Identifier
Created
Classification
Origin
05ANKARA929
2005-02-18 09:41:00
CONFIDENTIAL
Embassy Ankara
Cable title:  

EX-MILITANTS CLAIM KONGRA-GEL "PEACEFUL"

Tags:  PGOV PREL PHUM OSCE TU 
pdf how-to read a cable
P 180941Z FEB 05
FM AMEMBASSY ANKARA
TO SECSTATE WASHDC PRIORITY 4302
INFO EUROPEAN POLITICAL COLLECTIVE
CIA WASHDC
DIA WASHDC
JOINT STAFF WASHDC//J-3/J-5//
NSC WASHDC
ODC ANKARA TU//TCH//
SECDEF WASHDC
TLO ANKARA TU
TSR ANKARA TU
USDAO ANKARA TU
CDR USEUCOM VAIHINGEN GE
C O N F I D E N T I A L ANKARA 000929 


DEPARTMENT FOR EUR/SE

E.O. 12958: DECL: 02/18/2015
TAGS: PGOV PREL PHUM OSCE TU
SUBJECT: EX-MILITANTS CLAIM KONGRA-GEL "PEACEFUL"

REF: 04 ANKARA 6994

Classified By: Classified by Polcouns John Kunstadter; reasons 1.4 b and d.

C O N F I D E N T I A L ANKARA 000929


DEPARTMENT FOR EUR/SE

E.O. 12958: DECL: 02/18/2015
TAGS: PGOV PREL PHUM OSCE TU
SUBJECT: EX-MILITANTS CLAIM KONGRA-GEL "PEACEFUL"

REF: 04 ANKARA 6994

Classified By: Classified by Polcouns John Kunstadter; reasons 1.4 b and d.


1. (C) Summary: A group of ex-convict PKK militants faxed a
letter to the Embassy making reference to the January
U.S.-Turkey-Iraq talks on the PKK and claiming that the PKK
successor organization Kongra-Gel seeks a peaceful solution
to its conflict with the Turkish State. Officials from the
pro-Kurdish Democracy People's Party (DEHAP) asserted to us
they had not seen the letter -- though it was faxed from
DEHAP headquarters -- but said DEHAP shares the Group's
goals. The DEHAP leaders insisted the party has no links
with the PKK. They said DEHAP, which faces separatism
charges, seeks greater political rights and
cultural/linguistic freedoms for Kurds within Turkey.
DEHAP's continued association with the PKK limits the party's
influence and may lead to its closure. End Summary.

--------------
Letter Claims Kongra-Gel "Peaceful"
--------------


2. (U) A PKK-related organization called the "Peaceful and
Democratic Solution Group" in January faxed a letter to the
Embassy claiming that "Kongra-Gel," the latest iteration of
the PKK, seeks a peaceful solution to its conflict with the
Turkish State. The one-page letter, in Kurdish, is addressed
to the governments of the United States, Iraq, and Turkey,
and makes reference to the January trilateral talks on the
PKK. In the letter, the Group maintains that the "Kurdish
question" is a regional, rather than a Turkey-specific,
issue. It states that the fighting in Iraq and the
Arab-Israeli conflict are creating tension in the region, and
that the Kurds want to help establish peace and stability.
The authors claim that Kongra-Gel has long sought a peaceful
resolution to the conflict in southeastern Turkey, which is
why the organization declared a unilateral cease-fire in

1999. "It has shown over the past six years that it wants a
peaceful and democratic solution within the integrity of
Turkey," states the letter.

--------------
DEHAP Defends Substance of Letter
--------------

3 (U) DEHAP President Tuncer Bakirhan asserted to us he had
not seen the letter, though it was faxed from DEHAP

headquarters. He acknowledged that he had met with the
Group, whose members are former PKK militants who turned
themselves in and have been released after serving their time
in prison. The Group has 25 members, 19 of whom have been
released from prison; it has no headquarters. Both Bakirhan
and Tayyip Yildiz, president of the DEHAP Adana branch,
claimed to us that the Group is not associated with DEHAP,
although both organizations share the goal of reaching a
peaceful resolution of the Kurdish issue. In separate
meetings, Emboff and Adana PO reminded the DEHAP officials
that the U.S. considers the PKK a terrorist organization, not
a group seeking peaceful resolution. Bakirhan and Yildiz
acknowledged the U.S. position, but insisted that the PKK --
at least the portion of it that now follows the Kongra-Gel
banner -- has forsaken violence. Yildiz speculated that
Group members were inspired to send the letter out of fear
that the trilateral talks on the PKK spelled the first step
toward an imminent U.S. military attack on the PKK, which
they believe "would not contribute to a peaceful solution of
the Kurdish problem." We challenged the Group's claim that
the PKK had held to a unilateral cease-fire over the past six
years. The PKK called an end to the cease-fire in September
2003, and, in any case, PKK attacks continued after the
supposed cease-fire was declared in 1999. Bakirhan
acknowledged that the PKK had called off the cease-fire, but
asserted that "even the Turkish Government admits" that PKK
attacks declined after 1999.

--------------
DEHAP President Denies PKK Links
--------------


4. (U) Prosecutors in 2003 charged DEHAP with operating as a
separatist organization, and the party could be closed if the
Constitutional Court rules against it. Several of DEHAP's
predecessors were closed by the State. Bakirhan, however,
averred that there are no links of any kind between the PKK
and DEHAP -- no secret communication nor covert influence.
DEHAP is a political party; the PKK is an illegal
organization. The two organizations do not share the same
methods. What they have in common is a shared grassroots --
the Kurds, particularly in the southeast -- and a shared goal
of promoting Kurdish rights.

--------------
Four-Part "Solution" to Kurdish Issue
--------------


5. (U) We pressed Bakirhan and Yildiz to define the
"solution" they seek. They insisted DEHAP is not promoting
separatism, only greater freedoms for Kurds within Turkey.
Bakirhan described what he views as the four elements of a
solution:

-- In Kurdish-majority areas of the country, Kurdish should
be the language of instruction in public schools. Turkish
would still be the official language of the country, and
students in Kurdish areas would be required to take a Turkish
course. Bakirhan dismissed the private Kurdish language
courses, recently opened as a result of EU-related reforms,
as meaningless.

-- Kurds should play a greater role in local governance in
the Kurdish-dominated southeast. Governors in Turkey are
appointed, and have more authority than elected mayors.
Bakirhan said governors should be elected. Moreover, the
requirement that a party receive 10 percent of the national
vote to enter Parliament should be eliminated; DEHAP, like
many parties, fell short of the 10 percent barrier in the
2002 elections and holds no seats in Parliament. Bakirhan
argued that the barrier should be completely eliminated. In
addition, DEHAP candidates should be allowed to campaign
without being detained by police on frivolous charges for
speaking Kurdish or "promoting separatism."

-- The State should develop the economy of the southeast,
engaging in "positive discrimination" by channeling a
significant portion of state investment to the region.

-- The State should come clean about the atrocities committed
by security forces during the PKK conflict. Mass graves
should be investigated. When we raised the issue of PKK
atrocities, Bakirhan agreed that the PKK should also
acknowledge its acts of terrorism.


6. (U) Yildiz asserted that solving the Kurdish issue will
require the GOT to enact a general amnesty for PKK militants.
He said the USG should persuade the GOT to take such a step.


7. (U) We told the DEHAP leaders that the U.S. supports the
equal rights of all individuals; we do not advocate special
"group rights." Every Turkish citizen should be free to
speak or write in his mother tongue. But educating children
in Kurdish would produce a generation of Turkish Kurds
disadvantaged by weak Turkish-language skills. Moreover, the
EU, as well as the U.S., now officially regards the PKK as a
terrorist organization, and DEHAP must distance itself from
the PKK if it wants to be taken seriously as a political
party. If DEHAP did not appear to be so closely associated
with the PKK, and if it developed a broader-based agenda and
a less ideologically leftist orientation, it might draw more
voters outside the southeast and manage to cross the 10
percent threshold for entering Parliament. Bakirhan pointed
to the establishment of a DEHAP successor party (reftel) as
an effort to address some of those issues.

--------------
Comment
--------------


8. (C) DEHAP's tacit support for this letter, despite our
continuous repetition of the U.S. position on the PKK, is yet
another indication of how the parameters of the Kurdish issue
remain unchanged despite human right-related GOT legislative
reform. DEHAP claims to represent "the Kurds" and aspires to
reach a resolution with the Turkish State over the PKK issue
and the broader question of Kurdish rights. But the party's
influence is largely limited to the southeast, and even there
its leftist orientation is alien to the generally pious
Kurdish population, a fact that the ruling AK Party managed
to exploit in the March 2004 local elections. It continues
to associate itself in various ways with the PKK, a tactic
that may cause it to be next in the line of pro-Kurdish
parties closed by the State. The State authorities,
meanwhile, continue to apply the logic that, because the PKK
advocates Kurdish language and cultural rights, anyone who
adopts such positions is a PKK member. This practice
effectively prevents alternative Kurdish voices from emerging
and renders impossible a serious dialogue on the Kurdish
issue.


EDELMAN