ECONOMIST, — The latest innocent casualties of Turkey’s military escalation against the Kurds; A Tragic blunder, a cynical massacre or a deliberate attempt to undermine Turkey’s government?
The question was raised on December 28th, when Turkish F-16 war planes dropped bombs on a group of Kurdish civilians just south of the Turkish border in the mountains of Kurdish-controlled northern Iraq, killing 34 of them. Security officials in Sirnak, a Turkish town near the site, blamed a lack of co-ordination between the civilian and military authorities. “The governor [of Sirnak] had no idea what had happened until hours after the bombing,” said one.
The victims, aged between 13 and 28, were smugglers from villages in Turkey’s south-east who routinely bring in Iraqi fuel and cigarettes with the full knowledge of local authorities. Nearly 80 mules carrying the contraband also perished. In an ironic twist the smugglers belonged to the “village guards”, a pro-state militia that had taken up arms against rebels of the separatist Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK), the ostensible target of the raid.
Thousands of Kurds across the country took to the streets in protest. Selahattin Demirtas, leader of the pro-Kurdish Peace and Democracy (BDP) party, accused the government of deliberately massacring innocent civilians to intimidate his people. A huge banner calling Recep Tayyip Erdogan, Turkey’s prime minister, a “murderer” was draped across a tent in one of the smugglers’ villages.
Until recently some would have suspected a different sort of conspiracy: one carried out by coup-plotting army officers bent on discrediting the mildly Islamist Justice and Development (AK) government. Hundreds of such alleged miscreants, including around 30 serving generals, are in prison awaiting trial in connection with the so-called Ergenekon conspiracy to overthrow Mr Erdogan. This week a former chief of general staff, Ilker Basbug, was called in for interrogation over the affair. Rumours abound that he too will be jailed.
Yet Mr Erdogan has rushed to the defence of the current chief of general staff, Necdet Ozel, thanking him for his pledge to pay compensation to the families of the Sirnak victims. A flurry of investigative probes are under way, but no heads have yet rolled. Mr Erdogan has not visited the victims’ families, nor has he apologised for the deaths. He has, moreover, suggested that the group may have been targeted on the assumption that there were rebels and guns concealed in their midst. Smugglers usually travel in groups of three or four, he said, not 40. In 2010 the army was pilloried when news emerged that it had failed to prevent two deadly attacks on Turkish troops in the same area, even though images from unmanned drones had clearly shown the presence of large numbers of PKK rebels along the border. “[T]he prime minister is saying, ‘It’s OK to kill innocent civilians if there are some bad guys in the mix,’” observes Sezgin Tanrikulu, a deputy from the opposition Republican People’s Party (CHP).
Such claims may be exaggerated, but Mr Erdogan has certainly become a lot tougher on the Kurds. Thousands of pro-Kurdish activists, including serving BDP mayors, journalists and lawyers, have been jailed in recent months as part of a campaign to cripple the PKK. The army has intensified its operations inside Turkey and northern Iraq, killing hundreds of rebels, including senior commanders. Last summer secret talks between the government and the PKK, including its imprisoned leader, Abdullah Ocalan, broke down. Mr Ocalan has been denied access to his lawyers, most of whom are now in jail, in violation of international conventions on the treatment of detainees. The Council of Europe is expected to issue an official complaint in the coming weeks.
Sources close to the PKK admit that the military campaign has left it weakened. The rebels’ traditional backers, Iran and Syria, are bogged down in their own troubles. Some think the PKK could even be forced back to the negotiating table. This in turn could pave the way for Mr Erdogan to launch his long-promised new democratic constitution, which would properly embrace the Kurds for the first time in modern Turkish history. For now, however, apologising for the Sirnak killings and punishing those responsible would be a good start.
http://www.economist.com/node/21542459