A BAD MOON RISES OVER TURKEY

I see the bad moon arising.
I see trouble on the way.
I see earthquakes and lightning.
I see bad times today.
~ John Fogerty.

This weekend, Yüksekova and Hakkari led the way on payback for the new realities on the ground in Turkey.

Below is a video from Yüksekova showing the protests in the city this weekend. Please note that although it may be possible for some people to mistake the police in this video for Israeli security forces and the protestors as Gazans, this is not the case.

Although, it's also possible for some to ask me what the difference is between Turkish and Israeli security forces and I'd have to say, "None."

Here's a similar video (hat tip: Özgür Gündem), which shows a pack of Turkish--not Israeli--police severely beating one Kurd--not a Palestinian.

In Beytüşşebap, Molotov cocktails and stones were thrown at the Kaymakam's headquarters and the post office building. There were also clashes with police. My sources indicate that no DTP party members intervened to end the beating of two not-so-lucky police in Beytüşşebap. There's a tiny bit from ANF on that here: http://www.firatnews.com/index.php?rupel=nuce&nuceID=18508 and something at Özgür Gündem.

The word from the region is that not only did the Kurds of Hakkari beat the shit out of two Turkish police, the people had also disarmed the police. In a moment of irony, if not for the intervention of DTP party members, the goat-smelling asses of these two police would have been torn to pieces by the crowd. You can see a video of those police getting what they so richly deserve, here.

Better luck next time.

Radikal had a number of photos from Hakkari, here. Below is a selection:

(I'm sorry, Mr. Police, but if you really love your fascist regime, you'll have to part with much, much more of your blood than that.)

In another item, I noticed that Radikal was reluctant to show the faces of two fascists who shot Şevket Aslan, a Kurdish youth who was attending a protest against DTP's closure in İstanbul Beyoğlu, but ANF had no such qualms. Here are the photos:





(Source: http://www.firatnews.com/gallery/index.php?rupel=galeri&gid=2491)

The images were captured by an AFP photographer. I hope they are spread around as much as possible so that these two hyenas can meet with an untimely end.

Human Rights Watch released a statement on DTP's closure. It says, "Blah, blah, blah, blah", which is exactly the same thing the ECHR is going to say about DTP's closure when their case finally makes its way through all the bullshit legal hurdles of the world's finest "democracies".

Excuse me for a moment while I vomit.

To end on a positive note, almost 800 new guerrillas have joined HPG in the last nine months (Source: http://www.firatnews.com/index.php?rupel=nuce&nuceID=18013). That's almost 100 new recruits per month. With any luck, by the spring we may see an increase in that average.

HELICOPTERS AND HUSH MONEY

"Hush Money. Noun: (Informal) A bribe paid to keep something secret."
~ American Heritage Dictionary.

There was an interesting article on the aftermath of the Beytüşşebap massacre published last Friday by Özgür Gündem, which I had bookmarked in order to point out. Today I noticed a portion of it was translated on Info-Turk. Besides, a friend passed me the information in email, all of which reminded me to post something about it.

The original article has been summarized at Info-Turk as follows:

Former DEP MP Selim Sadak who visited the relatives of the people killed in a massacre in Beytüşşebap said that the families told him that they knew the people who massacred their relatives. Sadak said that peasants told him that it was not done by PKK and the families knew the names of the perpetrators.

Sadak said: “A helicopter approached the crime scene after the incident but it leaves without taking any of the injured. How come there are no bullet shells in the area where 12 people were shot? There were water bottles and food tins on the crime scene? Who were using them? Why were those cleaned afterwards?

The occupants of the helicopter had a good vantage point of the area surrounding the massacre site. If HPG gerîlas had committed the massacre, why didn't the occupants of the helicopter see them and pursue them? Why didn't the helicopter fire at them? Oh, by the way, there is no such thing as an unarmed helicopter in The Southeast.

Selim Sadak added that if the official investigation of the Beytüşşebap massacre were legitimate, the names of the perpetrators would already have been made public. I would add that not only would the names of the murderers be public, the murderers would already be in custody.

Sadak is quoted as referring to other massacres that were committed by the regime and then blamed on PKK, Such as the Gevaş massacre in Wan in 1993 and the more widely known Güçlükonak massacre. Earlier the comparison with Güçlükonak was made on Rastî, and Hevallo has done the same.

The Özgür Gündem article goes on say that with each passing day it becomes clearer that the regime is responsible for the massacre, particularly since Erdoğan and the AKP have offered hush money, overtly and covertly, to the families of the victims. AKP ministers have already visited the families and gave them Erdoğan's money, but the exact amount remains a secret. The state-appointed governor of Şirnex (Şırnak) gave each family 2,000 YTL.

The state which has deprived the Kurdish people since 1923, has created a dire economic situation, has forced Kurds through economic deprivation to take up unofficial military service with the state through the Village Guard system, and has pursued a brutal war against the Kurdish people, now comes to bribe them for their silence.

The very people who have created the economic conditions of extreme poverty in The Region, now pretend to come as economic saviors to twelve individual Kurdish families. Well, after all, it is only hush money.

More questions about the massacre come up than are answered, but these are not appearing in Turkish media. The Beytüşşebap massacre is being buried by the guilty, something that the parliamentary human rights commission will no doubt see too. The only trustworthy one on that commission is Akın Birdal and he is outnumbered by the commission's AKP, MHP, and CHP members. On the bright side, IHD, Mazlum Der, and KESK will conduct their own, joint investigation and their results will be the ones to watch for.

Hevallo is circulating a petition against the Ankara regime's use of cluster bombs against the civilian population of South Kurdistan. Take a look at his post on the matter and sign the appropriate petition. There is one for citizens of the UK and one for all others. Both petitions will be given to the British prime minister.

ROASTING IN HELL

"On 13 February 2006 the Forensic Medical Institute released the results of DNA tests which confirmed that the remains were those of the missing 11 villagers. They had been buried in the place where they had been detained for days by the Bolu Commando Brigade before they disappeared never to be seen again."
~ Amnesty International

At least 13 Bolu Commandos (contra-guerrillas) were dispatched to the nether world today by the freedom fighters of the HPG. At this point it is not clear how many wounded contras there are, but let us hope that there are many of them and that they will soon join their comrades in hell.

Not bad for a day's work.

Lest anyone become teary-eyed over the untimely deaths of these monsters in the Bolu Commando Brigade, let's review a little history:

The Bolu Commando Brigade, for example, was reportedly responsible for numerous violations of the laws of war, including village destruction, indiscriminate fire, and "disappearances." Relatives of victims of several extrajudicial executions and "disappearances" in Diyarbakır province in 1993 named the Bolu Commando Brigade as the perpetrating unit. The European Court of Human Rights found Turkey guilty of violations of the right to life in two clusters of "disappearances" reportedly involving Bolu commandos. One case was the "disappearance" of eleven Kurdish inhabitants of the village of Alaca in Diyarbakır province in 1993 (Akdeniz and others v Turkey). The second was the "disappearance" of three men from the village of Cağlayan in 1993. Relatives said that soldiers from the Bolu Commando Brigade took the men away (Orhan v Turkey). None of the perpetrators of these incidents have been brought to justice.

Or, from a former Turkish soldier's account in Nadire Mater's book, Mehmedin Kitabı or the English version, Voices from the Front: Turkish Soldiers on the War with the Kurdish Guerrillas:

Five of us with leftist inclinations were labelled as terrorists. We were honest and people liked us. I never went into a skirmish, but before I went to the Orduevi, the Bolu commandos camped close to our unit and showed us videos of the operations they had participated in. In one of those videos, they asked a terrorist lad something like "Where are the others?" You can't hear it well because the helicopter is too loud. Anyway, they tell him that he will be set free if he tells the truth. I am summarising for you what I can remember. The child tells them things. The filming stops at that point. Then they throw him out of the helicopter. They kill him right there. That is what I witnessed. I saw transparent things in their hands and asked what they were. They were using them as key-chains. One of them said: These are ears, man. I asked: What ears? Apparently, they cut off the ears of the terrorists they kill and put them in Coca-Cola until the cartilage comes out. Then they use them as key-chains. I mean they, too, have lost it.

Okay, let me ask this again: Who are the real terrorists?

And there's something on how contra-guerrilla forces like the Bolu commandos were established in Turkey, from Serdar Çelik.

Whoever sheds a tear for these bastards deserves the same fate.

Military operations in the Şirnex (Şırnak) region remain at intense levels, as they have been since Abdullah Gül's recent visit to the military in The Southeast. Is that a coincidence? Most likely not. AKP and the Turkish military are in agreement over the genocide of the Kurdish people, an agreement that began to show itself during the Amed Serhildan in March 2006, when Erdoğan declared an open shooting season on Kurdish women and children. Gül's blessing for an increase in operations, including black operations, is, no doubt, an olive branch extended to the military, who opposed Gül's presidency.

I would also like to think that HPG's whacking of the contras is revenge for the contras massacre in Beytüşşebap. And that may not be so coincidental after all, since it was the contras (especially the Bolu Commando Brigade) who used to disappear people back in the 90's. Maybe they just finished reading Erdal Sarızeybek's book and liked the idea of dressing up like PKK.

Poetic justice.

There is some breaking news in Zaman about the extension of OHAL regions in The Southeast. Before the July elections, OHAL was declared in Şirnex (Şırnak), Sêrt (Siirt), and Culemêrg (Hakkari). It was recently extended until December, and now it's being extended to include an additional twenty-seven OHAL zones.

Now, there is something else to ask oneself: Was the Beytüşşebap massacre carried out by the Ankara regime to help justify the extension of the OHAL? Inquiring minds want to know.

I will definitely post more info on this when it becomes available.

To the hevals: Bijin û Serkeftin!

TURKEY'S KURDISH POLICY

"Turkey must be aware that we will be faced with an independent state in the north of Iraq when conditions are suitable. I can say that this would be a security problem rather than a political problem."
~ Yaşar Büyükanıt, Chief of General Staff.

The nice people at Info-Turk.be have translated IHD's statement on the Beytüşşebap massacre:

A minibus, in the rural area of Beytüssebap district of Sırnak province, was raked. 12 people (children, women and men) in the minibus were killed. At the moment, perpetrators of the attack are unknown.

The region has been declared as security zone a few months ago. As a result; entrance and exit is being kept under the control by security forces of the State. Media and public opinion, currently, do not have proper, right information about the attack.

So, as Human Rights Association (IHD) we are commenting the attack within the framework of our principal attitude that is; We are defending dominance of peace in our country. Keystone of peace is composed of human rights and freedoms, democracy and rule of law.

As IHD we are against attack, which targets civilian, without considering peace period or war period. We condemn the violation of the Article 3, which is about prohibition of arbitrary murdering and common in Geneva Conventions that are the most important documents of Humanitarian Law. We are against extrajudicial executions, which are violation of right to life, by the State organs.

We are against executions by organizations that use arm as a tool in their activities, too. The attack in Şırnak is inhuman and cruel.

IHD considers the attack as the one, which should be condemned and be against without regarding its perpetrators or aim. We are sharing sorrow of families whose relatives killed in the attack.

We demand for revealing perpetrators and bringing them to justice.

The Turkish version is at IHD's website.

Hevallo has taken the time to deconstruct the Ankara regime's initial lie about a seven-year-old being killed in the massacre. He also reminds us of the games played at the Hudson Institute, where quite a few scenarios for Turkish-occupied Kurdistan were concocted. I have to agree with him that it's entirely possible that a scenario like the one played out over the weekend in Beytüşşebap might be one of the results of the game plan hashed out by the perverted minds involved with Hudson.

In the meantime, Yaşar Büyükanıt has set up DTP as a target for the regime's assassins:

We are faced with a mentality which cannot bring itself to call a terrorist organisation terrorist, which calls members of this terrorist organisation "brothers", and which calls the Turkish Armed Forces "separatist".

Remember that DTP's Ankara office came under gunfire earlier this week.

Yaşar Paşa goes on to blame the incompetence of the TSK, in its fight against the Kurdish freedom movement, on those pesky human rights types, which is what he did in June.

And, as if it weren't enough to treat the Kurdish problem in Turkey (which the Ankara regime created) as a strictly security matter, Büyükanıt says that an autonomous Kurdistan in the South will "be a security problem rather than a political problem". It is clear then that the Ankara regime considers South Kurdistan as a "problem" in and of itself and has nothing whatsoever to do with PKK.

Land forces commander, İlker Başbuğ, who will succeed Büyükanıt as chief of the Turkish general staff, parroted the same idea earlier:

Land Forces Commander Ilker Basbug signaled Monday that the main worry of the Turkish Armed Forces regarding northern Iraq is the danger of the region becoming a center of attraction for Turkey's Kurds.

The area which is run by the autonomous administration of the Kurdistan Regional Government seems to be regarded as a main threat to Turkish unity.

"It is a fact that the developments in north of Iraq has given political, legal, military and psychological strength to the Kurds living in the region as they have never had or experienced before in the past. We must be careful about the developments in north of Iraq as these may give some of our citizens a feeling of belonging to this region," the Land Forces chief said.

The idea of Kurdish autonomy as a threat to the Turkish state will be the guiding principle of Turkish policy toward the South for the foreseeable future. The Ankara regime's fears of Kurds in Turkish-occupied Kurdistan getting uppity as a result of Southern autonomy is the reason for the renewed Dirty War in the North. TSK's massacre in Beytüşşebap is the practical expression of this policy. Expect to see many more similar TSK atrocities.

There's more on Büyükanıt's remarks about the "threat" of South Kurdistan at TNA which concludes with his remarks on the division of Turkey:

Let us be sure of one thing. No force can divide Turkey. No one has the power to divide Turkey.

Unfortunately, Büyükanıt is merely the most recent in a long line of fascists who, all by themselves, divided Turkey a very long time ago.

HPG STATEMENT ON BEYTÜŞŞEBAP MASSACRE

"There is no connection between the recent incident [in Beytüşşebap] and the guerrillas."
~ HPG Headquarters Command.

The Turkish Army Is Responsible for the Beytüşşebap Massacre


To the Press and Public:


On the day before yesterday, in the district of Beytüşşebap, province of Şırnak, twelve persons, including seven Village Guards, died by the strafing of a minibus. For notice, those responsible are the Turkish army and the illegal military organization, JİTEM.

Our freedom movement proclaimed a unilateral ceasefire one year ago on 1 October 2006. The Turkish military increased the intensity of its attacks for this proclamation and used all conceivable dirty methods of warfare.

Within this year, the Turkish army carried out 483 military operations. Chemical weapons and cluster bombs were used, as well as the systematic burning of forests. It came to war crimes before the eyes of the world public.

This war concept, which was intensified after the elections of 22 July, is a result of an agreement between the government party AKP and the military. Previously, it was already announced by military circles that the "extermination of terror" is attainable at the earliest by aiming at the "collaborators". Thus almost the entire society was set as the target. For this reason, after that, the course of action which followed showed that this method was implemented.

The dirty relations between institutions of the state, the army, and the government were uncovered by the the bomb attack on a bookshop in Şemdinli by the resident population. Those caught red-handed again implemented the network of gangs, JİTEM, informers, and the use of terror in Kurdistan, in order to intimidate the population. As strengthened Kontras were used in the form of Hizbullah in the mid-1990s, so today there are more organizations such as JİTEM and TİT.

The purposes of this approach are to isolate the guerrillas and to damage the prestige of the PKK. In Beytüşşebap, Village Guards were deliberately selected as the target of attack in order to break the passivity of these circles and turn them against the Kurdish movement.

In the consciousness of this reality, our HPG guerrillas put an emphasis on attacks against JİTEM in their latest actions. There is no connection between the recent incident [in Beytüşşebap] and the guerrillas. We call upon the public of Turkey to place no faith in this war propaganda which twists the facts. In addition, we continue to request the political parties, human rights associations, and democratic-civil-social organizations to examine the incident, and to find and to call to account its true authors.


HPG Headquarters Command

TURKISH ARMY COMMITS MASSACRE IN BEYTÜŞŞEBAP

"Security forces will intervene with every possible means indiscriminately, including against women and children."
~ R. Tayyip Erdoğan.

From Özgür Gündem:

HPG Headquarters Command issued a statement about the massacre of 12 people, including 7 village guards. HPG said: "The raid on a minibus that was carrying villagers in Beşağaç (Hemkan), village of Beytüşşebap was commited by the extension of the Turkish army, JITEM."

HPG said further that the Turkish army intensified the number of its operations, with every kind of dirty warfare and special warfare tactics, since the first of October 2006, when HPG's unilateral ceasefire went into effect.

The Turkish army implemented 483 operations. In these operations, the Turkish army used chemical weapons and cluster bombs, systematically burned Kurdistan's forests, used civilian vehicles during operations, and committed war crimes in front of the entire world.

It is not a surprise that the Turkish army intensified its operations after the July 22 elections, which shows that the military and AKP agreed on the annihilation of the Kurdish people. Earlier, the Turkish generals made statement: "If you want to drive out terrorism, the best would be to aim at the supporters of the terrorists."

Check an earlier post about TSK starving Kurdish villagers and murdering Kurdish infants, and you'll have an idea of what the Paşas mean when they say they plan to "aim at the supporters." They mean that the entire Kurdish population is their target.

Another indication that the military and AKP agreed, was the recent visit of Abdullah Gül to the region. This visit was played up in the media as Gül's "reaching out" to the Kurdish people. However, the true reason for Gül's visit to The Southeast was to thank the military for accepting his presidency. In return, the Paşas have AKP's blessing for a new Dirty War.

It began with the Şemdinli bombing. Even though Erdoğan stated that the the perpetrators would be pursued to the end, he promised that whoever was responsible, would be punished. AKP did nothing, however, because the trail of the perpetrators led to the top of the Turkish general staff--Yaşar Büyükanıt. The prosecutor Sarıkaya was removed from the bar for his attempt to open an investigation against Büyükanıt. Erdoğan made comments denigrating the credibility of witnesses. Now there will be a retrial in a military court, leaving the fox to guard the henhouse.

Finally, HPG states that the Beytüşşebap massacre was committed by TSK in order to create hatred between the village guards and HPG, in an attempt to marginalize HPG and sway public opinion against the Kurdısh freedom movement. For the last few years village guards have not engaged HPG gerîlas if it were possible to avoid engagements. Some vıllage guards have gone so far as to turn their weapons back over to the state. Tensions between village guards and gerîlas had been greatly reduced.

A number of large operations have taken place in Beytüşşebap since the Dirty War began, the most recent being at least 20 days of fighting around the town of Beytüşşebap. All of these have occured without any comment from the media. However, this massacre did draw media attention. The sudden emphasis on an atrocity in Beytüşşebap is an indication of its importance to the regime as anti-gerîla propaganda. The only ones interested in creating anti-gerîla propaganda is the Ankara regime and its ruling military elite.

Beytüşşebap is famous as the first rebellious Kurdish town in modern Turkish history, with its rebellion taking place in 1924, the year before Şêx Seîd's rebellion.

In related news, Hevallo mentions the resignation of Joseph Ralston as the US "PKK coordinator." Ralston had the chance to force the Ankara regime's hand to accept the ceasefire that went into effect one year ago today. How many lives would have been saved if the ceasefire had been accepted?

Instead, Ralston's legacy to the Kurdish people is the Beytüşşebap massacre in exchange for a couple of business deals. Brilliant job, murderer!