NATO unmasked on 'ethnic rights'
Turkey condemns Kurdish leader to death
By
Deirdre Griswold
A special Turkish court has sentenced Abdullah Ocalan,
leader of the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK), to death. His
trial had been held on a prison island where Ocalan was kept
virtually incommunicado. He was confined to a soundproof glass
cage in the courtroom.
The Kurds, a distinct people who live in parts of Turkey,
Iraq and Iran, have been fighting for their national rights and
identity for 15 years. Their language and culture are
suppressed by the Turkish government, which jails anyone
showing the slightest sympathy for the Kurdish cause.
Tens of thousands of Kurds have been killed by the Turks in
the resistance struggle.
Turkey is a member of NATO, and has been used as a base by
the U.S. and Britain in their bombing assaults on Iraq and on
Yugoslavia. The U.S. government feigns sympathy for the Kurds
in Iraq when it launches military operations in the north of
that country, but it actually assisted the Turkish regime in
the kidnapping of Ocalan from the Greek Embassy in Kenya, where
he had sought asylum.
Giving the Kurdish leader the death sentence is especially
vindictive because he has been seeking an accommodation with
the Turkish regime since long before he was captured. Ocalan
had made several public and dramatic appeals for opening a
dialog with Turkey over a political framework within which
Kurdish national rights would be respected.
At the time of his capture in February, there were immediate
and extremely militant demonstrations by Kurds in many European
countries. Symbols of the Turkish regime were assaulted, and
some Kurds even committed suicide to show the world the depth
of their commitment to their leader.
By contrast, the demonstrations after the sentencing were
militant but peaceful, reflecting the discipline of his
supporters who are pursuing at this time the course Ocalan laid
out from behind bars.
In his speech to the court, Ocalan had made a strong appeal
for a peaceful solution to the struggle. He had accepted full
responsibility for the liberation war, but had warned the
Turkish government that if it rejected his offer the Kurdish
people would have no alternative but to resume the war.
The contrast between the way this struggle has been handled
by the "international community"--read the imperialist powers,
led by the U.S.--and the struggle in Kosovo is glaring. The
U.S. and its allies in NATO have built up, trained and used the
KLA, which calls for an independent, ethnically Albanian
Kosovo, as shock troops against the Yugoslav government. Right
now, NATO is allowing the KLA to carry out terror against
Serbs, Roma people and ethnic Albanians who supported
Yugoslavia.
The savage bombing of Yugoslavia and subsequent NATO
occupation of Kosovo are presented by the corporate media as a
"humanitarian" effort designed to end "ethnic cleansing."
Unlike the KLA, the PKK has been fighting not for
independence but for autonomy. This has been clearly stated by
Ocalan in many interviews over the years. Yet the repression
against the Kurds has been fierce.
Where have the Western media been? They have shown no
interest in the bombed Kurdish villages, the weeping refugees,
the mass arrests, the torture and imprisonment of Kurds by
NATO's main ally in the Middle East.
Nor are they condemning the lynch-mob spirit now being
whipped up in Turkey against the Kurds.
The attitude of the Western imperialist media to the Kurds
is the clearest giveaway that their concern for ethnic
Albanians in Kosovo is totally hypocritical and
self-serving.
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