One new thing is the use of the word “initiative.” Maybe for the first time, state authorities are working seriously to solve the Kurdish problem (or problems), and they are trying to reach citizens of Kurdish origin. The president and the government's wills have brought to the agenda what NGOs, political parties, intellectuals and Kurdish “representatives” have been saying for many years. Let us hope that the current initiative embraces divergent Kurdish tendencies and brings results that will reflect Kurds' opinions. Because in the past, the so-called solutions were dictated by central authorities without caring much about other actors' demands and needs.The second new thing is that everyone seems to have finally understood that the Kurdish problem (or Kurds' problems) is intertwined with Turkey's overall democratization process. Almost everyone agrees that trying to resolve the Kurdish issue through militarist and oppressive methods and stating that the Kurdish issue is only about terror, violence and separatism did not help to do anything except serve the authoritarian approaches in Turkey. Simultaneously, the Kurdish movement is now prioritizing civilian involvement in politics rather than creating political pressure through violence. Consequently, each player seems to have admitted that this issue will not be resolved by violence. In brief, Turkey has launched the process of giving the priority to “citizens” rather than to the “nation.”
The last new thing is, of course, the international context. The main reason for the tense relationship between the US and Turkey during the Bush presidency was that Turkey considered northern Iraq as the main source of the Kurdish issue. Ankara believed that it could manage Turkey's Kurdish question simply by controlling northern Iraq. Turkey did not help George W. Bush occupy Iraq, and in return, the US did not allow Turkey to control northern Iraq. It has even used the Kurdish card to make Turkey accept the US's will on certain issues. However, in the new era symbolized by Barack Obama, Washington is not inclined to use ethnic and religious groups' struggle with each other to achieve the US's global power policy goals. In other words, the US is now aware that unresolved ethnic and/or religious problems can potentially stimulate new and dangerous instabilities.
The revitalization of the tripartite mechanism between Turkey, Iraq and the US reflects the change in the conjectural realities. In the beginning, the tripartite mechanism was not very successful because it was created to work on security, intelligence and terrorist organizations, but every participant had a different understanding of “security.” But today, the mechanism seems to work on “humans.” The discussion is mostly about winning people back and improving political, social and economic relations between Turkey and northern Iraq in order to create a stability zone in this region. As the new American administration has no will and no time to tolerate anti-democratic practices and unstable regimes and as it wants to concentrate its energy on radical religious groups, Washington wants everybody to hurry up in this regard. From this perspective, the “Kurdish initiative” is not just the state's initiative toward the Kurds; it is also the Kurds' initiative to the world.
