Bulletin de liaison et d'information - Institut kurde de Paris

REvuE DE PRESSE-PRESS REvIEW-BERHEVOKA ÇAPÊ-RMSTA STAMPA-DENTRO DE LA PRENSA-BASIN ÖZETi
146
The Killing of A Kurdish MP
ismet G. imset
The killing of Mehmet.Sincar, member of parliament
and local party executive of the Kurdish
pro-Kurdish Democracy Party (DEP), in
the eastern refinery city of Batman on Sept. 4, has
led to developments which indicate that Turkey's tolerance
for Kurdish politics -- let alone separatism -is
nearly exhausted. Not only was Sincar, an elected
representative of the people, killed, but he was
killed under highly controversial circumstances.
What followed his death actually showed that despite
all official assurances, there may indeed be a
new clandestine campaign to "eliminate" the remaining
17 Kurdish deputies in Parliament.
Initial claims by Sincar's colleagues that pOlice
protection for the deputies -- who were in Batman
to investigate the murder of another party official -was
withdrawn before the MP was murdered never
received a serious reply.
Local officials only toyed with words in a fruitless
attempt to explain why Kurdish deputies, in a city
famous for ruthless violence targeting pro-Kurdish
activists, was not under protection.
A security chief argued that the deputies did not
like to be followed around. Another official argued
that they had demanded not to be protected. Yet
another said there was protection, in front of the
DEP building, but the deputies had used the back
door. Et cetera. None of the statements served to
tell the nation what hadreally go~e on.
According to other DEP deputies however, there
was police protection (or tailing) from the beginning
of their visit in the region, but it was lifted as of Saturday
morning, when the killing took place.
Naturally, the DEP and Kurdish activists concluded
that without the cooperation of local officials -or
at least their turning a blind eye -- such a murder
could not take place. What strengthened their argument
was anotherincident this weekend during
which another DEP parliamentarian survived only
by chance.
Sincar's family house in Klziltepe, Mardin, was visited
by at least 6,000 friends and supporters after
Sept. 9 and was constantly under observation by
local troops and armored vehicles.
On Saturday, however, the troops and vehicles
were reportedly withdrawn at around 7 p.m. local time.
About four hours later, three explosions rocked
the house, followed by six shots of gunfire. Five people,
children among them, were wounded in the
attack.
Leyla lana, one of the most outspoken pro-Kurdish
deputies in Parliament said to have links with
the outlawed Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) was
supposed to be on the roof of the house, along with
the other women, when bombs landed there. "Instead,
I was downstairs, watching television," she exp-
Turkish Probe September 14, 1993
lained later.
According to DEP leader Ya~ar Kaya, the target
of the attack was lana. According to most everyone,
even including Turkey's Interior Minister Mehmet
Gazioglu, there have been attempts in the country
to spoil the brotherhood between Kurds and
Turks.
The attack on Sincar's house mayindeed be
another step toward a hardening of the DEP which
already faces internal pressure to take radical action
against the Turkish Parliament. Last week, Turkey
witnessed a cat-and-mouse game put on by
Turkish authorities and DEP officials, further strengthening
the position of hardliners in the pro-Kurdish
legal movement. All attempts by Sincar's family and
DEP authorities to stage a funeral ceremony for the
murdered MP were blocked. But they were blocked
in such a skilful way that Ankara always gave the
impression Turkey was doing what it could to help
the party out. First, the DEP moved Sincar's body
from Batman, where he was killed, to Ankara -where
he even had the right to be given an official
ceremony at Parliament.
Later, DEP announced that it would stage its own
alternative funeral ceremony for its MP, would turn
down a ceremony at the Grand National Assembly
and would cover Sincar's coffin with a party flag instead
of a Turkish one.
This naturally angeredmany Turks, among them
soldiers as well as politicians, taken as a signal that
DEP was turning down the Turkish identity altogether.
A day after the attack on lana, Turkey's agriculture
Minister Refaeddin $ahin delivered a strident
speech in Kayseri, saying that everYone who denied
the Turkish national identity should, inhis words,
go to hell.
"Those who say I am not a Turk, those who do
not accept the Turkish flag, can go to whichever
hell they want," $ahin said. Three days prior to the
attack on Sincar's life, Turkey's president Süleyman
Demirel had made a similar remark, telling the nation
that anyone who sympathized with those shedding
blood in the Southeast were themselves "killers."
Knowing the level that the national reaction to
their policies had reached, the first thing DEP deputies
did after bringing Sincar's body to the Turkish
capital was to seek official backing and understanding.
Thus, early last week, party executives and several
deputies marched into the presidential palace in
Ankara and made their first appeal to Demirel.
A day later, they met with Prime Minister Tansu
Çiller. "We had positive replies from both,. Kaya
explained to the Turkish Probe later. "They said