Information and liaison bulletin - Institut kurde de Paris

Revue de Presse-Press Review-Berhevoka Çapê-Rivista Stampa-Dentro de la Prensa-Basin Ôzeti
Turkey that could lead to it laying down its arms,
thus avoiding a war across the border of two of
America's strategic allies in the region.
Zerya's life as a teenage rebel fighter began
when she first heard about the PKK as a tenyear-old
growing up in Hamburg, where her
Kurdish family were asylum-seekers from the
mountains of southern Turkey.
A talented musician and dancer, she became
attracted to the organisation because it ran clubs
that taught Kurdish songs and history. "Every
song or poem taught us something about the
Kurdish cause," she said in a hushed voice to
avoid drawing attention to herself. The PKK is
now classed as a terrorist organisation by much
of the international community.
Captivated by the plight of the Kurds in Turkey,
Iran, Syria and Iraq, Zerya yearned to help: "It
was like an illness for me. I just wanted to go to
Kurdistan and fight in the mountains."
After a year of pestering PKK leaders in Ham¬
burg she was given permission to travel on a
fake Turkish passport to Syria, where she was
meant to stay until she turned 16 and was dee¬
med old enough to learn how to fight. She left
Germany aged 12, without telling her parents.
But instead of waiting in Syria she secretly
followed a group of PKK trainees to Lebanon,
literally tracing their footprints until she arrived
at the Bekaa Valley.
There, she was allowed to join a six-month
political and military training course with 300
tfihicaeo Qfributif
November 11. 2007
recruits. "I remember walking along a path with
a Kalashnikov over my shoulder but it was too
long for me and would hit the ground," Zerya
said, recalling the day her training finished and
she was sent to the mountains to fight. "That first
day I felt I was free and in my home for the first
time in my life."
Instead of studying, gossiping about boys and
listening to pop music, Zerya spent her teenage
years fighting Turkish soldiers, living off scraps
of food and sleeping wherever she found shelter.
"We lived in caves or just used plastic sheets
for cover. Sometimes if the weather was kind
then we would live under the stars like birds."
By the time she was 14, Zerya was comman¬
ding small groups of rebels on operations. Equa¬
lity is a principle cherished by the PKK, which
divides responsibility evenly between men and
women fighters.
She recalled one occasion when her unit be¬
came encircled by Turkish soldiers. "I spotted a
weak point in the Turkish line and started to lead
my colleagues out but one young man panicked.
I had to slap him to calm him down." On another
occasion, aged 16, a Turkish grenade exploded
close by, sending a chunk of shrapnel deep into
her left knee. "In the heat of the fight I did not feel
the pain, but then I had difficulty moving so my
male colleagues took me to safety."
The guerrillas had nothing to treat Zerya with
other than water and thread to stitch up her knee.
She was forced to shelter in a cave for two
months until she was strong enough to walk
again. "It was winter and bitterly cold. It was too
dangerous to light a fire because that would have
drawn attention to our position."
Sexual relationships, and certainly falling in
love, are forbidden between PKK fighters in the
mountains because the group feels that such a
bond would distract a couple from the battle.
Zerya spoke of one young man she grew close
to. "He liked me and I liked him but we never
told each other," she said. The man was killed
during a fight with Turkish troops.
Zerya had her fair share of injuries after 13
years in the mountains, including shrapnel
wounds to the chest and thigh. She began to feel
a burden on her fellow fighters so decided three
years ago to leave the armed struggle to seek
shelter in the Kurdish north of Iraq. Returning to
civilisation was like stepping out of a time cap¬
sule.
Life is hard after the PKK because her past
means that she has no official identity or natio¬
nality and no passport. "I would like to settle
down and do some work to help women and
children," she said. She is trying to return to
Germany, where her family is still living. Asked
whether she would ever return to the front line
for the PKK, Zerya says that her fighting days
are over. "From my time in the mountains, I
have understood one thing: killing is not the
solution to this problem."
Iraq's Kurdish leaders walk fine line
Public's distrust of Turkey complicates regional government's tack on PKK crisis
By Bay Fang Tribune correspondent ZAWITA. Iraq
H amid Nabi remembers 1988 as if it were
yesterday. Stringing his plastic worry
beads through wind-chapped hands, the
retired Kurdish fighter recalls watching his
village razed by Saddam Hussein's bulldo¬
zers. He remembers carrying his month-old
son into the mountains with thousands of
other Kurds to escape the government's
chemical bombs.
But when asked who he considers his grea¬
test enemy, the man who spent half his life
fighting Hussein's army readily answered, "I
hate Turkey more than Saddam. Turkey is
more dangerous than Saddam was if it
could, it would destroy all the Kurdish villages
in the country."
Nabi and his neighbors in this village 30 miles
from the Turkish border say they are ready to
take up arms if Turkey invades northern Iraq
in pursuit of Kurdish rebels. "When Turkey
said, 'We're on the border,' we also say,
'We're on the border,' " he said.
Aware of those sentiments, Kurdistan's regio¬
nal government in northern Iraq is treading a
fine line as it warily awaits a move from Tur¬
key's government.
The Kurdish authority has tried to demons¬
trate goodwill toward Turkey by taking a
series of steps over the past week to contain
the Kurdish rebels, known as the PKK. And it
has openly stated its desire to be involved in
talks with the Turkish, Iraqi and American
governments over solving the rebel problem
without an invasion that could destabilize the
region.
At the same time, it is building up its military
presence along the Turkish border in a step
whose stated purpose is to limit the move¬
ment of the PKK, but which also could be
construed as a defensive measure to counter
the buildup of Turkish troops and reassure
villagers that the Kurds will maintain their
territorial integrity no matter what takes place.
To most, Turkey the enemy
The Kurdish public by far considers Turkey
the enemy to guard against, not the PKK.
Many here believe Ankara is using the PKK
as an excuse to invade the semiautonomous
Kurdish state.
"The movement of [Kurdish security forces] is
to ensure that Turkey's boundaries and bor¬
ders are protected," said Qubad Talabany,
the Kurdistan Regional Government's repre¬
sentative in the U.S. Asked whether it was
Turkey or the Kurds in Iraq that needed to be
protected, he declined to clarify.
He added that the other moves by the go¬
vernmentincreasing checkpoints, closing
PKK-affiliated offices and limiting the flow of
supplies and financial support to the rebels
are intended to generate goodwill with Anka¬
ra.
The U.S. has been pressuring the Kurds to
make these initial moves against the PKK,
hoping they will assuage Ankara enough to
restart the three-way dialogue over the fate of
the rebel group, even as it contemplates
military action against the PKK. Another
meaningful gesture the Kurds could make,
U.S. officials say, is to arrest a PKK leader or
two.
"The Turkish public will need to see pictures
of detained PKK leadership that they reco¬
gnize," said Zeyno Baran, a Turkey scholar at
the Hudson Institute, a Washington think
tank. "They still need to see results."
But Kurdish officials say it would be nice to
get some reciprocity from Turkey, which thus
far has refused to recognize their regional
government in Iraq. The last attempt at initia¬
ting talks in Ankara last month, with Kurdish
officials participating as part of the Iraq dele¬
gation, failed miserably, according to U.S.
officials with knowledge of the meetings.
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