In the past few weeks, media attention on the Middle East has been largely focused on the possibility of a Turkish military invasion of the northern Kurdish region in Iraq. To much of the public, the conflict between the Turkish military and Kurdish rebels from the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) highlighted in the midst of these reports is new. However, for everyone else including policymakers in Washington, this is a conflict that has existed for two decades at the very least. The cause of this new-found attention of the situation by the media is the instability that such an invasion may bring to the only peaceful region in all of Iraq; an instability that may damage U.S. interests in the region.
Today, the international community and in particular, the U.S., seems to be coming together to urge against a Turkish invasion only after it has ironically empowered the same groups involved to continue with their conflict for the past decades. Only minimal research of the seemingly everlasting conflict is required in order for anyone to see the assistance provided by foreign powers to Turkey that have instigated the conflict to the level it has reached today. While the president of the United States has recently made some requests to Turkey to find a political, rather than military, solution to the problem with the PKK, the same president was taking an opposite stance on this issue just a little more than one year ago; a stance of unconditional support for the Turkish government in their military campaign to pursue what they deem is a terrorist organization.
One year prior to the Turkish parliament’s approval for an invasion of Iraq, Kurdish rebel leaders in coordination with the president of Iraq attempted to negotiate the PKK’s fifth unilateral ceasefire on several key conditions. The conditions were based on a political settlement of the Kurdish issue in Turkey, which included democratic reform as well as amnesty for the rebels. Despite public support for the ceasefire by members of the Iraqi government, and even certain officials in the European Union, as a possible solution to the decades-long conflict, the Turkish and United States governments rejected the ceasefire on all its terms.
Further provoking the conflict, the Bush Administration appointed former USAF General Joseph Ralston to assist Turkey with their military campaign. Not surprisingly, Ralston who is also a board member of the corporate arms-giant Lockheed Martin and a member of the most powerful Turkish lobby group in the United States, did not do much to try to solve the issue. Instead, Ralston overlooked one of the largest sales of American weaponry between Lockheed and the Turkish military. Lockheed and its stockholders would in turn become a primary beneficiary of the continued conflict between Kurdish rebels and the Turkish military.
Aside from the ethical issues that arise in regards to business and foreign policy by enriching proponents of the Turkish-Kurdish conflict, concerns for human rights becomes problematic, but unfortunately, are often ignored. The Turkish state has a dirty human rights record and their almost century-old refusal to grant their Kurdish citizens equal political, social, economic and cultural rights has, not surprisingly, become an obstacle for them in achieving democracy and in their pursuit of EU membership.
Despite these realities, consecutive American administrations have refused to acknowledge that the continuous violations carried out against Turkey‘s Kurdish minority have any correlation with the American weaponry used to carry out these violations. Hence, weapon sales continue further arming a deadly conflict.
Now, one year after yet another weapons deal, the creation of a threat has grown and has begun to collide with the Bush Administration’s own interests in the region. The Kurds in the north of war-torn Iraq are the only friends that the U.S. has been able to find in the entire country. Iraqi Kurds welcomed the U.S. invasion of Iraq and fought alongside American troops to secure key Iraqi cities and overthrow Saddam Hussein’s regime. However, Iraqi Kurds too, have their own interests. They have worked hard for the limited autonomy that they have gained in the northern region and have been successful in protecting it from the insurgencies plaguing the rest of the country. The Iraqi Kurds have stated that any invasion of their region under any pretext will cause their entire population to react with resistance, meaning that the Turkish military would not only be facing Kurdish rebels from Turkey but the hundreds of thousands of Iraqi Kurdish forces employed by the Kurdistan Regional Government.
Despite calls by some Turkish politicians declaring that their invasion would only be targeting the PKK, Iraqi Kurds fear the Turkish military intends to stay and occupy the region. Iraqi Kurdish officials claim that the Turkish government is pursuing discriminatory policies against its own Kurdish minority and is attempting to extend those policies to Kurds in Iraq as well.
Based on past experiences, the Iraqi Kurds have more reason to be concerned. Not only has the Turkish government rejected all calls by the Iraqi Kurds for peace talks in the past year, their military campaigns in Iraq have been common practice for the past decade. In 1997, the Turkish military had invaded the same region with over 30,000 of its troops and many Kurdish villagers became the victims of military targets. Not much was achieved by the Turkish military in their pursuit of PKK rebels based high up in the mountains, and furthermore to the misfortune of the people living in the region, the same Turkish troops were accused by organizations like the Human Rights Watch for “grave and widespread human rights violations” targeting civilians.
These past experiences have become a harsh memory to the realities of a Turkish occupation. Furthermore, these memories have been renewed with the constant shelling of villages along the Iraqi-Turkish border for the past year. Even without an invasion, there has been considerable damage caused by Turkish shelling of lands inhabited by civilians; something that has also become an irritant for the Iraqi Kurdish government.
Now, as threats become more involved on both sides, the stability of the most peaceful region in all of Iraq has come under great concern. With Turkey coming ever so closely to an invasion, everyone seems to finally understand how much this conflict affects everyone’s interests in the region.
The mainstream American media has become gravely concerned and many statements, and even headlines, bare the phrase that the “Kurdish problem” has now become an “American problem”. However, the United States‘ complicity in the conflict has made it an “American problem” all along; an American problem that needs U.S. pressure on Turkey for a peaceful solution very quickly.
The rejection for peace one year ago may have been a mistake that cost the region peace but the offer still seems available. Renewed calls for dialogue by Iraqi Kurdish officials and the Iraqi president may be the last chance for peace before a disaster unfolds.
Tensions continue to run high and the threats remain fresh in the air. Only time will tell whether Turkey will invade the peaceful region and create a new Iraqi war, or try to create peace and evade an everlasting conflict.
Goran Sadjadi is a freelance writer living in the United States. He visited Turkey and Iraq in August 2005 and is actively engaged in political analysis of the Kurdistan region and the Middle East.
Sources:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/5391880.stm
http://www.voicesoftomorrow.org/293/international/another-iraqi-war-instigated-by-profit.php
http://www.hrw.org/reports/1995/Turkey.htm
http://www.greenleft.org.au/1997/301/15278
http://hrw.org/backgrounder/eca/turkey/turkey_violations.htm
http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/la-ed-turkey22oct22,0,1368284.story?coll=la-opinion-leftrail
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