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Car bomb hits Turkey police station in the Kurdish region, four killed

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bomb explodeANKARA,— Four police man including a pregnant policewoman were killed in a car bombing Wednesday in Turkish Kurdistan, the country’s southeast Kurdish region, a day after a deadly attack hit mega city Istanbul.

Both bombings targeted Turkish police and have been blamed on Kurdish rebels who have been waging a decades-long insurgency against the state.

A massive plume of black smoke was seen rising from the rubble of the police station after Wednesday’s attack in the town of Midyat near the Syrian border.

Prime Minister Binali Yildirim pointed the finger of blame at the “killer PKK”, referring to the outlawed rebel Kurdistan Workers’ Party.

“We will fight them both in urban centres and rural areas with determination,” he vowed.

The Anatolia news agency said two police officers, including a pregnant woman, and two civilians had been killed and about 30 injured.

The car — loaded with half a tonne of explosives — drove at the Midyat police station and blew up when police opened fire to stop it, the private Dogan news agency reported.

Turkey remains on high alert after multiple attacks on its soil that have killed well over 200 people in the past year and have been blamed on, or claimed by, Kurdish rebels and Islamic State (IS) jihadists.

On Tuesday, a car bombing in the heart of Istanbul killed 11 people, including six police officers and five civilians, the latest in a spate of attacks in Turkey’s largest city.

There was no claim of responsibility for the Istanbul bombing but President Recep Tayyip Erdogan too suggested that Kurdish militants were behind it.

Images carried by Turkish media showed a massive plume of black smoke rising from the rubble of the severely damaged police station in the town of Midyat near the Syrian border.

The windows of houses in the neighbourhood were shattered by the force of the blast.

Yildirim said one police officer and two civilians have been confirmed dead so far while 30 people were injured.

The police station blast comes a day after a bombing in the heart of Istanbul killed 11 people, including several police, the latest in a spate of attacks in Turkey’s largest city.

The government on Wednesday put the toll at six officers and five civilians.

A radical splinter group of the PKK, the Kurdistan Freedom Falcons (TAK), claimed responsibility for two bombings in Ankara earlier this year that killed dozens of people.

Violence flared last year between Kurdish rebels and government forces, shattering a 2013 ceasefire reached after secret talks between PKK leader Abdullah Ocalan and the Turkish state.

Since July 2015, Turkey initiated a controversial military campaign against the PKK in the country’s southeastern Kurdish regions. Since the beginning of the campaign, Ankara has imposed several round-the-clock curfews, preventing civilians from fleeing regions where the military operations are being conducted.

Activists have accused the security forces of causing huge destruction to urban centres and killing Kurdish civilians. But the government says the operations are essential for public safety, blaming the PKK for the damage.

Pro-Kurdish opposition political parties say between about 1,000 civilians, mostly Kurds, have perished in the fighting, since the Turkish offensive against the PKK centred in towns and cities in Turkish Kurdistan.

The PKK took up arms in 1984 against the Turkish state, which still denies the constitutional existence of Kurds, to push for greater autonomy for the Kurdish minority who make up around 22.5 million of the country’s 78-million population. Over 40,000 people have been killed.

A large Turkey’s Kurdish community openly sympathise with PKK rebels.

Turkey announces curfew in rural areas near southeastern Diyarbakir

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curfew diyarbakirTurkey has declared a round-the-clock curfew in rural areas near the southeastern city of Diyarbakir ahead of a planned military operation against Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) .

The curfew was announced at 10:30 am (0730 GMT) in 10 areas of Lice in Diyarbakir Province, where PKK militants, including senior operatives are believed to be active, a statement by the provincial governor’s office said Saturday.

The curfew came a day after Turkish security forces called an end to operations targeting PKK militants in the town of Nusaybin near the Syrian border and in Sirnak near the border with Iraq.

More than 1,000 people, mostly PKK militants, have been killed in three months of clashes in those areas, according to security sources.

Ankara has been engaged in a large-scale campaign against the PKK in its southern border region in the past few months. The Turkish military has been conducting offensives against the positions of the militant group in northern Iraq as well.

Turkey’s operations began in the wake of a deadly July 2015 bombing in the southern town of Suruc.

More than 30 people died in the attack, which the Turkish government blamed on the Daesh Takfiri terrorist group.

After the bombing, the PKK, which accuses the Ankara government of supporting Daesh, engaged in a series of attacks against Turkish police and security forces, prompting the Turkish military operations.

A shaky ceasefire between Ankara and the PKK that had stood since 2013 was declared null and void by the militants following the Turkish strikes against the group.

The PKK has been fighting for an autonomous Kurdish region in southeastern Turkey since 1984. The conflict has left more than 40,000 people dead.

Kurdish MP of Turkey: I hope one day our leaders will recognize Armenian Genocide

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YEREVAN. – The German Bundestag’s passing of the resolution on Armenian Genocide recognition is a historic and very important step.

Nazmi Gür, MP and assistant to the co-chair of the—pro-Kurdish—Peoples’ Democratic Party (HDP) of Turkey, on Friday stated the aforementioned at a press conference in Armenia’s capital city of Yerevan.

In his words, Germany is not an ordinary country.

“I hope that one day our leaders [in Turkey] also will take this step,” added Gür.

The Bundestag, the lower house of the German parliament, on Thursday formally recognized the Armenian Genocide, with the aforesaid resolution and with only one vote against and one abstention. The resolution also notes that the Bundestag regrets that the German government at the time did nothing to stop this crime against humanity, and therefore the Bundestag also acknowledges the respective historical accountability of Germany.

Turkey’s Kurd Party HDP sends photos of devastated Cizre to European lawmakers

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picturs send to EUTurkey’s Kurdish problem-focused opposition party has prepared a photo album showing traces of the conflict during curfews in the now-devastated Cizre district in the southeastern province of Şırnak and sent it to European lawmakers.

The album composed of 92 photographs named “Mezopotamya’nın Sevgili Şehri Cizre/The Beloved City of Mesopotamia” was sent to lawmakers from the European Parliament and the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE), the Peoples’ Democratic Party (HDP) said on June 2 in a press release.

“As known, during curfews which have been declared on and off since July 2015, and [one] which was finally started on Dec. 14, 2015, and ended on Feb. 11, 2016, in Cizre, the city has virtually been completely wrecked and hundreds of people have lost their lives,” the HDP said.

After the curfew was lifted, a delegation from the party went to the city and prepared the album, which includes an appendix composed of oral evidence as well as reports in Turkish and English which have been drafted by civil society organizations such as the Human Rights Association (İHD), the Human Rights Foundation of Turkey (TİHV), the Trade Union of Employees in Public Health and Social Services (SES), the Diyarbakır Bar Association, the Association for Human Rights and Solidarity for the Oppressed (MAZLUMDER), the Libertarian Lawyers Association (ÖHD), the Mesopotamia Lawyers Association (MHD), the Asrın Law Office and the Foundation for Society and Legal Studies (TOHAV). A letter by the United Nations concerning Cizre is also included in the DVD format appendix.

It was also sent to various civil society organizations and political parties at home and abroad.

Meanwhile, HDP co-chair Selahattin Demirtaş was paying a two-day visit to Switzerland to hold talks with leading parliamentarians, as well as senior officials from international institutions.

Demirtaş will hold various talks in Switzerland during his visit on June 2-3, the party’s press office said.

Demirtaş will meet Christa Markwalder, the speaker of the Swiss House of Representatives; Raphaël Comte, the speaker of the Senate; and Christian Levrat, head of the Socialist Party and the president of the Senate’s Foreign Affairs Committee.

Demirtaş will also hold talks with Martin Chungong, the secretary-general of the Geneva-based Inter-Parliamentary Union (IPU), and Gianni Magazzeni, chief of the Americas, Europe and Central Asia branch of the Field Operations and Technical Cooperation Division of the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR).

Following months of fierce debate, a bill that will mainly target HDP lawmakers with the aim of stripping them of their immunity from prosecution was passed last month by the ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) and the vocal support of President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, the founding leader of the party.

Demirtaş, one of two leaders of the third-largest party in parliament, has long said the move is likely to create more violence and stifle democratic politics, as the country has been embroiled in a reignited conflict between security forces and militants of the outlawed Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) since July 2015.

Demirtaş has also been arguing that Erdoğan’s drive for an executive presidency was preventing the revival of a peace process between the state and the PKK.

June/02/2016

Turkey: PKK clashes leave three soldiers dead in southeast Turkey

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3 turkish soldier killedA series of fresh clashes between Turkish army and militants from the outlawed Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) have claimed the lives of at least three soldiers in the country’s restive southeast over the past 24 hours.

Turkish military said in a statement on Monday that two soldiers were killed in the Kurdish-dominated province of Sirnak, while another lost his life in neighboring Siirt Province near the Iraqi border.

Turkish officials say a member of its special operations police was among those killed.

The statement added that two PKK militants were killed in the ongoing high-scale military operation across the volatile region.

This comes days after six Turkish soldiers were killed in a bomb attack ripping through a military convoy in the Kurdish-dominated Van Province On May 24. Also on May 18, a bomb attack on military vehicles in the town of Semdinli in Hakkari Province killed four soldiers and wounded nine others.

Turkish sources blamed members of the PKK militant group for the attacks.

The Turkish military has launched large-scale military operations against the PKK militants in its southern border region since last summer. The government has imposed curfew in the areas that have been targeted in the army’s anti-PKK campaign.

The Turkish military has also been pounding the PKK positions in northern Iraq.

Ankara’s operations against PKK began in the wake of a deadly July 2015 bombing in the southern town of Suruc. More than 30 people died in the attack, with the Turkish government blaming the Daesh Takfiri terrorist group for the attack.

Following the bombing, the PKK militants, who accuse the government in Ankara of supporting Daesh, engaged in a series of reprisal attacks against Turkish police and security forces, prompting the Turkish military operations.

A shaky ceasefire between Ankara and the PKK that had stood since 2013 was declared null and void by the militants following the Turkish strikes against the group. The PKK has been fighting for an autonomous Kurdish region in southeastern Turkey since 1984. The conflict has left thousands of people dead.

Syria: Raqqa Civilians Flee Airstrikes as Kurds, Jihadists Clash

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Raqa SyriaU.S.-led coalition warplanes carried out intense airstrikes Tuesday on Raqqa, the de facto Syrian capital of the Islamic State group, a monitoring group said, continuing days of air-raids that appear to be aimed at demoralizing jihadist fighters before an offensive by Kurdish-led forces on villages to the north of the city.

The airstrikes appear targeted mostly on IS defensive positions on the outskirts of the city. This may be to try to avoid civilian casualties, although civilian deaths have been reported.

Raqqa political activists have been warning that IS is using civilians as human shields, spreading fighters and their weaponry around civilian areas and housing militants in residential blocks.

Leaders of the U.S.-backed Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), a Kurdish-dominated coalition that also includes a mixed bag of small Sunni Arab armed groups and some Syriac and Turkmen community defense forces, announced Tuesday it had started an offensive to liberate Raqqa from the Islamic State.

Americans in combat mode?

SDF spokesmen said U.S. commandos are embedding with their fighters in the offensive and posted videos purportedly showing this. U.S. officials deny American soldiers are taking on combat roles in the fighting and insist U.S. Special Forces won’t be exchanging fire with IS.

Colonel Steve Warren, the spokesman for the U.S.-led international coalition against IS, says U.S. Special Forces personnel are only providing assistance and advice to the SDF in the battle, but they are not on the front line. “We are in their off centers and headquarters providing advice,” he said.

U.S. officials, and some Kurdish officials, are also cautioning the objective of the military operation is to seize villages and territory north and west of Raqqa rather than to seek to retake the beleaguered city. The objective, they say, is to squeeze the city and further isolate it.

Civilians urged to leave

Some Western officials concede the SDF doesn’t have the capability yet to mount a full-scale assault on the city. That has prompted political activists to question why the international coalition has been air-dropping leaflets in the past few days on Raqqa urging civilians to flee the city, implying that an assault is in the offing.

Civilians flee to countryside

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a British-based monitoring group that relies on a network of activists inside Syria, reported Wednesday sharp clashes between SDF and IS forces around villages close to Ain Issa, 56 kilometers north of Raqqa. The monitoring group also said dozens of civilians left Raqqa city Wednesday and headed into the western countryside.

Meanwhile, Turkish military officials have warned their U.S. counterparts that Turkey will not accept American-backed Kurdish-led forces crossing the Euphrates River to mount assaults on two other IS-held towns, Manbij and Jarabulus.

Reports recently suggested the Turks may have been reducing their objections to Kurdish-led forces moving west of the Euphrates, but in a meeting with General Joseph Votel, head of U.S. Central Command, deputy chief of the Turkish general staff Yaşar Güler warned Turkey still considers the Azaz-Jarablus line as a “red line” when it comes to the Kurdish-led forces.

Turkey: HDP Co-Chair: We Apologize to the Armenian People

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HDP-YuksekdagISTANBUL (Agos)—Turkey’s Peoples’ Democratic Party (HDP) Co-Chair, Figen Yüksekdağ, during a group meeting, discussed the Armenian Genocide. Yüksekdağ said, “On 101st anniversary of the genocide, we apologize to Armenian people. We apologize to Aunt Elizabeth, to Uncle Krikor. We apologize to our friends, comrade Garo and to our sister Roza.”

Yüksekdağ started the meeting by saying, “I would like to begin by commemorating the Armenians, Syriac and Chaldean people who were exiled and killed 101 years ago.”

She continued by saying “The mentality that led to the genocide avoids recognition today. However, recognition doesn’t demean a state, it only relieves pain. These lands will eventually spill out the bloodshed, regardless of your [the Turkish governments’] wishes. Our history is a history of massacres. Recognizing the massacres is a historical responsibility.”

“The ones who withhold their apologies have the same mentality. They use “Armenian” as an insult. This means that the genocidal mentality is still alive. We apologize to Armenian people. As I said, the mentality that led to death and destruction in the past is still active today.”

Los Angeles: Kurds rally with Armenians to commemorate #ArmenianGenocide 101

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Kurd soliderity with ArmenianReporting by Ava Homa

LOS ANGELES, United States (Kurdistan24) – On Sunday, an estimated 60,000 protestors rallied before the Turkish Consulate in Los Angeles to commemorate the 100+1 anniversary of the Armenian genocide.

Kurds were present among the protestors, including Ezidis from Phoenix, and non-Kurd members of the Rojava Solidarity Committee Los Angeles, holding signs to declare solidarity with Armenians.

The Kurdish American Education Society, Kurdish Community of Southern California, Kurdish Human Rights Advocacy Group and Kurdish National Congress of North America joined the Armenian Genocide Committee to support the 2016 Rally for Justice.

Armenians perceive the killing of a million and a half by Ottomans as an act of genocide. Turkey says half a million Armenians died when they rebelled against their rulers after World War I.

Kurdish political groups and NGOs have apologized for the fact that throughout the Kurdish-populated regions, some Kurds participated in the genocide of the Armenians. However, other Kurds opposed the genocide, and in some cases even helped hide or adopted Armenian refugees.

Southern California has the largest Armenian community outside of Armenia. According to US census data, over 200,000 people of Armenian descent live in Los Angeles.

Vazgen Barsegian, an Armenian activist, told Kurdistan24, “It was very emotional for me seeing my fellow Kurdish brothers and sisters sincerely joining our struggle and demanding justice. I grew up in Van with Kurdish people, so seeing my fellow Kurdish brothers and sisters marching by my side meant a lot to me.”

A Kurdish activist, Cklara Moradian, told Kurdistan24, “Building connections between our communities [Armenian & Kurdish] is crucial, not just because we share such intertwined histories of survival, but so that moving forward we can raise our voices in unison against the atrocities being committed by Turkey today.”

Moradian added that Kurds’ presence “was about showing up, visibly, to give our support. In the future, we hope to collaborate on more movement building, social and political. I deeply believe that we can more effectively fight for the recognition of each of our unique individual struggles when we rise in solidarity with each other.” 

One of the organizers of the rally, Mikael Matossian, said, “The truth is clear: the Armenian Genocide is not a solely Armenian issue, but a human one. The oppression felt by our ancestors in 1915 mirrors the experiences of other ethnic minorities who also have weathered imperialism, colonialism, and genocide.”

“The repressive tactics of the Ottoman Empire have carried on into the modern Republic of Turkey, targeted toward Kurds and Armenians there. Motivated by this shared struggle against a common enemy, Kurdish and Armenian activists united today to call on the Turkish government to end its currently racist and xenophobic-motivated policies, and deliver justice to the Armenian people in the form of recognition and reparations,” he added.

Soraya Fallah, Kurdish Human rights activist, says atrocities that happened 100 years ago are continuing today. “During the Ottoman Empire, Armenians were killed, years later Kurds were killed and today in the 21st century still Kurds are killed and massacred in Erdogan’s self-declared empire,” she stated.

“If there is no recognition, establishment, and mechanism of prevention, genocide will repeat and continue; the way we still see it today,” Fallah continued.

She added that the rally was very powerful. “It is amazing to see a nation transforming their mourning to the power of a movement for justice and unity and endowing their identity to their children and new generation!” Fallah declared.

Solin Rojihalat, one of the organizers of the contingent told Kurdistan24, “I had the pleasure to simply witness a person with Greek and Armenian flags dancing to the Armenian ‘Hay Qajer;’ the Kurdish ‘Lo Berde’ of the same melody. A few Armenians took pictures with some of our friends in the Kurdish contingent.”

“We want to find each other. Whether we’re planets that orbit the same sun or we’re simply earnest people with a desire to know one another, we catch sight of one another and know that we’re here together,” Rojihalat said.

In a statement to mark Armenian Remembrance Day on April 24, President of the United States Barack Obama called the massacre the first mass atrocity of the 20th century and tragedy that must not be repeated. But he refused to use the word “genocide,” a term he used before becoming president in 2009.

 Source: kurdistan24.net

Reporting by Ava Homa

Editing by Karzan Sulaivany

Kurdish PKK Forces killed 6 Turkish soldiers , 54 wounded in attacks in Turkey’s southeast

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DHA photo

Six soldiers were killed and 56 others were wounded in individual attacks by the  Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) and in clashes between security forces and the militants in the southeastern provinces of Şırnak, Hakkari,Diyarbakır and Mardin on April 11 and 12.

The Turkish General Staff announced that one soldier was killed due to an unknown explosion during clashes with PKK  in the Dağlıca district of Hakkari, while four soldiers were wounded. One of the injured soldiers is reported to be in a critical condition, according to the statement.

Additionally, one soldier was killed during clashes with PKK  in Şırnak, while three others were wounded.

Reports of a third attack emerged late April 12 when two soldiers were killed and two others were wounded in an explosion in southeastern Mardin’s Nusaybin district.

Meanwhile, two soldiers were killed and 47 were wounded, including civilians, late April 11 in a PKK bomb attack in the Hani district of Diyarbakır.

PKK  detonated a bomb-laden tanker in front of the Hani Gendarmerie Post, after which an armed clash erupted between security forces and PKK .

The relatives of gendarmerie personnel in the lodgings were among the wounded, the General Staff said in a statement.

The wounded were first taken to Hani State Hospital and later transferred to the Diyarbakır Military Hospital by helicopter and ambulance.

A significant portion of the military post collapsed due to the attack while other buildings nearby were also damaged as search and rescue efforts in the buildings continued.

The Hani Criminal Court of Peace ordered a broadcast ban until the completion of the investigation following the attack.

Kurdish forces PKK: neutralized Two Turkish soldiers 46 wounded in bomb attack & military post collapsed

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n_97668_1Two soldiers were killed and 46 were wounded, including civilians, on late April 11 in an  Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) bomb attack in the Hani district of the southeastern province of Diyarbakır.

PKK forces detonated a bomb-laden tanker in front of the Hani Gendarmerie Post. An armed clash later erupted between security forces and PKK forcess

Two soldiers were killed and 46 were wounded including the relatives of gendarmerie personnel in the lodgings.

The wounded were first taken to Hani State Hospital and later transferred to the Diyarbakır Military Hospital by helicopter and ambulance.

A significant portion of the military post collapsed due to the attack while other buildings nearby were also damaged as the search and rescue efforts in the buildings continued.

Meanwhile, the Hani Criminal Court of Peace ordered a broadcast ban until the completion of the investigation following the attack.