Saturday, February 09, 2008

TURKEY'S EU-FUNDED WAR CRIMES IN KURDISTAN

"In Turkey, where the majority of an estimated 25 to 30 million Kurds live, resistance is costly; as the pictures show, even your dead body is not immune from abuse and degradation."
~ Kani Xulam, "Turkey's War Crimes".


ANF, via Özgür Gündem, suspects executions without judgement during recent clashes in Bingöl:


The operation in Dallıtepe village, Bingöl, in whcich TSK clashed with HPG guerrillas, has some contradictory statements from various sources. On the night that the conflict took place, news agencies (Cihan News Agency and Ihlas News Agency) provided news to the Turkish media that five guerrillas were killed and five were captured alive. In addition, the chief of police of Adilcevaz, Bitlis, called Salih Toro to tell him to come and identify one of the martyred guerrillas--his brother--and also that five guerrillas were captured alive.

Salih Toro went from Bitlis to Bingöl to identify the body of his brother based on the information given by the Adilcevaz police station. When he arrived at the Bingöl state hospital morgue, he was shocked to see ten corpses, because he had been told there were five corpses. His brother was not among any of the ten corpses. He realized that the information he received from the police station and the scene he witnessed at the hospital was inconsistent.

Toro then applied to the Bingöl IHD. DTP's Bingöl provincial chairman Ömer Faruk Ersöz mentioned that there were bullet wounds on the heads and through the hearts of the guerrilla corpses. Having previously been a member of a medical staff, Ersöz has some familiarity with wounds. "I used to be a medical staff member. Therefore I know how living organisms react when wounded. The HPG guerrillas that have been shot in the head and through the hearts might have suffered close-range shots. The skin of some of the corpses was peeled and the possibility of this kind of peeling happening during operations is very low. The skin appears as if it had been peeled by a knife."


Turkey abolished capital punishment for all crimes in 2004 but extrajudicial murder continues and all Turkish security forces enjoy impunity.

The hevals at KurdishInfo compiled reports from DIHA and ANF to continue the story--which grows more shocking (English):


In the Bingöl countryside of Dağlıtepe, 10 HGP-guerrillas lost their lives and were taken to the mortuary where the corpses were thrown on a heap allegedly because of a "lack of space". The pro-Kurdish party DTP and Turkey’s Human Rights Association (İHD) said that this was a crime and inhuman treatment.

The Democratic People’s Initiative is urging people to take a stand and see off the guerrillas’ funerals.

The governor of Bingöl, İrfan Balkanlıoğlu, said, "some of them weren’t circumcised". In response to this statement, the DTP province chairman Ömer Faruk Ersöz reacted: "There is a mentality which makes politics upon peoples genitals. The governor should immediately apologise to the people", demanded Ersöz.

The Human Rights Association’s department chairman in Bingöl, Mehmet Şirin Yanılmaz, asserted that "whatever opinion, whatever nation one might be from, the treatment meted out is inhumane. What kind of mindset doesn’t even show respect for the dead? Therefore one must treat everyone with humanity", insisted Yanılmaz.

The Democratic People’s Initiative said that the Turkish government and its army insist on war: "Despite all the efforts to achieve a cessation of fighting, the AKP and its supreme commander Yaşar Büyükanıt keep on insisting on war. It should be well understood that it is this organisation which thrives on blood and conflicts among people", they maintained.

[ . . . ]

As for the guerrillas who lost their lives, the Initiative said that they "send their condolences to the martyrs of freedom and democracy, to the guerrillas’ families, the people, its unquestionable force the PKK, and its military force the HPG. The Kurdish people should take care of their guerrillas wherever they may be. The people should see off the funerals of our guerrillas", they encouraged.


Balkanlıoğlu needs to provide proof of his own circumcision because we certainly can't take his word for it, the dirty, dirty boy. And this incident raises questions about the humanity of good Turkish Muslims like Balkanlıoğlu. Is this the behavior Balkanlıoğlu's religion teaches? Is this the behavior the religion of the mortuary workers teaches them? Or were they simply born as dirty, uncircumcised pigs?

Guess who's been helping to fund these atrocities? The EU. From ANF via Özgür Gündem:


It has been revealed that the EU is subsidizing the TSK under the name of a donation program. Seeing the TSK as the major impediment against democracy, the EU donated 497 million euros in 2007 to the Turkish General Staff.

These donations are made for the TSK's modernization. The EU's economic aid, supplied for the last five years, indicates the EU's hypocrisy. In the EU's 2007 donation program planning, the Turkish General Staff received most of the aid.

For the modernization of the TSK, the EU gave 497 million Euros in economic aid in 2007. This aid will continue in 2008, 2009, and 2010. According to this plan, the EU will donate 538 million Euros in 2008, 566 million Euros in 2009, and 653 million Euros in 2010.


It's kind of odd, don't you think, that the Turkish military and government are so very eager to receive money from the hands of dirty, uncircumcised Europeans?

Well, maybe it's not so odd after all.

6 comments:

Anonymous said...

And how Ozgur Gundem knows this? They got some informers in the Turkish army or journalists working in the capital of Europe? What's their source?

Anonymous said...

It is good to see you quoting Kani Xulam. He is one of the best advocates of Kurdish rights.

Mizgîn said...

Serhado, check Radikal and Akşam. Turkish media seems to be carrying the information right now. I haven't seen anything in English yet.

In addition, Srusht, Kani has some excellent writing.

Anonymous said...

Gellek spas. I already had the suspicion Firat uses loads of Turkish sources.

Mizgîn said...

Well, Turkish media has reported accurately about Sibel Edmonds when the first article about her came out in The Sunday Times--they even mentioned Marc Grossman and the work Luke Ryland has done on the case.

The American media still hasn't mentioned anything about it.

You have to be careful in reading it, but Turkish media can be better than American media.

In the case of this post, why would Turkish media say anything about EU donations to TSK? Why would it say anything about the "projects" for modernization and accession . . . including the "Mehmetcik Project"?

Anonymous said...

It is obscene and an insult not only to the Kurdish people but to the people of Cyprus, the Armenians, the Greeks and all the countless Europeans who died in centuries of fighting to expel these unrepentant genocidal murderers from Europe, that we are now forced to subsidise their war machine with our taxes.

Of course this is nothing new - the Great Powers of Europe propped up their pestilent empire for centuries as an ally in our endless fratricidal wars...if they had done the decent thing even as late as 1923 there would be a strong Greek state including the Asiatic coast, no Turkish troops on Cyprus, Kurdistan and Armenia in their historic boundaries...and the Turks themselves forced to grow up, face their past honestly and learn some respect for other peoples and cultures.

How we fix the current mess is beyond me...and still the EU funnels money to the Turkish army, while Greece and Cyprus are continually running to keep up in the arms race.