"given to the earth"

"Given to the earth" is a literal translation of the Turkish idiom for being buried ("toprağa verildi"), which is seen often in Turkish (and especially Kurdish) news outlets reporting on the endless war between the PKK and the Turkish government.  In these papers and websites, someone is always being "given to the earth," as if the dirt of Anatolia felt an insatiable hunger for human flesh.  I made this musical collage in about a week, combining images from a multitude of online sources and Philip Glass's haunting music for "The Hours."  W.H. Auden famously wrote that "poetry makes nothing happen," and he was probably right.  If this minor attempt at art results in anything, it is likely to be only a transient sense of awe. Turkey's police state remains the same.  Formerly it was run by the "security forces" in collusion with statist prosecutors and judges, and the ever-changing "democratically-elected" governments only pretended to rule.  Now the "deep state," as it is known, is under new ownership.  Recep Tayyip Erdoğan and his AK Party play at being democrats, just as before, but as 2012 begins they have convincingly taken over the machinery of repression.  My few readers will know current events in Turkey as well as I.  If my brief video collage survives in "the valley of its saying" (Auden again) for a day or two, that will have to suffice.

A Vacancy in the Kurdosphere

Cengiz Candar in Yuksekova, SE Turkey

As mountain snows melt and war returns to the east of Turkey, one person is missing from the ranks of those who describe events, analyze trends, and translate important documents of that never-ending conflict. Mizgin Yilmaz, the vehemently pro-PKK proprietress of Rasti, has not posted a word in her domain since February 15 of this year. No one knows where she has gone, or why. For that matter, no one ever knew who she really was, or where she lived. But one thing is certain: this is unusual behavior in one who has usually posted at least 3-4 times a week.

I have read Mizgin's blog regularly since I first came upon it several years back. It really is necessary reading. (Even the Turkish General Staff logs on regularly.) No one else among pro-Kurdish bloggers is able to summon her range of offbeat sources and translate them so deftly into English. Thanks to her, I was able to locate the website of the PKK and copy from it photographs which now have been passed along to other sites on the Net. Thanks to her, I think I now have a much better grasp of the Turkish reality. Of course, she is not "fair and balanced." No one would ever mistake Mizgin the Blogger for a warm, cuddly person. I, who am anything but a radical leftist--Hey, I just want people to be happy! ;)--have sometimes been appalled by what seems almost a bloodthirstiness in her writing, as if all the enemies in her world deserved to be liquidated immediately. To Mizgin, Prime Minister Erdogan of Turkey is Katil Erdogan, Murderer Erdogan; any website with a positive word to say about Turkey's government is "pro-terrorist." But seldom if ever have I thought that I wasted my time reading her blog.

Now Rasti is vacant, a space on the web with a big question mark over it. In her last post of February 15, Mizgin translated a column by Cengiz Candar, in Radikal, in which the author, a prominent journalist and good guy of long standing among Turkey's liberals, analyzed the situation in Turkey's Southeast and saw clearly that the promises of 2009 were rapidly turning to dust. Now his fears have become real. The old cycle of attack and revenge has begun anew. Turkey's government, concentrating on a long-overdue reform of Turkey's Constitution, has been unable or unwilling to deliver on its promise of democracy for the Kurds. Obviously, Mizgin wrote, with an ominous link to the website of the PKK, "there is only one path left."

Meaning what? We don't know. But something about this prickly, ferocious woman has earned our affection. So while the wishes for her safety and well-being accumulate in her Comments, I will remember her by re-posting her translation of Cengiz Candar's article in Radikal. Read it, and know reality.

Oppression and Disappointment in the Southeast
by Cengiz Candar
Translated by Mizgin Yilmaz

If you make your way to the Southeast often--and not only talk to officials but also particularly have a relationship with the street--if you open up your heart and listen to the region's people, there is a result that you can easily arrive at: the ruling party's regional parliamentarians are not representing the region in Ankara but are representing Ankara and their party in the region.

I've stated this on every occasion when I met with important people in the state and in the government. The AK Party's Southeastern parliamentarians are not representing their regions; they do not convey the pulse of the Southeast to Ankara. Whenever they go to their election districts, they represent Ankara and their party.

Therefore, PM Erdogan's statement, "There are 75 Kurdish parliamentarians in my party," or the AK Party's receiving the greatest amount of votes in the region doesn't mean anything.

Have you ever heard these 75 "Kurdish" parliamentarians open their mouths to say anything about the Kurdish question? Have you ever heard them mention the unbearable oppression in the region in Ankara in front of the public?

A couple of days ago, Diyarbakır's Special Heavy Penalty Court convicted a fifteen-year-old girl called Berivan for "throwing stones at police" in addition to "cheering party slogans" during the events that took place on 9 October in Batman. She was convicted to 13.5 years at the first hearing. Yes, at the very first hearing.

Since she was a minor, the court showed mercy and reduced its punishment to seven years and nine months! At the event [during the protest in Batman], Berivan's face was covered with a scarf but police were determined that the girl with the scarf was Berivan. That girl with the scarf may very well be Berivan; but while there is more solid and concrete evidence for the generals who gathered to overthrow the government, which is a crime against the state, and while they've been released pending trial, have you ever seen any Southeastern AKP parliamentarian object to Berivan's conviction of 13.5 years for stoning police and cheering party slogans?

Do you know that there are over 1,000 children in prison in the Southeast?

In a condition where belief in justice is damaged so deeply, can we talk about the "Democratic Initiative" or the "National Unity and Brotherhood Project"?

In the Southeast there is no justice but oppression!

The other day, one of the members of AKP's executive council told me that in the council meeting PM Erdoğan was informed that people in the Southeast are very happy and very excited about the ongoing events [the "democratic" initiative]. Based on the PM's sources, everything is going well in the Southeast. Whereas the contrary is the case and the "political decision maker" [Erdoğan--i.e. Turkey's "decider guy"] is being deceived or prefers being deceived. Again, another piece of information I received from a similar source: AK Party's executive council is expecting very important incidents about Kandil around Newroz. If there are AKP members that believe this, I'm curious about what planet they're living on. Newroz is only one and a half months away; is there any indicator that thousands of armed people from Kandil will come and surrender?

Well, is there any little indication of a general amnesty to come out for the ones at Kandil? There are only two possibilities left so far. 1) America and Iraqi Kurds will have a joint military operation and finish PKK's military existence--for those who believe this, they are living in a dream. 2) The ones at Kandil disappear unexpectedly.

There are no such situations and there isn't the slightest sign that these will happen.

Meaning, within one and a half months, related to Kandil, it is impossible for any incident to happen, for PKK to disarm. A "climate" for such a thing has been removed in Turkey anyway. In the region [Southeast], in addition to 1,000 children, more than 1,000 people in political groups, including elected mayors, have been arrested.

The PKK members who came from Kandil three months ago are free; mayors have been handcuffed and arrested for having connections with PKK.

There are two ways to make the armed cadres give up on armed struggle:

1. Regarding Kurdish identity, you have to take such unilateral democratic steps that will remove the armed group's masses of supportö and the support will completely be removed. There won't be support of the masses for armed forces.

2. Open up ways for armed groups to become involved with peaceful [without arms] politics.

Until now, regarding the first, there are positive but insufficient steps. Regarding the second, just the contrary is being done. Elected people, who are involved with peaceful politics, are jailed. It is a politics of "to the ones in the cities calling 'go to the mountains'; meanwhile, to the ones in the mountains, 'stay there'" is being made.

The "negative atmosphere" and the "disappointment" in the region were reflected to Ankara as "information to the state in the governors' meeting". The governors in the East and Southeast told Interior Minister Beşir Atalay that, "initially, the democratic initiative raised expectation and excitement to their peaks in the region. Citizens became very hopeful. When the package ["democratic" initiative's packages] was presented, a serious disappointment took place. The citizens are expecting more concrete steps."

They are right.

For months, we have been saying and writing this. I forgot exactly how many articles I wrote specifically about this issue and specifically in this way. The governors who work in the region mentioned that our people's expectation became lively in March of last year due to Abdullah Gül's statement of "soon there will be good things on the Kurdish question" and with the initiative, their expectation is at its peak.

President Gül said those words to three journalists--of whom I was one--in the plane on the way to Tehran. Since that day, I am among those who've been keeping an eye on the pulse of the region. I spent a remarkable amount of the summer months in the Mardin, Van, Doğubeyazıt, and Kızıltepe regions. On 1 August [2009], I was among the attendees for the Kurdish Workshop. One month later, in September, I traveled 1,000 kilometers between Diyarbakır and Şemdinli.

Today's atmosphere is 180 degrees different from the atmosphere of those days.

It is as much a deep disappointment and negative atmosphere [now] as it was equally positive in those days.

How in the world will "national unity and brotherhood " come about without including our Kurdish citizens who live in the Southeast, who want to join with great enthusiasm and an expectation of an optimistic future?

How will a "national unity and brotherhood" will come about from a region where 1,000 children are currently living lives of misery in prisons?

The Interior Ministry said "İnşallah, soon good things are going to happen" to the governors and wanted them to wait for a while. I wish this problem could be solved with "İnşallahs" and empty promises. This is not a kind of problem that can be solved with "İnşallahs" and "Maşallahs".

And god forbid the potential of the disappointment is so great as to overwhelm the struggle against the junta members in Ankara and Istanbul, and to overwhelm Turkey's successful foreign politics that present Turkey as a "rising regional power".

PM Erdoğan needs to open up his eyes to the ongoing things in the Southeast and, without any delay, he must change track.

The Baby in the Iron Womb (continued)

A sign of reality?

This isn't a good time for an American to evaluate the politics of another country. We sit here with all our faults exposed: lunatic "tea-baggers" on parade; our economy trillions in debt; our politicians determined to prove their spinelessness or their stupidity, or both. But in Turkey, what a year 2009 has been: a year of hope and despair; of war and cease-fire; of initiative and inertia. It began in the spring with a political campaign, and democracy's most common ploy: an attempt to buy votes. The election: a nationwide poll for local officials. Across the southeast, and especially in the province of Dersim (Tunceli), Turkey's ruling AK Party called up their bankers, loaded up the trucks, and started delivering prizes to local voters. There is a great tradition of this sort of thing in western democracies. In England it used to be free ale. In 19th century America, it was free whiskey and cider. More recently, among big-city political machines, hams or turkeys went out by the thousands. In the southeast this spring it was refrigerators.

For the AKP, however, it didn't work out. The Kurds took the refrigerators from the AKP and voted for the other party, the DTP, or Democratic Society Party, which won big victories in local elections across the Kurdish southeast. The Turkish state responded in the usual way: they started arresting officials of the DTP. The charge: "supporting terrorism." This is what all DTP members are accused of: they won't denounce the PKK and its guerrillas as a "terrorist" organization; therefore, they are "supporting terrorism." Never mind that the PKK is a bunch of armed people organized in military units, dressed in uniforms, attacking another bunch of armed people in military units and also dressed in uniforms. The Turks insist that this makes them "terrorists." Never mind that the civilian politicians of the DTP all know families who have lost a child fighting in this war, or know people who have been driven out of their villages by the Turkish Army, or know people who are either in the PKK or have been involved with them: they must, in spite of this, denounce practically everyone they know as a "terrorist."

By May, Barack Obama had come and gone, repeating the usual State Department-Pentagon boilerplate about Turkey's "vibrant democracy" and fight against "terrorism." Abdullah Gul, President of Turkey, declared in May that, “Whether you call it a terror problem, a southeastern Anatolia problem or a Kurdish problem, this is the first question for Turkey. It has to be solved.” The AKP government, backed by business interests and hungry for its pending EU application to be approved, began to make noises about sincerely wishing to improve the lives of its Kurdish citizens, openly admitting that things had to change. In June, however, appearing at a news conference in Washington, D.C., the Turkish Armed Forces Chief of Staff stated quite plainly that his forces had no intention of making peace, and would fight on until the last terrorist was killed.

Nevertheless, by July and August, Prime Minister Erdogan and his associates seemed bent upon doing the impossible: bringing democracy to Turkey. They were calling their program, still undefined, as the "Kurdish opening." More Kurdish broadcasting hours; the restoration of Kurdish names for villages and towns; endless optimistic discussions in the news media: everything, it seemed, was going the right way, and with the PKK abiding by a unilateral cease-fire, the war seemed abated.

Except it wasn't. Low-grade conflicts continued, and the Turkish Army never stopped shelling across the border toward PKK positions in northern Iraq. Human rights monitors reported the same patterns of harassment and abuse among the populace. By the end of August the nationalist opposition was speaking out, saying that the nation was "one" and always would be, and Gen. Ilker Basbug, the Chief of General Staff, repeated that he had no intention of making peace with anyone.

In October, joy erupted. At the directive of Abdullah Ocalan, the imprisoned PKK leader, a group of PKK fighters came down from the mountains and crossed through the Khabur border gate between Iraq and Turkey. Turkish officials allowed them entry and did not arrest them, and they proceeded through Cizre and on to Diyarbakir. What followed were surely the most extraordinary days in the history of Turkey's Kurds. Masses of people flooded the roads and streets in the PKK group's path, waving banners and shouting with happiness. Peace truly seemed possible.

But this was Turkey, and nationalist Turks were offended. The celebration was "unseemly." The Army, nationalist politicians, and parents of dead Turkish soldiers did not approve. The Democratic Society Party (DTP) was accused of orchestrating the spectacle. Which of course they did. And why shouldn't they? This was the first time in thirty years that young PKK fighters had come back to their families in anything but coffins. How could the Kurds of the southeast NOT celebrate this occasion? They would have to be made of stone not to feel the importance of these events. Anyone who goes to the website of Firat (Euphrates) News, http://firatnews.com, and enters into its Search (Arama) window the word "taziye," can see why. There they are, hits by the hundreds. Taziye means "condolence," and it refers to the "condolence tents" which are erected for grieving families to receive visitors after (a) their son or daughter has been killed fighting with the PKK, (b) their child has been killed by a mine or a stray mortar shell, or (c) their husband or child has been found murdered. At Firat News page after page of "taziye" hits roll by, and anyone with the decency to look will see why the Kurds of Turkey's southeast would feel justified in displaying their happiness at seeing their children come back alive.

But it was the opening needed by Turkish nationalists. For years they had been waiting for first the AKP, and then the DTP, to be closed by the Constitutional Court. In 2008 the AKP had barely escaped closure, and after their reprieve the Erdogan government had a chance to change the laws that have made Turkey, in the common phrase, "a graveyard of political parties." Not only did they not do so, they did not try. In the aftermath of the PKK return celebrations, the court went ahead with the case against the DTP.

In the meantime, in the absence of any sign of peaceful intent from the Turkish Army, and after losing a score of their guerrillas to air, artillery, and ground attacks from the Turks, the PKK officially abandoned their cease-fire. Still, they did not pursue an active campaign of aggressive attacks. That ended in early December, when a group of PKK fighters, acting on their own initiative, ambushed a Turkish patrol in the province of Tokat in central Anatolia, alarmingly close to Ankara. Nationalist anger erupted, and within days the results came down in the case against the DTP.

The conclusion was foregone. The DTP was closed, and its leaders were barred from participating in politics for five years. All twenty of the DTP's members in Parliament resigned their posts in protest. And the cities of the southeast have exploded in what one Kurdish newspaper called "waves and waves" of riots, protests, and violence.

But it's a humble shepherd who I find, thanks to a friend, is the quintessence of all this absurdity. Abdullah Isnac (is-notch) must be the lowest-ranking municipal employee ever to get in trouble for a political demonstration. The Taraf newspaper uses the word "coban" to describe him, a word which in English, at least, has rather positive connotations. Really, it means that he looks after animals. In this case, it is stray cows that have wandered away from their owners and are blocking the streets of Sirnak, that town behind the Cudi mountain whose name means "Noah City" (shehr-nakh), after the landing-place of the Ark. In the indictment of the DTP, he is identified as a "politican" and is barred from politics for five years. So perhaps this is the way 2009 ends for Turkey, with the story of a poor shepherd, the lowliest of city employees in the southeastern town of Sirnak, a man whose job it is to round up stray cows from the city streets and return them to their owners, a man who despite his insignificance is mentioned by name in the most important judicial decision of the year and forced to "keep out of politics" for the next five years. Thus has history repeated itself, and ended again in farce.

Has Turkey totally regressed on the Kurdish question? No one can say that. The AK government says that they will stick by their program, and maybe they will. The Kurds most definitely are not going back to where they were. Near Diyarbakir, road signs (see above) point to villages whose Kurdish names are reborn. In the same city, a little girl has opened a home school to teach her classmates how to read and write Kurdish. In the Turkish parliament, a Kurdish politician has risen to describe, in candid terms, the genocide of 1915 against the Armenians. Despite police repression, people have long since ceased to be afraid of expressing their opinions or their identity. In the mountains, the PKK claims that 800 new recruits have graduated from their training camps in the past nine months. In Turkey, no one is backing off.