Kurdish Propaganda And Patriotism

[Kampfbaer]

How the PKK Operates in Europe
By Philipp Wittrock in Berlin

While the PKK concentrates on non-violent activities and propaganda work in Germany and Europe, in Turkey it is involved in a violent struggle for an autonomous Kurdish homeland. The kidnapping of three German tourists has put the issue firmly back on the political agenda in Berlin.

"Germany has declared war on the PKK. We can fight back. Every Kurd is a potential suicide bomber." These combative words were spoken by Abdullah Öcalan, head of the Kurdish Workers Party (PKK) back in 1996, three years after the group had been banned in Germany.

Öcalan soon watered down his statement: The PKK only wanted to fight Turks in Germany, not Germans, he said. Nevertheless the banning of the Kurdish separatist group was still interpreted as a declaration of war. It was a sign that Berlin had chosen Turkey's side in the Kurdish conflict that had been raging since the early 1980s.

The Kurdish terror campaign in Germany of the early 1990s, with its arson attacks, self-immolations, the blocking of motorways and storming of Turkish consulates may now be a thing of the bloody past. And PKK supporters in Europe may also have become a lot less militant following the arrest of Öcalan in 1999, but the movement is still kept under strict survaillance by German intelligence agencies.

http://www.spiegel.de/international/world/0,1518,565298,00.html

PKK Calls on Berlin to End 'Hostile Policy'

http://www.spiegel.de/international/world/0,1518,565110,00.html

[4X4Driver]

How the PKK Operates in Europe
By Philipp Wittrock in Berlin

While the PKK concentrates on non-violent activities and propaganda work in Germany and Europe, in Turkey it is involved in a violent struggle for an autonomous Kurdish homeland. The kidnapping of three German tourists has put the issue firmly back on the political agenda in Berlin.

"Germany has declared war on the PKK. We can fight back. Every Kurd is a potential suicide bomber." These combative words were spoken by Abdullah Öcalan, head of the Kurdish Workers Party (PKK) back in 1996, three years after the group had been banned in Germany.

Öcalan soon watered down his statement: The PKK only wanted to fight Turks in Germany, not Germans, he said. Nevertheless the banning of the Kurdish separatist group was still interpreted as a declaration of war. It was a sign that Berlin had chosen Turkey's side in the Kurdish conflict that had been raging since the early 1980s.

The Kurdish terror campaign in Germany of the early 1990s, with its arson attacks, self-immolations, the blocking of motorways and storming of Turkish consulates may now be a thing of the bloody past. And PKK supporters in Europe may also have become a lot less militant following the arrest of Öcalan in 1999, but the movement is still kept under strict survaillance by German intelligence agencies.

http://www.spiegel.de/international/world/0,1518,565298,00.html

PKK Calls on Berlin to End 'Hostile Policy'

http://www.spiegel.de/international/world/0,1518,565110,00.html


...and?? what are YOUR thoughts?

[Excalibur]

Unfortunately terror and violence is the only thing Turkey (and other countries that claim kurdistan's territory) have left in hands of kurds by suppressing any political activity and freedom of expressing anything that sounds like national self-determination. I think the independent Kurdistan is only the matter of time and for Turkey the best way to solve Kurdistan's problem is to open dialog with Kurds (not with PKK terrorists). It's stupid to tell that all Kurds are terrorists just because they want independent state on their own land.

[Mackie]

That Turkish war on terror failed?
The conditions in Eastern Turkey are some levels under the western parts.
Unemployment and poverty are perfect for the PKK. People losing the faith in the republic. Expamples are Eastern Germany and Europe after 1990. Racism and violence are above-average.
If everything failed around you it's difficult to believe in the government.
Would you?

[4X4Driver]

Well.. the article posted is about the pkk terrorists asking the German authorities for a deal in return with immunity for the Germans from the terror attacks on them. The question is; will the German authorities make a such deal with the pkk terrorists for an immunity for the Germans or not. If they do, it'll be a sad day in the name of WOT, but at the same time German auth. will loose the right to expect other nations' cooperation on the war against the terrorists which they consider as terorists and others don't....it'll just set an example.



Unfortunately terror and violence is the only thing Turkey (and other countries that claim kurdistan's territory) have left in hands of kurds by suppressing any political activity and freedom of expressing anything that sounds like national self-determination. I think the independent Kurdistan is only the matter of time and for Turkey the best way to solve Kurdistan's problem is to open dialog with Kurds (not with PKK terrorists). It's stupid to tell that all Kurds are terrorists just because they want independent state on their own land.

It would be a vital mistake to bring in all the kurds in Turkey and the ones in N. Iraq by assuming pkk is the represennetive for all of them. They're reps of the kurds as much as AQ reps all the muslims in the world. Their aim is totally different than what they say in order to win the symphathy of the west. There has been quite a lot developments regarding the kurdish issue of Turkey in the past 10 years or so (pkk even has their political wing in the Turkish parliament) but the terror just hasn't ended, instead it escalades...so their aim is not the so called human rights for the kurds.

[Hollis]

How about you two staying on Topic.


Also I would not suggest someone advocating support for the PKK.

[Ulytau]

First about language many countries in the World using offical language about education

Two days ago there was an American Woman who expert about terror organizations was giving brifing about PKKs economical sources ''if i remember true she was saying they doing similar thing with FARC drugs etc..''

Today just another news;

Switzerland Federal Police start to follow 6 deputies cause they will have connection with the PKK..Also their report saying;
They did many sabotage etc in Switzerland..They takin tribute from the workers life mafia and PKK is the secret threat for Switzerland Jürg Bühler says (He is vice chairman of the Switzerlands Secret Information Service)

And Germany ban Roj Tv and started invertigation about their production''Viko Production'' when PKK supporters start to protest this issues German Security Forces wont let em carryin terrorist leader posters and emblem..(same time they wanted to do same thing in Basel and Switzerland Security Forces wont let em)

If we turn to economical issues when goverment launched new economical program ''Also businessmen of the Turkiye visited region too'' and their supporters start to blame this program when they speakin about the Village names at region..

[SoSo]

The Kurds of Turkey are making all Kurds look bad by engaging in terrorism. I'm a supporter of an independent Kurdistan, carved out of northern Iraq. And I wish the Turks would just give their Kurds some autonomy so they would be satisfied and this campaign would end. I hate to see two US allies fighting each other. But for the Kurds or anyone else to employ terrorist tactics, no matter how just their cause, is a vile and unforgivable crime.

[deli_dumrul]

Unfortunately terror and violence is the only thing Turkey (and other countries that claim kurdistan's territory) have left in hands of kurds by suppressing any political activity and freedom of expressing anything that sounds like national self-determination.


What a dumb argument. I guess Gandhi should have blown up sh*t instead... Or Turks should have terrorized Bulgaria during the Zhivkov regime.


I think the independent Kurdistan is only the matter of time

If you are referring to the kurdistan in this map, it won't happen. It is much more likely all the other states on this map will be a reality before a kurdistan on Turkish lands.

http://i237.photobucket.com/albums/ff163/deli_dumrul/n1045169915_32431_6470.jpg

Tigris and Euphrates will be more important than oil in a couple of decades.

http://www.wired.com/science/planetearth/magazine/16-05/ff_peakwater

The water card has already been used against Syria to extradite the PKK leader.

[deli_dumrul]

The Kurdish terror campaign in Germany of the early 1990s, with its arson attacks, self-immolations, the blocking of motorways and storming of Turkish consulates may now be a thing of the bloody past.

Those rebels...



Kurdish rebels say they can hit German targets: report

15 hours ago

ANKARA (AFP) — The rebel Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK), which last week kidnapped three Germans in Turkey, said Sunday it was "strong enough" to hit German economic targets, an agency close to the group reported.

The group also renewed a call on Berlin to end "hostile" policies towards the group in return for the release of three climbers, kidnapped in the east of the country.

A PKK statement, carried by the Firat news agency, singled out Chancellor Angela Merkel's government as the target of the hostage-taking, saying that the group had no ill feelings against Germany as a nation.

"Had we had (such feelings) we could have inflicted greater damage to German economic interests in Turkey... We are strong enough to inflict such damage," it said.

"The Merkel government, together with the Turkish government, must give up sacrificing the Kurdish people's freedom struggle in the name of certain economic interests," it added.

On Tuesday, the PKK seized three Germans in the eastern province of Agri, who were part of a tourist group climbing Mount Ararat, believed to be the final resting place of the Biblical Noah's Ark.

The rebels said they would keep the hostages unless Berlin ended a crackdown on PKK militants and their supporters in Germany, which is home to about 2.4 million immigrants from Turkey, including about 600,000 Kurds.

Last month, German authorities banned the Danish-based Roj TV from broadcasting in the country because it promoted the PKK.
They also also ordered the closure of a production house that supplied the channel with programming.

In an interview with Germany's Bild newspaper Sunday, Merkel issued a personal appeal for the immediate release of the hostages, saying that Berlin would not allow itself to be blackmailed.

And earlier this week, Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier rejected demands for a change of policy towards the PKK in exchange for the hostages' freedom.

Turkish paramilitary troops have launched a sweep to rescue the three men and Mount Ararat has been was declared off-limits until further notice.

The PKK, listed as a terrorist organisation by Ankara, the European Union and the United States, has been fighting for self-rule in Turkey's Kurdish-majority east and southeast since 1984. The conflict has claimed more than 37,000 lives.

The group has in the past kidnapped people, among them soldiers, police officers and tourists, but it is not a tactic it frequently employs.

http://afp.google.com/article/ALeqM5hhLRx2AUWN1p0Ks57167NpTTUh5w

[The Balkan]

What a dumb argument. I guess Gandhi should have blown up sh*t instead... Or Turks should have terrorized Bulgaria during the Zhivkov regime.



If you are referring to the kurdistan in this map, it won't happen. It is much more likely all the other states on this map will be a reality before a kurdistan on Turkish lands.

http://i237.photobucket.com/albums/ff163/deli_dumrul/n1045169915_32431_6470.jpg

Tigris and Euphrates will be more important than oil in a couple of decades.

http://www.wired.com/science/planetearth/magazine/16-05/ff_peakwater

The water card has already been used against Syria to extradite the PKK leader.

Republika Srpska and the even more laughable Herceg-Bosna ...over our collective 2 million+ dead bodies, you feel me?

So nah, it's not more likely my friend.

[Bro Jangles]

Republika Srpska and the even more laughable Herceg-Bosna ...over our collective 2 million+ dead bodies, you feel me?

So nah, it's not more likely my friend.
your 1,999,999 homies may not like you talking for them.

[The Balkan]

your 1,999,999 homies may not like you talking for them.

I'll worry about my homies, you worry about yours :)

[Mackie]

Those rebels...

http://afp.google.com/article/ALeqM5hhLRx2AUWN1p0Ks57167NpTTUh5w

Really believe that Kurdish terror can be successful in Germany?

2.4 million turkish immigrants, 600.000 kurds.
Why do they emmigrate to Germany? And why are 85% of them uneducated?
I always wondering how you can claim Kurdish loyality while the Kurdish inhabited territory is the poor. Young unemployed angry men are a gift to the PKK.
Nobody here supports the PKK. But attacking them by military is a no ending job as long as the Kurds have no perspective to reach the education standards and rights like the Turks in the western regions.

BTW:
It's hard to find a Turk which don't call the Kurds "Mountain-Turks" with a touch of racism.
I don't know how it is in the western of Turkey but German Turks are bit anti-kurdish. Perhaps are Tukish "NAZI like" groups like the Grey Wolfes are a reason?
So I am a bit interested if this is only a phenomenom in Germany.

[multani]

2.4 million turkish immigrants, 600.000 kurds.
Why do they emmigrate to Germany? And why are 85% of them uneducated?

Maybe becuz Germany ASKED for them after the War? And maybe becuz German WANTED uneducated workers?



I always wondering how you can claim Kurdish loyality while the Kurdish inhabited territory is the poor. Young unemployed angry men are a gift to the PKK.
Nobody here supports the PKK. But attacking them by military is a no ending job as long as the Kurds have no perspective to reach the education standards and rights like the Turks in the western regions.

BTW:
It's hard to find a Turk which don't call the Kurds "Mountain-Turks" with a touch of racism.
I don't know how it is in the western of Turkey but German Turks are bit anti-kurdish. Perhaps are Tukish "NAZI like" groups like the Grey Wolfes are a reason?
So I am a bit interested if this is only a phenomenom in Germany.

For a Turk living in Germany i can ensure u noone calls the Kurds "Mountain-Turks" here. The relationship between Turks and Kurds here is the same as in Turkey. As far as a Kurd doesn't presents himself as a PKK syphatisan, we are fine...

[Basillicus]

I think their cause is just, but the methods are totally wrong. If they want to show the world they can take care of themselves and survive as an independent state letting this terrorist scum run around freely isn't going to work.

[Mackie]

Maybe becuz Germany ASKED for them after the War? And maybe becuz German WANTED uneducated workers?

So you agree that Turkey don't care about their Eastern territories since the 60's?



For a Turk living in Germany i can ensure u noone calls the Kurds "Mountain-Turks" here.
rofl

[4X4Driver]

Really believe that Kurdish terror can be successful in Germany?

Recognization of PKK as a terror organization by the German authorities and taking actions against them is a pretty recent thing...and the consequences of it surfacing now by the actions of this terror organization (starting with kidnapping Germans) So, if Germany bowes to these terror threats, sure...it won't happen again and the PKK terror (note that I'm not generalizing all kurds by calling it a "kurdish terror" like you) will not continue in Germany..which will mean a success for them.

Even this generalization of them by you tells us how much you actually know about the situation..



2.4 million turkish immigrants,

actually...most of the immigrants (guest workers) were from the east and South eastern Turkey...for the exact reason to give the poorer parts of the country the first priority...there is nothing wrong with that. Ther reasons of "why they were poorer than the rest of the counrty" can also be dicussed.



600.000 kurds.
Why do they emmigrate to Germany? And why are 85% of them uneducated?


I always wondering how you can claim Kurdish loyality while the Kurdish inhabited territory is the poor. Young unemployed angry men are a gift to the PKK.

Lack of knowledge is behind all this wondering. It's true the kurdish inhabited territories poorer than the western parts, but knowing the fact that their constant attempts for separation since the invasion of Turkey by Entente powers at the end of WWI, made Turkish gov'ts thorugh ot the history reluctant on investing as much as they did to western parts. But all this is not an excuse for terrorism since there are other parts in Turkey as poor as the kurdish inhabitad areas and they don't see terror as a way out. Turkey has seen the mistakes made before and in the lats ten years or so, gave the priority to SE parts for development... but the continuing terror despite of these efforts makes it very difficult..seems like nothing pleases them.



Nobody here supports the PKK. But attacking them by military is a no ending job as long as the Kurds have no perspective to reach the education standards and rights like the Turks in the western regions.
BTW:
It's hard to find a Turk which don't call the Kurds "Mountain-Turks" with a touch of racism.
I don't know how it is in the western of Turkey but German Turks are bit anti-kurdish. Perhaps are Tukish "NAZI like" groups like the Grey Wolfes are a reason?
So I am a bit interested if this is only a phenomenom in Germany.



I'm aware that it's difficult to convince someone who has personal motivations for taking sides and has been a target of one sided propaganda. The info you're puting out shows how intensive they've been on you with their propaganda. In Turkey no one calls the kurds as "mountain Turks" That was first mentioned by a coup general in 80's and no one bought it...kurd is a kurd in Turkey and they're attached to the country by a citizenship. The citizens of this country are called "Turkish". Turkey is made out of up to a dozen different ethnicities...but only PKK is killing innocent ppl of Turkey in the name of "kurdishness"(kurdish identity)..and selling this to you as their "human rights"...I call this the true racism.

So...the info I'm going to put out is not to convince you..but for others who are not directly influenced by the PKK propaganda. By knowing the profile of this terror organization and their goals, they should be able to draw their own conclution...of course I mean those who already don't have any prejudist feeling againts the Turks in general for one or another reason and support the "kurdish cause" anyways.

You should also be able to find some answers to your questions..such as i.e "education rigths" and who is actually behind the "anti kurdish" sentiments/actions in your country and in Europe.


Before Al-Qaeda’s fanatics were blowing themselves up in Iraq, members of Abdullah Ocalan’s Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) were terrorizing Turkey in the 1990s. According to Yoram Schweitzer from the Institute for Counter-Terrorism in Herzliya, Israel, between 1996 and 1999, the PKK carried out 16 suicide bomb attacks (plus 5 failed attacks), “killing 20 people and wounding scores.” Schweitzer adds that “PKK suicide attacks were inspired and carried out on the orders of the organization’s charismatic leader Ocalan, who was perceived by the members of his organization as a ‘Light to the Nations.’” Ocalan, also known as Apo, sees himself as a model to be emulated. “Everyone should take note of the way I live and what I don’t do” he told the [I]Turkish Daily News in 1998. “The way I eat, the way I drink, my orders and even my inactivity should be carefully studied. There will be lessons to be learned from several generations because Apo (Ocalan) is a great teacher.” (mhtml:mid://00000620/#_edn2) Like a teacher, Ocalan enjoyed lessons, except he favored bloody ones: in the 1980s, the PKK slaughtered the inhabitants of Kurdish villages in southeastern Turkey who were unsympathetic to its cause in order to coerce other nearby villages into submission. In August 20, 1987 the PKK killed 24 inhabitants of the Kilickaya village of Turkey’s Siirt province, including 14 children. The lesson to the villages around Kilickaya was clear: “either you join Apo or you are dead.”

Beginnings: From Peasant Kid to Peasant Killer
How did Abdullah Ocalan, a simple peasant from Turkey’s southeastern Sanliurfa province, turn into a mass killer? The answer to this question lies in Turkey’s leftist movement in the 1970s. At the time, Ocalan was studying in Ankara, at the capital’s prestigious School of Political Science, Mulkiye, where most of the country’s diplomats were trained. A poor Kurd from rural Turkey attending Mulkiye would have been the best proof to Turkey’s integrative powers across class and ethnic lines. This would also have demonstrated the means of upwards mobility available to anyone in Turkey. Yet Ocalan hardly developed a regard for such integrative mechanisms. Instead, under the influence of Marxist-Leninist ideology popular at Mulkiye and other Ankara universities, he became persuaded that nothing around him was good enough because it was capitalist and imperialist. Ocalan aimed for a revolution to fix the perceived problems resulting from capitalism, and years later was quoted telling the PKK cadres, “You must believe before everything else that the revolution must come, that there is no other choice.”[iii] (mhtml:mid://00000620/#_edn3)

Even though the burgeoning Marxist-Leninist movement in Ankara did promote revolution through violence, as a committed Maoist the peasant kid from southeastern Turkey did not quite feel at home in Ankara. The capital’s leftist literati appeared too soft for Ocalan, whose weltanschauung was shaped by his patriarchal upbringing and the orthodox ways of Shafii Islam in Turkey’s Kurdish southeast. Rural feudal values and a Maoist obsession with the peasantry determined Ocalan’s politics, causing him to drop out of Mulkiye in 1978.

The First Enemy: Other Kurds
Ocalan’s Marxist-Leninism with its Maoist twist had no patience for other leftist terror groups, even Kurdish ones. Ocalan saw rural southeastern Turkey as his domain and the bedrock of a future Marxist-Leninist-Maoist Kurdish state. Conveniently, Ocalan branded all his Kurdish rivals as fascists and acted to eliminate them. In the late 1970s, the PKK decimated various leftist groups in eastern Turkey, including the Revolutionary Unity of the People (Devrimci Halkin Birligi), the Liberation of the People (Halkin Kurtulusu), the Revolutionary Democratic Cultural Association (DDKD), and the National Liberation of Kurdistan (KUK). Ocalan crushed not only violent groups but also peaceful Kurdish political parties, including Kemal Burkay’s Kurdistan Socialist Party (PSK), effectively ending the hopes for peaceful political action among the Kurds.

Ocalan’s lack of tolerance also extended to opposition inside the PKK. Not surprisingly, the group referred to itself as the “Apocus” (Apoists), emphasizing Ocalan’s central role in shaping the PKK’s identity and destiny.

Once he had eliminated all opposition from other Kurdish groups and within the PKK, Ocalan focused on “state collaborators” – Kurds who identified with Turkey. In 1979, PKK rose to national prominence when it assassinated Mehmet Celal Bucak, a well-known conservative Kurdish politician and a wealthy landowner in eastern Turkey, condemning him as someone who “exploited the peasants.” [viii] (mhtml:mid://00000620/#_edn8) It would soon become the PKK’s practice to attack all Kurds who were loyal to Turkey.

http://www.frontpagemag.com/Articles/Read.aspx?GUID=90D190FF-22E4-4784-989D-65B234C5E198



After training in PLO-run international terrorist camps in Lebanon, the PKK opened its military campaign against the Turkish state in 1984, largely from its secure bases in Syria. By 1990-93 it was able to take advantage of the post-Gulf War environment (specifically, the power vacuum created by the [I]de facto creation of an autonomous Iraqi Kurdistan), and it became a real threat to Turkey’s territorial integrity. The PKK engaged in a massive rural insurgency in southeastern Turkey, which, by 1999, resulted in some 30,000 fatalities. These deaths were mostly insurgents, civilians and anti-PKK village guards -- and almost all were Kurds. Indeed, far more Kurdish civilians havebeen killed by the PKK than Turks, some as reprisals for suspected collaboration with Ankara, others during clashes with rival clans. Kurds in Europe and Lebanon who disagreed with Öcalan were murdered. Throughout the 1990s the PKK in Iraq enjoyed Saddam’s support and regularly engaged in clashes with local Kurdish forces.
At its Fifth Congress the PKK decided to engage in suicide bombings and, by 1997, the group had formed “Suicide Guerrilla Teams.” The early “volunteers” came from the most vulnerable segments of society: young, impoverished, poorly educated women. The group’s ambitions went even further: in November 1996, thirteen PKK members arrested on the Syrian border with the Hatay Province were found to possess antimony, which they thought was uranium.
PKK operations in Western Europe are led by relatively well-educated people. They enjoy support from governments and groups in Western countries (Germany, Benelux, Scandinavian states), local governments such as the Basques in Spain, prominent individuals and member parties of government coalitions in Italy, France, Russia, and Greece, and most of the remnants of Germany’s and Italy’s Marxist terrorists. These latter occasionally participated (and were killed or captured) in PKK combat operations.
In addition to its key role in PKK propaganda and political support, Europe was and still is the major source of PKK funding. European assessments of the PKK’s income generally placed it at between $200 and $500 million a year for the mid-1990s. The German government has asserted that the PKK collects millions of deutsche marks at its annual fundraising events, and some sources have estimated PKK’s annual income from these along with drug trafficking, robberies, extortion, and emigrant and arms smuggling at $86 million (U.S.). Considering the range of PKK drug trafficking in Europe (Germany, France, Denmark, Romania, Switzerland, Belgium, Netherlands), the group is wealthy indeed. None of thisdissuaded such self-proclaimed “human rights” militants as Danielle Mitterand, the radical widow of former French president, from addressing Öcalan as “Dear President Öcalan” in a 1998 letter which ended with: “Looking forward to an initial result, rest assured, Abdullah, that I am committed to be beside you in the bid for peace, Sincerely yours, Danielle Mitterand.”

http://frontpagemag.com/Articles/Read.aspx?GUID=282E3683-BBCA-4DA2-B719-F57AA5D7742B


The second angle in the fight against the group “entails confronting the PKK directly in northern Iraq. Many have questioned whether force is the only option in that arena. In the wake of Turkey’s EU reforms—…Kurds can now attend classes and listen to news programs in their own language, an unthinkable development as recently as a few years ago—some expected that the PKK might hear the voice of reason and renounce violence. Yet, the organization seems incapable of such change. [Ocalan and his cadres] are steeped in a culture of violence.”[xxxix] (mhtml:mid://00000620/#_edn39) Just as in the 1980s and 1990s, the organization has resorted to every imaginable form of violence, “today, it uses violence in an effort to pull Turkey into a political maelstrom and derail EU accession. In this context, the group’s declared ceasefires mean little—the PKK will not abandon terrorism of its own volition.

http://www.frontpagemag.com/articles/Read.aspx?GUID=7EA8CDE0-E829-4DCC-AA5E-D8309B6EA227