The latest snag in the already fragile Kurdish reform efforts occurred when the possibility emerged that some pro-Kurdish deputies may be taken to court forcibly by police for their unwillingness to testify about earlier statements they made that are regarded as criminal.
Due to their parliamentary immunity, the Democratic Society Party (DTP) deputies once again refused to give testimony on Tuesday. DTP head Ahmet Türk, who is also expected to testify in court, recalled that it was the DTP itself that urged the lifting of parliamentary immunity for all deputies. While parliamentary immunity continues to exist, DTP deputies will refuse to give testimony in court.
Some DTP deputies are accused of “promoting the cause of a terrorist organization” (the outlawed Kurdistan Workers' Party [PKK]) in separate cases over speeches they made during party demonstrations.
In the midst of an intense debate over Kurdish reforms, the possibility that some Kurdish deputies will be forcibly taken from Parliament to court by police during the next hearing, planned for Dec. 29, threatens the already fragile Kurdish initiative. In 1993, pro-Kurdish deputies that were members of a social democratic party were forcibly taken from Parliament to court by police and were jailed for more than 10 years on charges of attempting to inflict serious injury to the concept of the unitary state.
Sixteen years have passed since this incident, which was humiliating for the country. Now Turkey is facing a similar event. In the words of Türk, the DTP does not have anything to lose, but Turkey has much to lose if DTP deputies are brought to court by police.
“We want the removal of parliamentary immunity, but we are now being pushed into a position in which we are being forcibly excluded from Parliament simply for the sake of keeping the Kurdish question on Turkey's agenda,” he said.
Türk added that the decision of the court is an attempt to damage a sense of reason and compromise the sides are presently trying to establish.
In his remarks to a group of journalists last Monday during a reception given in Ankara by Güler Sabancı, Turkey's leading businesswomen and head of Sabancı Holding, Türk drew a bleak picture concerning progress on the Kurdish initiative due to the military's remarks on the process, which he said have had the effect of narrowing the ruling Justice and Development Party's (AK Party) room for maneuver.
Turkish Chief of General Staff Gen. İlker Başbuğ has drawn red lines over the Kurdish reforms discouraging the AK Party from making necessary changes to the Constitution and from allowing education in one's mother tongue. “If those elements are dropped from the agenda, what are we talking about related to the Kurdish opening?” Türk remarked.
Against this background, the first time that genuine attempts have been made by political leadership to solve the country's Kurdish problem through widening the democratic rights of all Turkish citizens has been endangered since the main political parties in the country also create a roadblock instead of facilitating the work of the government in taking steps towards Kurdish reforms.
Adding to the problem is the emergence of the Turkish public's negative sentiments toward its Kurdish citizens, whom they usually associate with the PKK. Slogans chanted accusing the fans of Diyarbakırspor (the soccer team of a Kurdish-dominated province) of being “separatists” by fans of host team Bursaspor during a soccer match last Saturday demonstrated the necessity of educating and preparing the Turkish public for Kurdish reforms. For some Turks, Kurdish reforms are wrongly perceived as opening a way for a Kurdish state.
DTP leader Türk speculated that an early election sometime next year instead of the planned 2011 elections appeared to be on the horizon in the wake of the fault lines that occurred in Turkey over the Kurdish reform issue.
In addition to Türk's remarks, there has been increased speculation that an early election appears to be unavoidable in the wake of serious roadblocks created before the Kurdish initiative.
