DTK Co-chair Hatip Dicle. (Photo: Cihan)
Pro-Kurdish Democratic Society Congress (DTK) Co-chair Hatip Dicle said on Sunday that Kurds have the right to self-governance and that the DTK supports the demands of Kurds living in Turkey.
“Self-governance is a right and is guaranteed in international conventions. It is a legitimate demand. The DTK and other institutions affiliated with the party support the struggle [for self-governance for Turkey’s Kurds]. The war that the government is trying to provoke is both unlawful and unethical,” Dicle said during a press conference held jointly by the DTK and three other pro-Kurdish parties.
The DTK, the Peoples’ Democratic Party (HDP), the Peoples’ Democratic Congress (HDK) and the Democratic Regions Party (DBP) held a press conference in the southeastern city of Diyarbakır on Sunday evening to voice their objections to the ongoing large-scale operations being conducted by the Turkish security forces in urban areas in the Southeast and the days-long curfews imposed in several southeastern towns.
Condemning the offensive launched by the government in the Southeast, the pro-Kurdish politicians said that the Kurds would fight back. Dicle said it was the government that ended the settlement process launched in 2012 by the government and the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) to end Turkey’s long-standing Kurdish problem, adding that the only solution to end the problem is democratic autonomy. “We want to bring this demand to public attention after we discuss it during our party congress to be held between Dec. 26 and 27. We hope this solution will stop the ongoing chaos in the region.”