ERBIL, Kurdistan Region – Turkey’s Kurdish Peace and Democracy Party (BDP), which helped negotiate a peace process between Ankara and the militant Kurdistan Workers Party, says it is stepping into the role again, amid mutual recriminations by both sides and threats by the PKK to halt a withdrawal of fighters.
The BDP “will do whatever it can to make the process work,” said party leader Selahettin Demirtas. He said that a party delegation would meet with PKK leaders next week.
Demirtas, who spoke to BDP members in Turkey’s largest Kurdish city, Diyarbakir, said that the party is trying to be a link for the three parties to the talks, the Turkish government, PKK leader Abdullah Ocalan -- who is in jail on Turkey’s Imrali island -- and the PKK leadership at its Qandil Mountain base in the Kurdistan Region of northern Iraq.
“The PKK is aware of the details of the meetings happening between the BDP and Abdullah Ocalan,” Demirtas said.
“Our delegation will meet with the PKK leaders to get their position about the peace process and upon return we will meet with Turkish officials in Ankara,” he added. “Our efforts are aimed at removing all obstacles on the way finding a solution.”
After years of negotiations between Turkish intelligence officials and the imprisoned Ocalan, both sides reached a peace deal whereby the PKK agreed to withdraw its fighters and Turkey pledged to address the cultural and political rights of more than 15 million Kurds.
However, PKK leaders have since accused Turkey of building new military bases in the Kurdish regions and continuing its aerial reconnaissance of PKK bases, warning this could renew fighting.
The PKK has waged a three-decade war against Turkey in which an estimated 40,000 people have been killed.
“If Turkey continues to complicate the situation or wages war against us, we will resend our fighters back to Turkey,” the PKK’s new commander, Cemil Bayik, said recently. “We will defend ourselves.”
Demirtas said that, “At this stage only the BDP can facilitate dialogue between Imrali, Qandil and Ankara.”
The Turkish government has announced it will be starting a democratization process in the country, but without giving details.
Demirtas said his party was not privy to any plan by Ankara that affects the Kurds, but admitted that sometimes the Turkish government chooses not to consult the Kurds about its political plans.
“The Turkish government has not talked to either the BDP or Imrali about the contents of this plan,” said Demirtas.
Officials of Turkey’s ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) say that the democratization package will also address the Kurdish issue.
Sinan Yerilkaya, the AKP head in Dersim, said that among the contents of the plan is a a move to change the names of cities and places from Turkish back to their original Kurdish.
“In this plan the name of Tunceli will be changed back to Dersim,” he said. “That name was changed in 1935 by a parliamentary law which slowly banned the name Dersim.”
Turkey’s Kurds have lived for decades under Ankara’s repressive heal, unable until 10 years ago to even speak their own language.
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