ERBIL, Kurdistan Region — Kurdish political parties and language promotion institutions have launched a campaign, calling on the Turkish government to recognize Kurdish as an official language in the country. The government responded by placing restrictions on their activities on Thursday. The pro-Kurdish Peoples’ Democratic Party (HDP) and a number of other Kurdish parties on Thursday began holding events and rallies in Kurdish areas in southeast Turkey to promote official recognition of the Kurdish language – a call that has been rejected for decades. Turkish security forces in the Cizre district of Sirnak province prevented the politicians and activists from gathering in the iconic Birca Belek Park. However, this did not stop them from gathering in front of the HDP office in Cizre. Badir Demir, one of the event’s organizers, told Rudaw they were not allowed to hold the event as planned “because the province’s officials would not tolerate it.” Kurdish has been banned in official settings in Turkey since the foundation of the state nearly a century ago. The restriction of the language was eased during the peace process between the government and the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) in 2013. However, when the process ended in 2015, things reversed. Huseyin Kacmaz, an HDP MP who attended the event in Cizre, told Rudaw the government has been trying to prevent activities promoting the Kurdish language through trustees they have assigned in the place of HDP mayors. “Their aim was to make our women and children marginalize their language but we will protect the language, no matter how much of a ban they impose on us,” he told Rudaw on Thursday. The campaigners gathered in Van province on Friday and are planning to hold similar events in Diyarbakir (Amed) on June 7. The events included Kurdish dancing and Kurdish songs as well as slogans which called for the language to become official in the country. Sharafkhan Ciziri, spokesperson for the cross-party Kurdish Language Platform, told Rudaw they want to promote the Kurdish language, adding, “Kurdish should be an official language.” Both the platform and Kurdish Language and Culture Network - which were key organizers of the campaign - have also launched a petition on change.org, aiming at collecting at least 25,000 signatures to make Turkey recognize Kurdish as an official language. So far, nearly 23,000 people have signed. “In order to end the political repression of our language, we must not restrict our demands to matters of legal regulation. We must also require elimination of all obstacles in practice. Kurdish must become an official language at all levels of government and state institutions, and must be a language of instruction at all levels of education,” a statement from the organizations read. Additional reporting by Abdulsalam Akinci
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