In both Turkey and Iraq, peace, prosperity and democracy in great part depend on whether Ankara and Baghdad can find ways to satisfactorily integrate their significant Kurdish minorities into the national political system. Since what is happening in Turkey is perhaps even more alarming than in Iraq, I will first focus on the situation in Ankara and look at the Iraqi dynamics in my column next week.On Dec. 11, the Turkish Constitutional Court voted unanimously to ban the biggest Kurdish party, the Democratic Society Party (DTP), on the grounds that it had become “a focal point for terrorism.” Two DTP deputies, including its co-chairman, Ahmet Turk, were stripped of their seats .and 37 party officials were banned. This is a familiar pattern in Turkish politics. The DTP is the fourth reincarnation of the same Kurdish party, which re-established itself under a different name each time it was banned by the Turkish Constitutional Court during the 1980s and 1990s. So, not unlike previous times, some 19 other DTP deputies said they were pulling out of Parliament with the aim of regrouping under a new label.
Yet, there are alarming signs in Turkey that this time the Kurdish frustration has reached its limit. We may not be witnessing a “business as usual” situation for a couple of reasons. First is the fact that the decision to ban the DTP came at the worst possible time. For the last year or so, the Justice and Development Party (AKP) government had significantly raised Kurdish expectations with its so-called “Kurdish overture” -- a political and legal plan to improve Kurdish cultural, political and human rights. The objective was obvious: to win the hearts and minds of Turkey’s 15 million Kurds and to end the Kurdistan Workers’ Party’s (PKK) 25-year insurgency. Instead of the democratic initiative they were promised, the Kurds have now seen their own party closed down. Managing their expectations and frustration is likely to prove much more challenging this time. The second reason the Kurdish frustration is high has to do with Abdullah Öcalan’s willingness to exploit this already dangerous situation.
As argued by The Economist: “Mr Erdoğan’s overtures -- easing restrictions on the Kurdish language, restoring Kurdish names to Kurdish villages, and reintegrating PKK fighters untainted by violence -- have spooked the terrorists, who thrive on state repression. Nobody more so than Abdullah Öcalan, the imprisoned PKK leader, who ignited the protests in early December when he claimed he had been moved to a smaller cell. ‘I can hardly breathe,’ he said, though it emerged that his quarters had barely shrunk. More reforms mean less support for the PKK. It seems that Mr Öcalan does not like being sidelined -- and he still commands the allegiance of millions of Kurds.”
It is no secret that Abdullah Öcalan wants to become the Nelson Mandela of Kurds. He wants to become a political leader and turn into the one and only counterpart of the Turkish state in terms of representing the Kurds in negotiations. Since none of these dreams is likely to become reality, he has now decided to take a bloody gamble by unleashing the PKK. Again as argued in The Economist: “He may want to blackmail the government into direct, public negotiations. He also wants to be moved from solitary confinement into house arrest. Neither demand is likely to get very far. As ever, ordinary Kurds will pay the price as support for the AK’s Kurdish reforms fizzles out. Banning the DTP has reinforced the belief of many Kurds that they can get change only through bullets, not the ballot box.” Needless to say this is not the place the AKP wanted to find itself when it began its Kurdish initiative. Under such circumstances, time will only tell if whether Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan will have the courage and wisdom to pursue democratic reforms.
