of other women assassinated, raped, tortured and murdered by the Turkish state. We demand the UK, France, the European Union and international organizations take action to hold Turkey to account and to bring the real murderers to justice.
The group demanded that:
The UK, France, EU and the international community must launch a proper and thorough investigation into the chain of command which led to these deaths.
On the same day in Cardiff, around 40 demonstrators gathered to remember those who died in the attacks.
A vigil was held in Cardiff city centre, and then the demonstrators moved to a statue of Lloyd George. The group explained why in a press release:
Lloyd George, the Welsh prime minister of Britain was responsible for the partition of Kurdistan 100 years ago. The partition of Kurdistan, meant that in Syria, Turkey, Iraq and Iran Kurds are being massacred to this day.
Jill Davies from Kurdish Solidarity Cymru said:
Kurds are being forcibly assimilated, murdered and tortured, this is happening not only in the middle east but also in Europe. This triple murder is not the first time for this to happen. France failed to protect its Kurdish born citizens that came to France to flee violence
Wales is not innocent either, a Welsh prime minister was behind the partition of Kurdistan, and to this day we have statues of him in Cardiff and Caernarfon. There is even a Lloyd George museum that fails to mention his role in the partition that had lead to war that lasts to this day. There are 40 million Kurdish people worldwide, they are the largest nation without a state in terms of population.
Baris Rubar, a member of the Kurdish community in Wales said:
We flee from our countries so that we can live in safety, only to have the violence follow us here. The European governments have a responsibility to protect its citizens. This is the second triple murder in 10 years in Paris of Kurdish activists. We believe there is something sinister going on and that the Turkish state should be investigated for these assassinations.
Kurdish organisations have vowed to keep on organising until they get justice for those killed in the two Paris massacres. They deserve support and solidarity in their struggle.
Featured image via Kurdish Solidarity Cymru (with permission)
By Tom Anderson
This post was originally published on Canary.
Kurdish people from across Europe travelled to the suburbs of Paris, France, on 3 January for the funeral of three Kurds murdered in a racist attack. Gunman William Malet killed two men and one woman on 23 December, in a attack on the Ahmet Kaya community centre in Paris’ 10th district.
His victims were Abdurrahman Kizil, singer and political refugee Mir Perwer, and Emine Kara, a leader of the movement of Kurdish women in France.
Organisers chartered buses to bring people from across France and some neighbouring countries to the ceremony in Villiers-le-Bel, north of Paris, local sources said. Tears and cries of “Martyrs live forever!” greeted the coffins, wrapped in the flags of the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) and the Kurdish-controlled Rojava territory in northern Syria.
Thousands of people attended the funeral ceremony held today for #EvînGoyî, #MîrPerwer & #AbdurrahmanKızıl, who were murdered in the attack on Ahmet Kaya #Kurdish Cultural Centre on 23 December 2022 in #Paris, the capital of #France#ParisMassacreOfKurdspic.twitter.com/cGX6KHvp4G
— Vedat Yeler (@vedatyeler_) January 3, 2023
The huge crowd followed the funeral on giant screens erected in a car park. The screens showed coffins surrounded by wreaths beneath a portrait of imprisoned PKK leader Abdullah Ocalan.
Police arrested Malet after the murders, and charged him on 26 December. Malet told investigators at the time that he had a “pathological” hatred for foreigners and wanted to “murder migrants”. As well as killing Kizil, Perwer, and Kara, Malet wounded a further three people. The suspect had a violent criminal history. At the time of the murders, he had just left detention for attacking a Paris refugee camp with a sabre in 2021.
Many Kurds in France’s 150,000-strong community refuse to believe Malet acted alone. They called his actions a “terrorist” attack, and pointed the finger at Turkey.
Ten years ago, men believed to have ties with Turkey’s secret services shot dead three Kurds connected to the PKK. The murders took place in Paris’s 10th District. Coincidentally, their funerals were held in almost exactly the same spot as those of Kizil, Perwer, and Kara. More recently, the now-banned Turkish ultra-nationalist group Grey Wolves was blamed for an attack in Lyon. Members of the group beat men at the city’s Kurdish cultural centre in April 2022.
Celik, a local who attended the 3 January funeral, said:
We feel like they’re doing everything they can to crush us, whether it’s here or in Turkey.
Malet’s murders led to confrontations between Kurdish people and French police in the streets of the capital.
The Democratic Council of Kurds in France (CDKF) said the 3 January ceremony was an:
opportunity for those who wish to pay their final respects… before the bodies are repatriated to their native soil [for burial]
CDKF activists will lead a march on 4 January in tribute to the December victims. The route will include the street where the shootings took place.
On 7 January, a “grand march” of the Kurdish community will set off from Paris’s Gare du Nord rail hub. Organisers had originally planned to mark the 10th anniversary of the 2013 shootings, but will now mark the most recent murders.
Thousands attend the funeral of the martyrs of #Paris terrorist attack
The Democratic Kurdish Council in France called for participation in a march to be held in the French capital on January 7. pic.twitter.com/MhgrE7LJhh
— Rojava Network (@RojavaNetwork) January 3, 2023
Additional reporting via Agence France-Presse (AFP)
Featured image via AFP, resized to 770*403
By Glen Black
This post was originally published on Canary.
An emergency rally at Sydney Town Hall Square called for the immediate end to the cruel and illegal isolation of Kurdish leader Abdullah Öcalan. Video by Peter Boyle.
This post was originally published on Green Left.
Content warning: graphic descriptions of state violence
This week, supporters of the Kurdistan Freedom movement have called for action against Turkey’s ongoing assault.
Turkey is reported to have been using chemical weapons in its attacks on Kurdistan Worker’s Party (PKK) guerillas in the mountains. Videos like this one – taken in the mountains of Iraqi Kurdistan – have been circulating. Antifa Enternasyonal tweeted in October:
URGENT! To those people that don't believe that the #Turkish fascist state is using chemical weapons against the #Kurdish guerrilla freedom fighters, look!
Take a good look at this video! Dozens of young brave comrades have fallen to the use of forbidden weapons! pic.twitter.com/jK36wdRLig
— Antifa Enternasyonal (@Antifa_Entsy) October 18, 2022
The PKK has been involved in guerilla warfare against the Turkish state for over 44 years now. It is demanding freedom and democracy, and has proposed to replace the state system with a system of federated direct democracy known as democratic confederalism.
The chemical attacks by the Turkish state are by no means new. In October, the Canary published this interview with bereaved families of guerillas who had fought the Turkish state. One of them told Canary contributor VZ Frances:
When I talk about my son who was martyred, he died with 16 others in Dersim. When we found them, there were no wounds. We were able to get only 3 bodies out of the 16 martyrs. They were killed by chemical weapons. When their bodies were found, their eyes were completely filled with blood.
Since the state knows that these chemicals can only be analysed up to a certain point after death, they refuse to give up the bodies. It has been 4 years. There were many attempts within those 4 years, with no response.
However, the reports of the use of chemical warfare against PKK guerillas have been steadily increasing.
People have been tweeting footage of the attacks under the hashtags #WeSeeYourCrimes and #YourSilenceKills. International campaign group Rise Up 4 Rojava tweeted:
Footage showing Turkish attacks with chemical weapons in #Kurdistan #WeSeeYourCrimes pic.twitter.com/ZQGtSRz86H
— RiseUp4Rojava (@RISEUP4R0JAVA) October 31, 2022
In Vienna, on 30 November, hundreds demonstrated outside the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW), demanding that it launches an investigation:
Some hundreds of people today in #Vienna in front of @OPCW protesting turkish use of chemical weapons in #Kurdistan and demanding an official investigation. https://t.co/JPnXKLza4d
— RiseUp4Rojava (@RISEUP4R0JAVA) November 30, 2022
Also on November 30, a group of international academics, campaigners and others published an open letter to the OPCW demanding that it investigates the attacks.
Meanwhile, Turkey’s attacks on Rojava – the part of Kurdistan within Syria’s borders – continues. The Turkish military has been engaged in heavy bombardments of Rojava since Saturday 19 November. Turkey is trying to crush the revolution that has been taking place there since 2012. It has already launched two major invasions, in 2018 and 2019, and is occupying parts of north and east Syria.
The Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) released a statement on 29 November, condemning the ongoing attacks. It says:
The Turkish occupation continues the brutal attacks on the north and east of Syria, targeting the lives of more than 5 million indigenous people and hundreds of thousands of IDPs [internally displaced persons] from other Syrian regions. The recent Turkish aggression has entered its tenth day and caused extensive damage to the population’s farms and properties and civilian infrastructure
The current attacks, dubbed ‘Operation Claw-Sword‘ by the Turkish military, are a coordinated offensive against both Rojava and Iraqi Kurdistan.
According to the SDF, many villages in the north and east of Syria have been hit with artillery shells, tank shells, and mortars.
Turkey has been accused of deliberately targeting camps where thousands of Daesh (ISIS/ISIL) members are being held, in order to facilitate their escape. The bombing of Al-Hol camp led to the deaths of eight members of the SDF, and at least six Daesh prisoners escaped – but were later rearrested. The region is now on high alert to defend against attacks by Daesh sleeper cells.
Turkey’s “military escalation” has been criticised by US officials. The US has forces in north and east Syria, and coordinates with the SDF.
However, SDF commander Mazloum Abdi has called for a stronger statement from the US.
Russian military officials have also called for “de-escalation” by Turkey, and Russia has reportedly sent reinforcements to the region.
However, Turkey and its allies seem to be pushing ahead with the threat of ground attacks, with several assaults on the Manbij region – by mercenaries allied with Turkey – reportedly being repelled in the last few days.
Preparations for a full ground offensive seem to be ongoing:
Watch our Daily Review:
❶ Turkey to launch ground operation
❷ Intensive air strikes across NE Syria
❸ Syrian mp on Damascus, Ankara dialogue
❹ No justice for Kurdish lawyer
❺ Football controversy over Kurdish flaghttps://t.co/GELhbSKPOt pic.twitter.com/vq3qqrKgBb— MedyaNews (@1MedyaNews) November 30, 2022
As these moves by military powers play out, people at a grassroots level all over the world are answering a call to ‘Defend Kurdistan’. Several blockades of Turkish Airlines counters have taken place at European airports:
Today in #Berlin Turkish Airlines check-in's were successfully blocked! #RiseUp4Rojava #DefendKurdistan pic.twitter.com/8qIacJOACz
— RiseUp4Rojava (@RISEUP4R0JAVA) November 30, 2022
Another blockade in front of Turkish Airlines today in #Napoli! Make the war-profiteers pay! #WeeSeeYourCrimes #RiseUp4Rojava #DefendKurdistan pic.twitter.com/HNNWc5iGnV
— RiseUp4Rojava (@RISEUP4R0JAVA) November 30, 2022
Meanwhile, actions and mass demonstrations have been held in many European cities:
#Barcelona #RiseUp4Rojava #RojavaIsUnderAttack pic.twitter.com/ued32SsvVy
— RiseUp4Rojava (@RISEUP4R0JAVA) November 23, 2022
Solidarity against the attacks even came from as far away as Mexico:
#Mexico #RiseUp4Rojava #TurkeyAttacksRojava pic.twitter.com/TKLHiaqPyt
— RiseUp4Rojava (@RISEUP4R0JAVA) November 24, 2022
Demonstrations have been held in London, Bristol, and Leeds against UK arms sales to Turkey, and in support of the uprising in Rojhelat (the area of Kurdistan within Iran’s borders):
NEW
Extended coverage of the weeks Actions on our new website:https://t.co/Wa9UBdbqeQ#DefendKurdistan
— Kurdistan Solidarity Network #YourSilenceKills (@kurdistansolnet) November 28, 2022
Bristol Kurdistan Solidarity Network is holding a demonstration against Boeing on 1 December, protesting the company’s supply of weapons to Turkey.
Turkey is attempting to stamp out a revolution right now in Kurdistan – a revolution which represents the struggle of people against states and against fascism. Those resisting the current attacks deserve our support and solidarity. Check out the Kurdistan Solidarity Network and Rise Up 4 Rojava on Twitter for news of demonstrations and how to get involved.
Featured image via screenshot/Riseup 4 Rojava
By Tom Anderson
This post was originally published on Canary.
Turkey has struck more than 90 villages and towns in North East Syria since November 19, reports Susan Price. Meanwhile, international voices of condemnation are growing.
This post was originally published on Green Left.
