Kurdish lawyers in Germany aim to bolster lobbying power of Kurds

FRANKFURT, Germany – A newly-founded association in Germany aims to lobby for the Kurds by connecting diaspora Kurdish lawyers in Europe with colleagues in all parts of Kurdistan.

“As German-Kurdish lawyers we feel obliged and downright predestined to create human and legal bridges inside and outside of Germany,“ said  Kahraman Evsen, chairman of the new German-Kurdish Lawyers Association (DKJV).

Speaking to invited politicians, academics, activists and the media at the association’s founding event at the Goethe University in Frankfurt on Saturday, he said the DKJV aims to build a network of Kurdish lawyers in Germany and other parts of Europe.

In Germany, he said, the organization would focus on issues such as better integration and other conditions for Kurds, who he said now number some 1 million in the country. 

Evsen, who works at the European Commission in Brussels, emphasized that Kurds are the second-largest minority group in Germany, but that “nobody but the Kurds know that fact.”

He vowed that the DKJV was an independent organization that would work for all Kurds, regardless of their provenance.

In the different parts of Kurdistan, the association wants to train lawyers in order to promote good governance and the rule of law, as well as lobby for the Kurdish cause.

"We are committed to Kurdish unity everywhere. Irrespective of party affiliation; we believe in one diverse nation of Kurdistan," Evsen declared.

Thomas Schirrmacher, head of the theological commission of the World Evangelical Alliance and also president of the International Society for Human Rights, was honored as a special guest.

Referring to the DKJV, he said: “Under international law an ethnic or religious minority has the right to self-determination. But the Kurds were never asked, what they want for their future. Therefore lawyers are very important for the Kurdish cause.”

Others, like Claudia Roth, vice-president of the German parliament, hailed the new organization as an achievement for “democracy and the rights of immigrants and refugees.”

Via video messages various politicians from different parties congratulated the organization and called its founding a big step for democracy and the rule of law, including the German leftist, Green and Conservative parties, as well as the pro-Kurdish HDP in Turkey.

The event, which included Kurdish music and songs, began with a minute of silence for the Kurdish fallen.