ANKARA, Turkey – Nationalist lawmakers in Turkey’s parliament scratched out any reference to “Kurdistan” in the 2014 budget, after heated exchanges and insults with MPs from the pro-Kurdish Peace and Democracy Party (BDP) on Monday.
The use of “Kurdistan,” to refer to the country’s predominantly Kurdish-populated southeast regions, has been a taboo in Turkey, where the large and oppressed Kurdish minority has been struggling for greater rights. Until only 11 years ago, it was illegal in Turkey to publicly speak or write in Kurdish. The Kurds themselves refer to Turkey’s Kurdish regions as North Kurdistan.
The latest row in the Turkish parliament was ignited after the nationalist parties vehemently opposed the use of the word in a budget report by the BDP.
The ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP), the Republican People’s Party (CHP) and Nationalist Movement Party (MHP) unanimously agreed to remove the word from the report, alleging it was against the constitution.
Mahir Unal, group deputy chairman of the AKP, skipped over the word “Kurdistan” when reading the BDP report, and insisted it should also not be mentioned in the minutes.
“Do you think that 20 million Kurds will disappear when you remove that word from the budget?” BDP lawmaker Hasip Kaplan asked in a speech in parliament. “This is racism,” he charged.
Tensions mounted, and a break was called, after MHP MP Ozcan Yeniceri hurled insults at the BDP’s Idris Baluken, calling him a “carrion crow.”
The AKP, CHP and MHP decided unanimously that the first edition of the budget should be replaced with a new version.
“The president of the parliament did not even ask us to change our statement of opposition and published the budget today without informing us,” Kaplan told Rudaw. “This shows they have an allergy toward Kurdistan.”
Last month, Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan used the word “Kurdistan” for the first time while welcoming the president of Iraq’s autonomous Kurdistan Region, Massoud Barzani, to the predominantly Kurdish city of Diyarbakir.
Referring to Erdogan’s use of the word, Kaplan said: “They used the word ‘Kurdistan’ in Diyarbakir when Mr Barzani visited Turkey. But in Ankara they prevaricate. They are not sincere,” Kaplan charged.
“I told them that I will take the issue to the European Court of Human Rights because they are not letting us express our opinions and discuss our projects even though we are a political party in the parliament,” Kaplan added.
Erdogan’s use of the words “Federal Kurdistan” in his speech ignited severe criticism, forcing the premier to issue a defence.
“The words ‘Kurd’ and ‘Kurdistan’ also exist in the minutes of the first Turkish Parliament. Was Mustafa Kemal a separatist as well?” Erdogan said. “If those who criticize me go back a little bit more, they will also see that the eastern and southeastern regions (of Turkey) were called the principality of Kurdistan in the Ottoman state,” he said.
