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AK Party's Bozdağ says Kurdish plan a national project
“This is a national project. The military support that became apparent during [last Thursday's] National Security Council [MGK] meeting is a strong sign of it,” Bozdağ said during a press conference on Monday.
He also stated that critics of the Kurdish initiative should stop accusing the government of treason and contribute to plans to find a way out of the decades-old question.
“They should stop looking for foreigners behind the plan. You should come with a plan for a solution instead of opposing efforts and claiming that our project is a project of treason. You should display a new stance,” Bozdağ stated yesterday. He was directly referring to Nationalist Movement Party (MHP) leader Devlet Bahçeli, who claimed last week that the Kurdish initiative is an “American project” and that everyone supporting it is guilty of treason.
“The real American project was to save [Abdullah] Öcalan [the jailed leader of the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK)] from execution. Look what happened. Öcalan was sentenced to death, and his file was sent to the Justice Ministry. The file was later transferred to the Prime Ministry. Who prevented the execution there? The MHP. They had a seven-hour deliberation then. They decided to suspend the decision at the Prime Ministry. Now Bahçeli says he does not have a signature on the decision. Here is his signature,” Bozdağ stated, pointing to a document bearing the signature of the MHP leader.
The MHP was a signatory to the law abolishing the death penalty in Turkey, passed shortly after the terrorist leader was captured in Kenya and brought to Turkey. Öcalan's death sentence was commuted to life imprisonment after the death penalty was abolished.
Bozdağ lashed out at MHP claims that the ruling party was seeing the PKK as a participant in the solution of the Kurdish problem.
“It is the MHP who saw the PKK as an interlocutor for the first and last time. In an official document, the MHP said they would execute Öcalan if the PKK staged a terrorist attack. Is this not seeing the PKK as an interlocutor?” he asked.
He also said plans to settle the Kurdish question was part of a democratization package, which stands as a national project for the government. “We are not in search of an interlocutor. Our interlocutor is the Turkish nation. Our aim is to include everyone in the solution process,” Bozdağ added.
On the other hand, Ahmet Reyiz Yılmaz, who is a candidate to become the new MHP leader, claimed that Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan was continuing with the Kurdish initiative under the guidance of Israel.
“It is surprising that policies under the name of the so-called Kurdish initiative are being carried on perfectly under the guidance of Israel. I am watching our submission and weakness in surprise,” Yılmaz said on Saturday.
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