Strategic Allies

By Steven Stycos

The Providence Phoenix

Thursday, May 16, 2002

Turkey's Kurds find little respite from terror

The war on terrorism isn't aiding efforts to free Leyla Zana, who was imprisoned for wearing Kurdish garments at a political rally and saying, "I am taking this oath for the brotherhood of the Turkish and Kurdish peoples," after being inducted as a member of the Turkish parliament.

Turkey, which will lead the international peace-keeping force in Afghanistan, has a military cooperation pact with Israel and will provide a crucial support base should the US invade Iraq. Turkey is also a major purchaser of US arms, including a pending $4 billion deal to buy King Cobra helicopters from Providence-based Textron (see "Torture is the issue," News, December 14, 2000). These factors cause the NATO's member allies to overlook well documented human-rights violations in the moderate Muslim nation, according to Kani Xulam, director of the Washington, DC-based American Kurdish Information Network.

Although Amnesty International USA opposes the helicopter sale because the weapons have been used to terrorize Kurdish civilians -- like those represented by Zana, in southeastern Turkey -- Xulam predicts that the US State Department will approve the sale. "The war on terror has made Turkey more favorable [to the US] than ever before," he says.

Although Turkey calls itself a democracy, "Turkish authorities continue to commit gross human-rights violations against the country's Kurdish minority political parties with primarily Kurdish membership routinely encounter harassment," according to Amnesty. "Police regularly raid local party offices and detain party members and supporters. Many of the detainees have been tortured, disappeared or killed."

Bogac Guldere, a political counselor at the Turkish embassy in Washington, DC, disputes Amnesty's assessment. Kurds do not face discrimination in Turkey and many play prominent political roles, he says. Guldere says Zana had direct links to the Kurdistan Workers Party or PKK, which the Turkish government calls a terrorist group. No country has a perfect human-rights record, says Guldere, and Turkey, unfortunately, is no exception.

Using Zana as a symbol of what's happening to Kurds in Turkey, Xulam is pushing a congressional resolution calling for her freedom. The former parliament member has served eight years of a 15-year sentence. On Sunday, May 5 -- Zana's 41st birthday -- activists at Brown University gathered with Xulam to call for her release. The same geopolitical factors, however, are complicating the resolution drive.

Despite the difficulties, Xulam has gathered 49 congressional supporters for the resolution to free Zana, including US Representatives William Delahunt, Barney Frank and James McGovern of Massachusetts. Local Kurdish activist Mehmet Akbas says he will soon be asking US Representatives Patrick Kennedy and James Langevin to sign on.