TURKEY: GROWING PESSIMISM AMONG KURDS IN SOUTHEAST

C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 03 ANKARA 001468

SIPDIS

DEPARTMENT ALSO FOR EUR/SE

E.O. 12958: DECL: 10/09/2019
TAGS: PGOV PHUM PREL OSCE TU
SUBJECT: TURKEY: GROWING PESSIMISM AMONG KURDS IN SOUTHEAST
ABOUT "THE OPENING"

REF: A. ANKARA 1339

B. ANKARA 1295

C. ADANA 55

Classified By: Adana Principal Officer Daria Darnell for reasons 1.4(b,
d)

This is a Consulate Adana cable.


1. (C) Summary: During a recent eight-day tour around
southeast Turkey, we found Kurds throughout the region
expressing growing doubt that the Government of Turkey is
sincere about its "Democratic Opening." Many view it as the
AK Party's (AKP) tactic to attract Kurdish voters after
losing Kurdish support in the March 2009 local elections.
The Kurds we met focused on four issues for the GOT to
address -- a cessation of the Turkish military operations,
constitutional amendments, amnesty for the PKK and broader
use of Kurdish language -- and emphatically expressed their
wish for a U.S. role in the process. End summary.

AKP Trying to Attract Voters for Early Elections?
-------------- --------------


2. (C) Adana Principal Officer, Adana LES Political
Assistant and Ankara Political Counselor visited Diyarbakir,
Van, Agri, Dogubayazit, Yuksekova, Hakkari, Mus, Bingol,
Tunceli, Bitlis, Elazig and Malatya in an eight-day blitz
that began September 24. We found a broad range of Kurdish
politicians, businessmen and lawyers openly pessimistic
about whether the GOT's "Democratic Opening" will result in
changes to the lives of Kurds in southeast Turkey. They fear
the government will, in the words of a former CHP member of
Parliament from Hakkari, "keep on talking and debating the
issue, but they will never do anything about it." Most noted
the CHP and MHP's strong opposition to the Opening and said
PM Erdogan may be backing away from his previous support for
a Kurdish initiative, citing Erdogan's use of the term
"Democratic Opening" instead of "Kurdish Initiative" as proof
of the lack of political will. Several local officials also
cited contradictory statements and actions from the Turkish
government and the Turkish state (i.e., its civil, judicial
and security institutions). While the GOT discusses the
expansion of Kurdish-language broadcasting, for example,
legal cases continue against the mayor of Diyarbakir and
other politicians for speaking Kurdish. Despite their
concerns, Kurds continue to hope for greater democratic
rights and to support PM Erdogan. As the president of the
Van Young Businessmen's Association told us, "as long as
Erdogan is behind a solution, we are behind Erdogan."


3. (C) Several of our contacts, including the mayor of
Diyarbakir, the deputy mayor of Hakkari and the mayor of
Elazig, told us they expect the GOT to declare early
elections in 2010, using the continual promise of the
Democratic Opening and Kurdish language and education rights
to attract Kurdish voters from the DTP to the AKP. The
Elazig mayor (who is a member of AKP) said he expected the
AKP convention on October 3 to include discussion of plans
for early elections. Kurdish contacts told us they support
the GOT's Democratic Opening but doubted it would cause
significant defection from DTP to AKP. As the former
president of the Mus Bar Association explained, "The Kurdish
people are politicized from childhood, and we will not be
deceived by government promises."

Kurds' Four Main Concerns
--------------


4. (C) In contrast to our trip in southeast Turkey in
August (REF B),when our question "What do you want from the
Kurdish initiative?" was answered with a laundry list of
demands big and small, our Kurdish interlocutors on this trip
focused on four priorities:


A. Turkish Armed Forces (TAF)'s operations in southeast
Turkey must end. Our interlocutors generally cited this as
the most important step for the GOT to take.

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B. Changes to the Turkish Constitution are essential. The
Constitution, they argued, must protect the rights of ethnic
minorities and religions in Turkey. There was no general
agreement among Kurds we met with, however, regarding whether
the rights of Kurds must be granted specifically in the
Constitution, or whether a general statement guaranteeing the
rights of all minorities would be better. Lawyers we met
generally favored a broad statement of equal rights, while
politicians favored specific language relating to Kurds.


C. The use of Kurdish language must be permitted in a wider
range of activities, to include Kurdish-language education in
primary schools. The GOT's permission for a "Living
Languages Institute" at Mardin Artuklu University was praised
(Note: Istanbul University will also have a Kurdology
Institute),but the former president of Tunceli's Bar
Association pointed out Dicle University's request to
establish a Kurdish language department was denied, and the
university in Tunceli was advised informally not to make a
request at this time. Bar associations in Hakkari, Mus,
Diyarbakir and Tunceli also reported to us that the Ministry
of Justice's recent decree allowing prisoners to speak
Kurdish with family members -- a policy they told us has been
implemented smoothly -- as an example of a positive GOT step
expanding language rights.


D. PKK members must receive amnesty. As with the
constitutional changes, Kurds we spoke with had a wide range
of opinions about the extent of the amnesty, from the
insistence of the acting mayor of Dogubeyazit that PKK leader
Abdullah Ocalan receive amnesty to the measured comments of
Hakkari's deputy mayor, who told us amnesty for Ocalan and
many of the PKK leadership would be politically impossible
and recommended instead more comfortable prison conditions
for Ocalan. Most alarming were the almost identical comments
from city council members in Yuksekova and Dogubeyazit, who
said that PKK members should not have to ask the GOT for
forgiveness -- that instead the GOT should ask for
forgiveness from the Kurds.

The View from the State
--------------


5. (C) Turkish government officials such as governors and
sub-governors were generally supportive of Kurdish demands
for greater language and education rights and hoped peace and
stability would bring economic development. They were
equally committed to the GOT's fight against the PKK and said
the PKK must lay down its arms before any cessation of TAF
military operations (with one notable exception: the governor
of Hakkari, Muammer Turker, told us the TAF could perhaps
limit their operations). Turker also described PKK pressure
on voters in the March 2009 local elections and attributed
some of the DTP's gains to that pressure, citing the
inability of other parties' candidates even to campaign in
the province. The sub-governor of Dogubayazit told us in his
opinion "The DTP and PKK are the same." (Note: Adana
Security Assistant, who was on the trip to make contacts in
the Turkish National Police, reported deep unease in the TNP
with the Democratic Opening and complete opposition to any
type of amnesty for the PKK. End Note)

Where Is the U.S.?
--------------


6. (C) Virtually every Kurdish interlocutor (quite a few of
whom have spent time in prison) urged a greater U.S. role in
the Democratic Opening, asking for U.S. support for greater
rights for Kurds and other minorities and for pressure on the
GOT on human rights issues. Several leaders expressed
extraordinary confidence in U.S. authority in Turkey, telling
us variations of "we know that PM Erdogan went to the U.S. in
September to get President Obama's support for the opening.
The PM will come back to Turkey with a plan." The president
of the Van Chamber of Commerce and Industry assured us "If
President Obama would call the MHP and CHP and tell them to
stop opposing the initiative, the Kurdish problem would be

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resolved in a few months."

Harsh Conditions in the Southeast
--------------


7. (C) Poverty is a striking feature of life in southeast
Turkey, with subsistence farming, animal husbandry, little
industry and unofficial estimates of unemployment in one town
of 60 percent. (Comment: Governors and sub-governors
universally declined to give us unemployment figures, but
politicians were more forthcoming. End comment). Poverty
and terror, including the GOT's forced evacuation of villages
in the mid-1990s, has caused migration from southeastern
villages to western Turkey and onward to western Europe. The
sub-governor of Yuksekova in Hakkari bemoaned his town's
image as a scene of PKK terror and pro-PKK protests, claiming
to us that he could walk freely around town "even at night"
and blaming the bad image for the lack of investment. (Note:
Five PKK terrorists died during military operations in
mid-September in Hakkari, and the GOT's refusal to turn the
bodies over to the families for burial led to three days of
protests in Yuksekova. End Note)


8. (C) We did see some positive signs on our journey. Road
and other infrastructure projects are underway. The governor
of Mus described the opening of several factories including a
shoe factory that relocated from Istanbul in search of lower
costs. Elazig and Malatya are vibrant university cities with
expanding campuses and, in the case of Malatya, significant
investment in the healthcare sector. Even in Hakkari, the
extremely unsettled and poor province bordering Iraq and
Iran, Adana's LES Political Assistant noted how the town has
improved on this trip compared to other visits in his 28-year
consulate career. More shops have opened; the streets were
crowded with people, even on a Sunday night; homes were not
just shelters for people, but "they have some architecture,
like people are taking pride in their town and planning to
stay."

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


9. (C) The sense of impatience and pessimism on this trip
contrasted sharply with the mood of cautious optimism we
experienced in August (REF B). Kurds continue to support the
GOT and the Democratic Opening because they see it as the
best possible option for greater democratic rights and they
have no desire to separate from Turkey, but they are
impatiently waiting for the GOT's concrete proposals.
Meanwhile, deep distrust of the Kurds as shown by the TNP and
the Dogubeyazit sub-governor make it clear that any GOT's
overtures on the Kurdish issue will continue to attract
strong nationalistic opposition.

JEFFREY

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