Chauvinism on the rise in Turkey: Freed Kurdish politician
MARDIN, Turkey (Kurdistan24) – Chauvinism and nationalism are on the rise in Turkey as harsh government policies continue to target Kurds, argued a prominent Kurdish politician on Saturday.
Ahmet Turk, a Kurdish politician who Turkish authorities recently released after serving a two-months long pre-trial imprisonment, spoke to Kurdistan24 about the unfair treatment of Kurds in the country.
“The most important issue in the Middle East is the Kurdish question. We always wanted it to be solved with peaceful means, a shared understanding, and dialogue,” said Turk speaking from his house in the city of Mardin a day after being set free.
“Millions of Kurdish people are without a status,” he continued. “We demand equality between Turks and Kurds in light of a friendship of thousands of years.”
“Today’s policies on the Kurdish people and their identity, culture, and language cause conflict,” Turk added.
The politician first entered the Turkish Parliament in 1973, serving six times as a lawmaker representing Mardin.
In November 2016, Turkey’s Interior Ministry sacked him from his post as the elected Co-mayor of Mardin.
“The Turkish government’s policies are aimed at silencing Kurdish people, preventing them from getting their rights and leaving them without a status,” Turk continued.
The veteran politician whose family name, Turk, was given by a young Turkish Republic in the first half of the twentieth century still believed in the possibility of peace between the Kurds and Turkey.
“The status in the Kurdistan Region is an example that Kurds and Turks can build a friendship. When the Kurds in Turkey and Syria as well have a free life, the friendship can become even more valuable,” he told Kurdistan24’s Basî Roj program.
Turk said the Kurdistan Region’s President Masoud Barzani could play a significant role in starting a new peace initiative between Turkey and its Kurdish population.
“Kurdish people are not an enemy to the Turks, Arabs, and Persians,” he explained insisting the Turkish state should stop seeing Kurds’ demands for their rights as a threat.
The Kurdish politician warned against a repeat of the same policies of a post-coup d’etat 1980s’ Turkey that saw thousands jailed and tortured and ravaging Turkish army operations against the outlawed Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK).
The former Co-mayor of Mardin also criticized Kurdish movement in Turkey led by the Peoples’ Democratic Party (HDP) which is the second largest opposition block at the Parliament.
HDP’s putting 80 lawmakers in the 550-seat Turkish parliament in June 2015 elections was a chance that “should not have been wasted,” he added.
The Kurdish opposition’s gains denied the Justice and Development Party (AKP), founded by President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, to form a single-party government for the first time in 12 years.
As a result, Turkey’s leadership “sabotaged” a two-years-long peace talks with the PKK, Turk argued.
“We should not have given them that opportunity,” he said.
Editing by Karzan Sulaivany