The New Turkey and Its Discontents by Waldman Simon; Caliskan Emre;

Author:Waldman, Simon; Caliskan, Emre;
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Oxford University Press
Published: 2017-01-15T00:00:00+00:00

The Enduring Conflict

In all, Turkey fielded around 130,000 troops including special units in the south-east. At times they lost control of the region, not venturing out at night and retreating behind fortified positions.27 From a military perspective, the PKK’s activities were a significant burden on the Turkish state. By the late 1990s, over one third of the annual central government budget was spent on combating the PKK.28

In its attempt to repress the rebellion, the Turkish state closed down newspapers and periodicals, assassinated moderate Kurdish leaders, journalists and businessmen and orchestrated forced evacuations of villages in an attempt to deny the PKK bases for launching attacks.29 Brutal measures were also adopted by Turkish law enforcement authorities, many of which have been documented by human rights organisations such as Human Rights Watch (HRW). For example, in 1997 HRW reported “widespread” torture and mistreatment of persons detained under anti-terror laws by the hands of the Anti-Terror Branch of the Security Directorate of Turkey’s Ministry of the Interior, employing methods such as electrocutions, beating the soles of the feet, hanging by the arms in various positions, threats of sexual abuse, squeezing testicles or breasts as well as starving inmates or not allowing them to use toilet facilities.30

That was not all. In an earlier report in 1994, HRW had detailed forced evictions and home destruction suffered by the Kurdish population at the hands of the Turkish authorities, either for refusing to join the Village Guard system or because they were believed to have given food or shelter to PKK fighters.31 In yet another HRW report, the agency identified that following the election of Suleyman Demirel as prime minister in November 1991, the rate of killings, torture and disappearances reached an “appalling rate” and noted that “Turkish security forces have attacked Kurdish cities in the south-east with increased ferocity” and that the government (as of 1992) had failed to investigate over 450 killings by death squad. The HRW report also detailed house raids in western Turkish cities such as Istanbul and Ankara with dozens of alleged terrorists shot and killed. In the southeast, protesters were dealt with through “shoot to kill” orders, with over 100 killed by police in demonstrations in 1992 alone.32 All this did was provide further fertile recruiting ground for the PKK. 33

One group that was exploited by the Turkish state to combat the PKK was Kurdish Hezbollah. This group emerged in the early 1990s in opposition to both the PKK and the state. Not to be confused with the Lebanese organisation of the same name, Hezbollah (as it is known in Turkey) was a uniquely Kurdish group that sought to create a Kurdish Islamic state. It received some sponsorship from Iran, which manipulated and sponsored both Kurdish Hezbollah and the PKK at different times.34 These two groups engaged in conflict during the 1990s, and both committed human rights violations, including killings and torture. Kurdish Hezbollah was particularly severe.35

Sadettin Tantan, who was interior minister (1999–2001) in the pre-AKP coalition government, denies that the Turkish state had any hand in sponsoring Kurdish Hezbollah.

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