Kurdish militants have detonated a bomb under a military vehicle in southeast Turkey, wounding four soldiers, security officials said on Tuesday, March 5, according to Reuters.

Turkish intelligence officials and Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) leader Abdullah Ocalan, imprisoned on an island near Istanbul, began talks last October aiming to end a 28-year-old insurgency in which more than 40,000 people have been killed.

As the discussions have advanced, violence has dwindled, with one of the most recent PKK attacks coming in January, when its fighters killed a Turkish police officer in the southeastern province of Mardin.

In Monday’s attack, militants remotely detonated roadside explosives under a military convoy on a road in the Lice district of Diyarbakir province. Four soldiers in an armored vehicle were lightly wounded, officials said.

Turkish military units were hunting the perpetrators, Diyarbakir Governor Mustafa Toprak said.

According to Kurdish politicians, the PKK is now observing a de facto ceasefire and Ocalan plans to declare an official halt to hostilities by the Kurdish New Year on March 21.

But Turkish warplanes have continued to bomb militant targets in the mountains of northern Iraq where thousands of rebels are based, drawing warnings from the PKK that they are jeopardizing the peace process.

Military operations have also continued in southeast Turkey. Soldiers backed by helicopters launched an operation around Cudi mountain in Sirnak province near the Iraqi border, with artillery units shelling the mountain, officials said.

There was no immediate comment from the PKK on Monday’s attack.

Under a plan discussed by Ocalan and government representatives, the PKK would end hostilities and give up its demands for autonomy for Turkey’s largely Kurdish southeast in return for greater Kurdish rights, enshrined in the constitution, Turkish media have reported.

0

-1

By JOSH WOOD
Published: February 6, 2013 NYT

ERBIL, IRAQ — Syria’s Kurds have mostly escaped prolonged bouts of direct conflict in the country’s civil war, but with rebel units pushing east toward the resource-rich Kurdish heartland, Kurdish militias proliferating and calls for greater autonomy growing, this may not remain the case.

Last summer, the Democratic Union Party, known by its Kurdish-language acronym P.Y.D., seized control of many towns and villages in the Kurdish majority northeast. The group also holds territory in a few Aleppo neighborhoods and some towns around the city.

The P.Y.D. is the most powerful Kurdish faction in Syria and has a well trained militia. This is perhaps a product of its ties to the Kurdistan Workers’ Party, or P.K.K., a guerrilla group that has been fighting for Kurdish autonomy in Turkey.

The leadership of the P.Y.D. plays down its ties to the P.K.K. But Syrian Kurds often use the names interchangeably, and P.Y.D. offices feature portraits of the imprisoned P.K.K. leader Abdullah Ocalan and Syrian P.K.K. guerrillas killed in fighting with Turkey.

Detractors of the P.Y.D. accuse it of working in collusion with the Syrian government. The party’s leadership and supporters, who say they were struggling against the government to secure rights for Syria’s two million-plus Kurds well before the uprising began in 2011, reject this allegation.

But in the complexities of Syria’s civil war, friendships are not born of common enemies.

The P.Y.D.’s militant Kurdish nationalism, which puts ethnic identity before allegiance to Syria, and their goal of some form of autonomy has put them at odds with Syria’s rebels. After decades of discriminatory policies against the Kurds under the Baath Party, the P.Y.D. is opposed to anybody but Kurds ruling their areas.

Last month, fighting flared in Ras al-Ain, which the Kurds call Serekaniye, as rebel units assaulted P.Y.D.-held areas. Dozens were killed in the fighting.

“Those groups attacking Serekaniye, we don’t consider them as Free Syrian Army,” said Saleh Muslim, the leader of the P.Y.D. Instead, he said the groups that attacked “are mainly just taking orders from the Turkish regime.”

The Free Syrian Army “is a name, or a trademark, not registered to anybody,” said Mr. Muslim. “So anybody can come from his home and get a hold of some weapons and say, ‘I am Free Syrian Army.”’

The push on Ras al-Ain, a town on the Turkish border about 300 kilometers, or 185 miles, northeast of Aleppo, could reflect a number of things: a rebel attempt to gain strategic territory, the lack of coordination among Free Syrian Army units, the spread of armed groups beyond the control of the Free Syrian Army, or the prodding of rebel groups by Turkey to confront the Kurds.

Mr. Muslim believes that Turkey, which is concerned that P.Y.D.-controlled areas along its borders could act as a base for P.K.K. attacks and has warned of intervention if it feels threatened, had something to do with the outbreak of fighting.

“I think it’s a part of the larger plan by the Turkish regime,” he said. “They want to disarm all people, to leave them without defense.”

Beyond the strategic value offered by the northeast, with its access to long stretches of the Iraqi and Turkish borders, the area is home to the majority of Syria’s oil. Before the conflict, oil exports earned Syria $4 billion per year.

The amount of oil that Syria could produce is negligible when compared with other exporters in the region, but with the economy shattered the oil fields are attractive real estate.

There are conflicting reports over who holds the main northeastern oil fields around the town of Rmeilan, though in late January a video appeared online purporting to show members of the P.Y.D.’s militia patrolling the smaller Gir Ziro field nearby.

Beyond the P.Y.D., the other notable political player in Syria’s Kurdish areas is the Kurdish National Council, a coalition of 16 parties. The parties are mostly small and have differing views, though on the whole they are more amenable to working with the mainstream Syrian opposition, which the P.Y.D. rejects.

Click to Continue reading on New York Time

0

-1

Another A senior member of  Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) has been killed during an operation in the southeastern province of Mardin, daily Hürriyet reported today.

The militant was reportedly killed in clashes that erupted when anti-terror police launched a raid on a house in the Nusaybin district of Mardin, after gaining information that PKK militants were staying there.

Hand-grenades and long barreled weapons were used during clashes that lasted almost 30 minutes.

A group of protesters gathered around the house during the raid and clashed with police before security teams dispersed them by using gas bombs.

Mardin Mayor Turhan Ayvaz has confirmed that a senior militant was killed.

+2

-3

Murat Karayilan, PKK’s leader Talk to Al Jazeera  13 Oct 2012 13:02

“Turkey does not want us to be part of the changes in the Middle East …. Turkey is afraid of the changes in the region. They are afraid that the Kurds will wake up and also rise like the rest of the people in the Middle East …

There are no PKK fighters inside Syria. This is Turkish propaganda. As far as I know and I follow the Syrian situation very closely, there are PYD  forces in that area but they are not cooperating with the regime or the government forces. PKK is an organisation that wants peace and democracy in the region. PKK has been fighting for peace for 40 years.  PKK supports change and democracy in Syria. But PKK does not accept Turkish interference in Syria. That’s the main problem …

There are many Kurdish political parties inside Syria and they don’t cooperate with either the Syrian government or opposition, they have chosen a third path, in the middle. For example in Aleppo, the Kurds decided to stay outside the fight because they see that the opposition in Syria is backed by Turkey. The opposition has not recognised Kurdish rights. They have not reached an agreement. So the Kurds in Syria have decided to stay neutral. But they also want change …. Generally speaking if the opposition recognise the rights of the Kurds in that area, then the Kurds might join the opposition there …

Now the Kurds in the area are not fighting any battles or getting involved because their goal is not to take over the Damascus regime. The Kurds just want to have their own natural rights. This is the Kurdish reality …. We want a revolution and we are on the side of the revolution. But we believe in a different way of achieving the revolution. We do not support the regime, we are on the side of change and democracy …

The region is heading towards a sectarian war. This is very dangerous. We will not get involved in the Sunni Shia divide. Kurds will stay neutral. We would like to see constructive politics. Turkey is trying to twist our position. Because they want to finish the PKK and they want us to become a target in the current war …

It’s a path for democracy and freedom that started in Tunisia and Egypt. We will take part in this path. The Kurds will not be anybody’s army. We have to stay independent and work with the people. We will be on the side of democracy, if the West brings democracy we will take part in it. But if the West has hidden agendas then we will not take part. This is what we are preparing for …

This is the time to end those kinds of regimes. Sooner or later they will fall. But the use of force alone will only bring more destruction now and later. Change is a must and Assad should not insist on staying in power.”

Murat Karayilan, PKK’s leader

0

-2