Alan Rebin:
Kurdistan Worker Party (PKK) declared its first unilateral ceasefire in 1993 to open way for peaceful solution of Kurdish issue. Since then the PKK has declared 8 unilateral ceasefires and called upon Ankara for negotiation. Such initiatives taken by the PKK indicates its willingness for negotiation and democratic solution, as opposed to what has been said by Turkish officials. However, there has been constant failure on the side of Turkish state to realise the strength and the power of the PKK. Turkish government has seen every single ceasefire of the PKK as the sign of the organisation’s weakness.
This is one of the problems with the Turkish officials and some circles within the state apparatus. But they should not take the PKK’s ceasefire as sings of weakness and re-evaluate their approach toward the Kurdish issue. Before the PKK’s latest attack, carried out before last night on a number of Turkish military outposts in Hakkari in which, according to Turkish officials, 26 soldiers and wounded 22, Turkey was propagating against the PKK, claiming it was weak and powerless, that is why it was calling for peace and democratic solution. But this is not the case and the PKK’s power and strength should be recognised to avoid further bloodshed.
The PKK is powerful as usual and the most influential Kurdish organisation throughout the Kurdish history. One of the best examples for the military power of the PKK is its recent attack in Hakkari in which more than 50 soldiers were killed and around 40 were wounded. Albeit, Turkish authorities claimed that only 26 were killed and 22 wounded. Many observers of the conflict know that Turkey tends to reduce the number of casualty to conceal their defeat. Between 26 or 50 dead… however… the question is, if the PKK was weak, according to Turkish allegation, how it could inflict such a suffering on the Turkish army, the second largest one in the world after the United States’?!
Following the military shock in Hakkari, Turkish Prime Minister cancelled his foreign trip and the Turkish president warned to take ‘great revenge” against the PKK. News of ground operation and military incursion to south Kurdistan resurfaced. But what would happen if Turkish army cross the border hoping to liquidate the PKK and clear them off from Qandil Mountains. Would such dream ever come true? Have not they embarked on such perilous initiatives before? Why then they want to try something proved fruitless previously? It still goes back to the same thing; there is constant failure to recognise the power of the PKK in the region and the extent to which the party has organised the masses of the people in all parts of Kurdistan as well as Kurdish Diaspora.
They should realise that the PKK is not exclusively the guerrillas who reside in Qandil Mountains. As the Turkish journalist Hasan Jamal, who recently travelled to Qandil Mountains said, “The PKK is not only the PKK… the PKK means municipalities, the PKK means the civil societies… the PKK means the TV and the newspapers in the region… the PKK means politics”. Hasan Jamal is quite right and there is something behind his message that Turkish state should admit, which is, The PKK is the Kurdish people… Hence when the PKK declare ceasefire and call upon Ankara for a peaceful solution of Kurdish issue, it should not be taken as a sign of weakness. If the PKK was weak how it could inflict such suffering on the NATO second largest army in Hakkari?