Ankara- Turkey: Ankara is expecting support from the Kurdish regional government in Southern Kurdistan (Northern Iraq) to fight against the Kurdish freedom fighters, the Turkish foreign minister said.
Turkish Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu appealed for the support of the Kurdish regional government during the visit of the Iraqi Sunni lawmakers to Ankara. He stressed the need to fight against the Kurdish resistance movement spearheaded by the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK)
“We are expecting active support from the regional administration (in northern Iraq), the foreign minister said.”
Davutoglu added that Barzani was a welcoming partner in Ankara. On trilateral efforts between U.S., Iraqi and Turkish officials on the PKK issue, the foreign minister stressed that Ankara’s “determination is continuing.”
It should be noted that recently the Turkish military operations have been escalated against the PKK and have resulted in a series of clashes with vital consequences for the Turkish Army.
The Kurdistan Worker Party (PKK) was founded in 1973 as the result of the continuous and systematic oppressions and the denial of the Kurdish nation by the occupying powers of Kurdistan. The PKK took up arm in 1984 since all the possible political and diplomatic means applied for 11 years in between 1973-84 proved exhausted. The PKK however declared its first unilateral ceasefire in 1993 since it believed the arm struggle hit its targets. Since 1993 to date the PKK has declared unilateral ceasefires in 6 different occasions and called upon Ankara to solve the Kurdish problem in a peaceful democratic procedure.
Despite the facts that the PKK has declared 6 unilateral ceasefires and also it sent peace groups in two different occasions yet the PKK is considered as a ‘terrorist’ organization by Ankara and the US. It also continues to be on the blacklist in EU despite the court ruling, which overturned the decision to place the Kurdish freedom movement on the EU’s terror list “By labelling PKK as a terrorist organisation, the EU and the US are giving the Turkey a green light to target its civilians. They give the Turkish government a free hand to do what it will, a mother of Kurdish martyr said”.
It should be noted that after 1954, apart from the Korean war, 1949-52 and the invasion of Cyprus, 1974, the Turkish Army operations have continued to be exclusively against the Kurds.