KAYSERI COMMANDO GARRISON DESTROYED BY PKK!

Who am I, you ask?
The Kurd of Kurdistan,
a lively volcano,
fire and dynamite
in the face of enemy.
When furious,
I shake the mountains,
the sparks of my anger
are death to my foes.
~ Cigerxwîn, "Kîme Ez".

Oh, SWEET!!

A brigade of Kayseri commandos has been destroyed early this morning Kurdistan time by the beloved freedom fighters of the People's Defense Force (HPG)!

U-LULULULULULULULULU!!!!

Before we get to the announcement, let's review the role of Kayseri commandos in Turkish-occupied Kurdistan [emphasis in the original]:

The decision to ‘train’ alongside Turkey’s mountain commandos in 1997, we should note, was also made two years after Human Rights Watch had publicly disclosed that “two special Commando Brigades, Bolu and Kayseri, [we]re heavily involved in counterinsurgency operations. Unlike the regular Turkish Army forces, the Bolu and Kayseri [mountain commando] units [we]re more highly trained and [we]re expected to engage in closer contact with PKK fighters and with civilians suspected of supporting the guerrillas. [Witness] B.G. told Human Rights Watch that during his April 1994-May 1995 stint in the southeast, he learned that the Bolu and Kayseri were considered by soldiers and civilians alike to be far more abusive of the civilian population than the regular Army. ‘Nasty behavior toward the population [wa]s encouraged in the Bolu and Kayseri brigades’, he explained, ‘while the Piyade (infantry) Commando tend[ed] to be kinder. The commanders want[ed] there to be a kind of good guy - bad guy situation, which they then use[d] to threaten the locals. They sa[id] be good or we’ll send the Bolu after you!’ Bolu and Kayseri Commandos were prevalent throughout the 1994 Tunceli [Dersim] campaign, during which tens of villages were destroyed. Witnesses interviewed by Human Rights Watch said they were able to identify Bolu and Kayseri soldiers, and reported that they were involved in numerous violations of the laws of war, including village destructions, indiscriminate fire, and kidnapping civilians who were then forced into serving as porters during Army patrols … The Bolu and Kayseri Commandos”, furthermore, “appear to have incorporated a significant number of U.S.-designed M-16 assault rifles and M-203 grenade launchers into their regular arsenal … According to Reuters, 5,000 Bolu and Kayseri commandos joined 35,000 other forces in the Tunceli campaign [See ‘Turkish Army Torches 17 Villages, Residents Say,’ Reuters, October 5, 1994]”.

Now that we know these bastards have received what they have so richly deserved, on to the news report, from ANF:

Garrison Destroyed in Çukurca!

It has been announced that HPG guerrillas, who conducted an operation against a mobile military garrison in Çukurca, destroyed the entire garrison and killed 30 soldiers. It was also reported that the guerrillas confiscated a number of weapons and munitions.

The clashes started between 0100 and 0200 hours. The mobile garrison that was targeted by the guerrillas was located 30 km from Çukurca district in Hantepe, between Bilican and Talise villages and the military unit was the Kayseri Commando Military Brigade Command.

30 Soldiers Killed

According to HPG sources, in the operation against the Bilican mobile garrison the entire garrison was destroyed. In the operation, in which 30 soldiers were killed, many weapons like artillery and artillery shells were destroyed.

Weapons Confiscated

While the TSK came to pick up their wounded soldiers with helicopters they too encountered guerrilla intervention and it was reported that the helicopters were fired at [by the guerrillas]. HPG sources also indicated that the helicopters were forced to retreat.

In addition, during the guerrilla operation, the guerrillas went into the military units and confiscated many weapons and munitions.

Clashes Continue

Clashes in the region, in the Uzundere area are still ongoing under the control of the guerrillas. Details of the clashes are expected from HPG soon.

One would presume that these Kayseri commando-types are the same types that would fill the ranks of a so-called professional army within TSK, which would be posted to Turkish-occupied Kurdistan to fight our guerrillas.

Sweet!!

Bijî Gerîla!


Çok Yaşa Gerilla!


Çok Yaşa Önder Apo!

CEASEFIRES AND STATE TERRORISM

"These enemies of humanity who believe that the state authority has weakened and turned their guns on our innocent citizens will definitely drown in the hole that they have fallen into. Such attacks which are against the existence of the Turkish Republic prove how just we are in the struggle against terrorism."
~ Turkish Prime Minister Tansu Çiller on the Güçlükonak Massacre.

Well, we all know Ergenekon goes east of the Fırat. Now they are finding out. From Özgür Gündem:

Ekmen confessed it: The Güçlükonak massacre was conducted by the state


The former state minister responsible for human rights, Adnan Ekmen, had important statements about the Güçlükonak massacre. These statements shed light on the reasons for leaving the Kurdish question unresolved and point out the who provoked, and why, the declared ceasefire.

The confession came after 13 years

The minister responsible for human rights in the 52nd government, in which Tansu Çiller was prime minister and Deniz Baykal was foreign minister, Adnan Ekmen made statements to Yeni Aktüel magazine by saying, "My conscience makes me uncomfortable": "Although we knew the background of the event, unfortunately we could not explain it to the public. According to the hearings from the region and from the relatives of the people who were killed, we realized that the situation was not the same as the security forces were talking about. The event that took place was in a location where the security forces had full control anyway; It was impossible for PKK to conduct an operation. Yet the ID cards of the murdered were in the hands of the security forces, people were burned; however, somehow, their ID cards were never damaged. Apparently the people who burned them took their ID cards before burning them. To me, this was the point that exposed them.

"We sat and talked about what we could do together with the ministry's bureaucrats. I called a village guard chief and tribal leader who I trusted, and told him what I had heard. He said to me, 'I cannot lie to you; whatever you heard is true. The official statement ofthe security forces does not reflect the truth.' I asked him whether he would be willing to tell us the truth if we went to Güçlükonak; 'This is not possible. If we tell the truth we cannot protect ourselves, and neither can you,' he said. After he said that we changed our minds about going to Güçlükonak.

"I offered Deniz Baykal the things that I knew, to tell Prime Minister Çiller. When he said 'It is up to you, but the Prime Minister is very busy nowadays,' I changed my mind."

"I told the event to the chairman of CHP, of which I was a member, and I told him that I wanted to share what I heard with the public. He asked me why they were putting the blame on PKK. In Europe there would be a very important vote about the Kurds. By blaming this incident on PKK, I said to him that they might want it to give a message to the association which would hold the election."

First ceasefire, first provocation

Özal wanted it, a ceasefire was declared.

President Turgut Özal conveyed his ceasefire demand to PKK through the PUK leader Celal Talabani. The Kurdish people's leader, Abdullah Öcalan, responded to Özal's demand positively. On 17 March 1993 in Lebanon's Bar Eliyas town, Öcalan and PUK leader Celal Talabani, as mediator, came out in front of the press and declared a 25-day ceasefire.

Özal expressed his satisfaction to Talabani, who visited him after the ceasefire, by saying: "For ten years it is the very first time I slept peacefully." After Özal's positive reaction, one day after the limited ceasefire, on 16 April, in Bar Eliyas, Öcalan came out in front of the press one more time and declared that they had extended the unilateral ceasefire indefinitely.

Özal's suspicious death and the 33 soldiers incident

Özal, who had sympathy for most of the demands that were mentioned in the ceasefire, including a general amnesty, died suddenly, one day after the indefinite ceasefire, on 17 April 1993. It was stated that Özal suffered a heart attack. However, many people, primarily his family, and including Öcalan, said "Özal was murdered". On 24 May 1993, the news of the massacre came. Şemdin Sakık, who blocked the Bingöl-Elazığ highway and killed 33 unarmed soldiers, declared the end of the first ceasefire. Öcalan said that incident of the murder of 33 soldiers was not related to them [PKK] and he refused to take responsibility. Öcalan mentioned this truth many times on İmralı and he called for the enlightenment of this incident.

Second ceasefire, second provocation

This time Çiller wanted it

After Özal's death, Süleyman Demirel became president and Tansu Çiller became prime minister. Çiller sent a letter to Öcalan, again through Talabani, and wanted Öcalan to declare a ceasefire. After that, PKK declared the second unilateral ceasefire on 15 December 1995.

11 villagers were raked with gunfire and burned

One month after the ceasefire, on 16 January 1996, this time the news came from Şırnak's town, Güçlükonak. The Koçyurdu minibus, which contained 11 villagers, was raked with gunfire and the corpses were then burned. The general staff and government officials declared the operation was conducted by PKK. PKK, on the other hand, defined the incident as "provocation through state-related contra groups" and despite this incident, declared the "continuation of the ceasefire". However, for the very first time the general staff took journalists, including foreign journalists, to the scene and made anti-PKK statements. However, the general staff did not let the journalists talk to the villagers.

Intellectuals blamed the state

The Together for Peace Working Group members, intellectuals, and journalists, went to the scene twice and found clues. They focused on the fact that the incident was related to the state. They sued, however not only did they receive no result, but also they were countersued by the charge of "insulting the army" and were convicted to ten years in prison.

Two days after the massacre, the EU parliament would assemble for a ceasefire

During the Güçlükonak incident, the European parliament had assembled for an important agenda. Turkey conducted its military operation despite the PKK's unilateral ceasefire. However, the ceasefire issue became a hot debate in the international arena. The European parliament called PKK and Turkey for a democratic solution to the Kurdish question on 13 December 1995. The ceasefire decision was given as a response to this call. In fact, a proposition related to Turkey was accepted unanimously during the 18 January 1996 session. One of the articles in the proposal was about the ceasefire: "The European parliament greets the unilateral ceasefire declared by Öcalan and accepts this initiative as a positive response to the European parliament's decision on 13 December 1995. At the same time it [the European parliament] hopes Turkey considers this gesture as a step towards a peaceful solution and accepts it as an opportunity to initiate a national-level dialog to overcome the problem in the Eastern Anatolian Region." Just two days before the meeting at which this decision was made, the Güçlükonak massacre took place.

Villagers were detained

It was revealed that some of the villagers who were murdered were detained and were held in the Taşkonak Jandarma Battalion, and some of them were taken from their homes on the day of the incident. Among the people who were killed, Halit Kaya's daughter from Yatağankaya village, Ramazan Oruç's son, and Ali Nas's nephew from Çevrimli village had previously joined the PKK guerrillas.

Third ceasefire, third provocation

Everyone wanted a ceasefire

Prime minister Erdoğan made moderate statements related to the Kurdish question in 2005 and showed attempts to make PKK declare a ceasefire. Many parties, including the US, the EU, KDP, PUK, AKP and DTP, made various attempts toward this issue. On 1 October 2006, PKK declared a ceasefire. However no improvement was made after the ceasefire.

Massacre in the first year of the ceasefire

One year passed and the ceasefire was still in effect. On 29 September 2007, the news of the massacre came from Şırnak's Beytüşşebap. Twelve people in a minibus going to Beşağaç (Hemkan) village were ambushed. The general staff and the government made a statement that "PKK did it" about the massacre, which resembled the Guclukonak incident. PKK on the other hand declared that "the massacre was committed by JITEM, which is linked to the army". Villagers also said that the incident was conducted by village guards and JITEM; the information received confirmed this claim. After this date, not only did the hope for a solution to the Kurdish question weaken but it was also the start of the cross-border operations. Thus the policies of violence entered a new stage.

Kaplan: The state prosecutor must act

DTP's Şırnak parliamentarian Hasip Kaplan expressed his views regarding the statements made by the former minister responsible for human rights at that time, Adnan Ekmen, and wanted the state prosecutor to take action. Kaplan said, "The investigation and evidence previously found by the intellectuals and the NGOs is today confirmed one more time by the statements of someone who has been at the ministry level. The prosecutor must immediately begin an investigation, listen to Minister Ekmen, the intellectuals, and the NGOs who have previously made such investigations. Because this is a massacre case, a case of provocation, the case must be reopened." Mentioning that they would take this issue to the parliament's attention, Kaplan said: "Previously we had given question and investigation proposals to the parliament regarding extrajudicial murders and massacres. We are going to keep a close eye on these. We will bring up this incident too."

Now tell me again, who are the real terrorists? Who are the real "enemies of humanity", as Çiller so boldly put it? What is this bullshit "struggle against terrorism" really all about?

JITEM'S ACID WELLS IN CIZRE

"If the Ergenekon investigation doesn't pass east of the Euphrates, the Kurdish problem will never be solved."
~ Ahmet Türk.

A month ago Nuh Gönultaş at Bugün wrote about some interesting information from supreme Ergenekon weirdo, Tuncay Güney, in a piece titled, "Where are JITEM's acid death wells?":

The black box, Tuncay Güney's life story and his relations, is not known whether or not it is real. He, who first disclosed Ergenekon and has become a legend.

Güney's most important trait is his close nine-year relationship with Veli Küçük, who was the deep paşa of the 1990s.

The book written by journalist Faruk Arslan, who lives in Toronto, titled Black Box: Ergenekon's Unknown Name Tuncay Güney, in which the mysterious witness makes shocking statements.

Güney claims that thousands of Kurdish citizens, who were killed by JITEM as extrajudicial murders for harboring PKK, were thrown into acid-filled wells, in which their corpses dissolved. Thus their bodies were never found.

This is quite an original and new information.

Güney advises looking at the BOTAŞ complex which JITEM had used in the Southeast in the 1990s, to find acid-filled death wells.

For years no one knew where the graves were of more than 18,000 citizens, most of whom were Kurdish and were killed by "unknown perpetrators"; no one questions or dares to question.

Güney claims that although there are very few people who know where these acid-filled wells are located in the Southeast, and Veli Küçük is one of them, but Küçük does not tell.

However, Güney gives a specific address in the book: "The places where JITEM and Kucuk's group used were these places. For a clear address, when you go towards the Habur border, close by Mardin's old town Cizre, on the left there is a complex that is guarded by soldiers. If you dig there, there will be a lot of bodies. BOTAŞ has enterprises in Diyarbakır, Batman, Adıyaman and these places should also be checked."

As a response to the question where did they find the acid, Güney replied in a classic way: "There are several factories in İzmit. Even Küçük's greeting is an order for them. Besides, for drug-trafficking they needed acid. They had become experts in bringing acid."

For more on that, see 32. Gün from November 2008, in which Güney reiterates the claim about the acid-filled wells. Note that I've provided the link for the first in a series of fourteen videos of that particular edition of 32. Gün.

Now it looks like the Şırnak state prosecutor is going to investigate the claims of the acid-filled wells.

The complaint was initially made by the head of the Şırnak Bar Association, based on the book by Faruk Arslan, mentioned in the Nuh Gönultaş piece . Before the state prosecutor's decision to go ahead with the investigation of the acid-filled wells, the Şırnak Bar Association vowed to move to open the wells at the first opportunity as soon as their exact locations were identified. The bar association will now be able to do just that. From Zaman:

Şırnak Bar Association chief Nuşirevan Elçi says: "This situation gave us hope. Turkey must face its past in order to have a bright future. If there are illegal implementations, these must come before the judiciary. The relatives of those murdered by unknown perpetrators don't know whether or not they are dead these last 15-20 years. This situation puts those people in pain. If this event is disclosed, these people will cease hoping. For Turkey's bright future, these kinds of works must be done. Especially within this context I see the Ergenekon investigation as a new era."

In the past, DTP has said that unless Ergenekon was investigated east of the Euphrates, their would be little hope for a solution to the Kurdish question in Turkey. Now let's wait and see how much of this is truly investigated and the results revealed. Then we'll find out, too, if Ergenekon's mysterious "black box" has any credibility.

BLACK OPERATIONS IN IRAQ BY TURKISH CONTRA-GUERRILLAS

"Turkey is working in Iraq with 3 major Sunni radical groups: Ansar al-Sunni Army, Iraq Islamic Army, and the 1920 Revolution Battalion, especially within the last 6 months. Turkey is supplying technical and logistic support to them."
~ Özgür Gündem.

Someone else from the US military comes along and tries to spread propaganda for Washington's puppet government in Ankara. Posted over at the MoJo Blog:

Evidence is piling up that the Turkish government will commit its armed forces against the de facto Kurdish state in Northern Iraq sooner rather than later. . .

[ . . . ]

What most Americans don't know is that the Turkish government has tried to negotiate a settlement with the Kurds through its new Special Envoy for Iraq, Murat Ozcelik. People who know Ozcelik insist he is the best person to negotiate Turkey's peace with the Kurds. Unfortunately, his Kurdish counterpart, Massoud Barzani, has turned out to be a fool who thinks he leads a pan-Kurdish movement inside Iraq, Iran, Syria, and Turkey.

What the hell is Murat Özçelik doing "negotiat[ing] Turkey's peace with the Kurds" in South Kurdistan (Northern Iraq)? Turkey needs to negotiate peace with the 20 million Kurds inside Turkey and I've got a news flash for Özçelik and Douglas Macgregor, the author of the piece at the MoJo Blog: Mesûd Barzanî does not speak for the 20 million Kurds of Turkey. There are 20 DTP parliamentarians in the TBMM who were elected by the Kurds of Turkey as their representatives, and they are the ones that Özçelik must begin negotiations with.

Then we have the KCK Executive Council which also represents the Kurds of Turkey. Özçelik must also bring them into negotiations and then we can have a dialog along the lines already proposed by KCK in August 2006 (http://www.kurdish-info.net/modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=3467):

The framework for the steps that need to be developed mutually in the second phase for a permanent solution:

1- The acknowledgement of the Kurdish identity and the constitutional guarantee of all identities under the identity of a Citizen of Turkey as the main identity,

2- The lifting of obstacles on the development of the Kurdish language and culture, the acknowledgement of education in the mother tongue and Kurdish acknowledged as the official second language alongside Turkish in the Kurdistan region, and with this to show respect to other minority cultures,

3- The acknowledgement, on the basis of freely practicing politics and organizing, of the right to thought, belief and freedom of expression, the lifting of all social inequalities in the constitution and laws, firstly being those of gender discrimination,

4- A social reconciliation project with the aim of mutual forgiveness of both people’s for the development of a peace and freedom union, on this basis the release of political prisoners including the PKK Leadership, and no obstacles to them participating in politics and social life,

5- The removal of forces in Kurdistan there for the purposes of special war, the abolition of the village guard system and the necessary social and political projects to be developed for the return of displaced villagers,

6- In parallel to the realization of the above articles, the initiation, with a timetable determined by both parties, of the gradual disarmament and legal participation into the democratic social life.

All of this, of course, would take place within the current borders of Turkey:

We would like as a movement to emphasize once again that the right solution is a democratic autonomy within the borders of Turkey. We believe that a solution in the unity of Turkey will be for the benefit of firstly the Kurdish people and all the people of the region.

Contrast that with the propaganda of Macgregor:

. . . the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK), a militant group that seeks to establish a Kurdish state in the region.

Macgregor actually admits that current tension between Kurds and Sunnis in Iraq is the result of Turkish black operations:

Much of the violence that is picking up between the Kurds and the Sunnis may well be the first sign of a Turkish counter-offensive to punish the Kurds for their continued support of the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK), a militant group that seeks to establish a Kurdish state in the region.

Thanks, pal, for confirming what was reported one year ago by Özgür Gündem and carried on Rastî:

According to Özgür Gündem, a contra-guerrilla base has been founded in Amed (Diyarbakır) by the Ankara regime. These contra-guerrillas not only will operate against Kurds in the region of Amed and North Kurdistan, but also against Kurds in Iraq, Iran, and Syria.

The goal of the contra-guerrillas is to delay the Kerkuk referendum through black operations. Since Turkey cannot conduct a military operation in the South, it's initiating black operations through this contra-guerrilla group, operating in the same way it did in Şemdinli, in the Council of State, and in the Hrant Dink murder. JITEM and the Patriots Movement were behind those operations.

Ostensibly the contra-guerrilla group raised donations from $500,000 per month to $1,000,000 per month for the Iraqi Turkmen Front (ITF). I say "ostensibly," because it's more likely that the "donations" are coming directly from the Ankara regime. In addition, the contra-guerrillas give rewards for each successful ITF operation.

Turkey is working in Iraq with 3 major Sunni radical groups: Ansar al-Sunni Army, Iraq Islamic Army, and the 1920 Revolution Battalion, especially within the last 6 months. Turkey is supplying technical and logistic support to them.

The contra-guerrillas contacted some Arab tribes in Mosul and promised economic assistance to the tribes if they encourage the Sunnis to attack KDP and PUK offices.

Turkey has also been in contact with Arabs in Kerkuk, who had moved there during Saddam's arabization. Turkey organized these Arabs into death squads and provided them with assassination lists of Kurdish leaders. Attacks against Turkmen leaders, including Iraqi Turkmen Front leaders, would be encouraged in order create chaos.

They have assassination plans for some Arab and Turkmen leaders in order to turn Kurds and other peoples against each other and create a basis for the justification of the assassinations of Kurdish leaders.

The goal is to delay the Kerkuk referendum and not to allow Kerkuk to become part of Kurdistan.

The Ankara regime has invaded South Kurdistan in pursuit of PKK a number of times in the past and the TSK has always left with its tail between its legs. If the Ankara regime thinks it will insert itself in order to save Kerkuk for the ITF, then it had better learn the meaning of the word "quagmire", from Andrew Lee Butters almost one year ago:

So this is going to be a slow motion disaster rather than a spectacular one. Turkey will have to go deeper and deeper into Iraq, committing itself more and more to a course that will at best be ineffectual and at worst drag it and Iraqi Kurdistan into the great sucking sound that is the American project in Iraq. The only way out of this is for the Turkish state to begin political negotiations with the PKK, an internal enemy that it has been unable to defeat for more than 20 years. But the US, which labels the PKK a terrorist group, is hardly in a position to preach to its allies about talking to terrorists.

At the same time, Murat Karayılan confirmed the potential "quagmire":

Speaking to The Associated Press deep in the Qandil mountains straddling the Iraq-Turkish border, some 150 kilometers (94 miles) from the northern Iraqi Kurdish city of Sulaimaniyah, Karayilan warned an incursion would "make Turkey experience a Vietnam war."

[ . . . ]

"Iraq's Kurds will not support the Turkish army," he said. "If Turkey starts its attack, we will swing the Turkish public opinion by political, civil and military struggle."

[ . . . ]

Karayilan said the PKK was only defending itself against attacks by the Turks.

"This was not the first time. It happened many times before and no one talked about it, so why this time," he said, adding the clashes took place at least 100 kilometers (62 miles) from the border, within Turkey, not Iraq.

He said he believes the Turkish attacks are meant to destabilize Iraq, not remove the rebels.

"Turkey is only making pretexts to enter the Kurdistan region in Iraq," he added.

For those hard of understanding: Quagmire = Vietnam.

Not only should we expect meddling by the Ankara regime in the refusal to allow elections in Kerkuk, but we should also consider the recent turmoil in Xanaqîn as the result of Turkish contra-guerrillas, including recent roadside bomb attacks that resulted in the deaths of six peşmêrge.

Furthermore, let's not expect much from the KRG, Barzanî, or Talabanî. They have too much money tied up in business interests with Ankara for them to take a stand against Turkish black operations aimed against Kurdistan.

ACQUITTAL, TRIALS, AND COUNTER-INSURGENCY

"The document, which is official US Special Forces policy, directly advocates training paramilitaries, pervasive surveillance, censorship, press control, restrictions on labor unions & political parties, suspending habeas corpus, warrantless searches, detainment without charge, bribery, employing terrorists, false flag operations, concealing human rights abuses from journalists, and extensive use of 'psychological operations' (propaganda) to make these and other "population & resource control" measures palatable."
~ Wikileaks on FM 31-20-3.

Today the court in Amed (Diyarbakır) acquitted the older members of Koma Dengê Zarokên Amedê of "spreading propaganda" for singing "Ey Raqîb" while they were in the US. Younger members of the choir are due to have their day in court on 3 July and the choirmaster is still under investigation. For more, see the story at the IHT.

Bülent Ersoy also went on trial this week for her comments during Turkey's February land invasion of South Kurdistan that she would not send her children into the Turkish army to fight the PKK. A video of Ersoy's remarks can be seen here. At the BBC, Mehmet Ali Birand makes some of his usual stupid comments:

"Most people are fed up of the Kurdish problem, and want a solution. You could hear their voices more three years ago when there was a ceasefire," explains respected newspaper columnist Mehmet Ali Birand.

"But when the PKK started to kill again, the mood changed. People are dying every day. It's a very sensitive issue."

Whose fault is that, Mehmet? If you had taken up the offer of a democratic resolution and the ceasefire from 2006, instead of rejecting them both for the sake of a few Lockheed Martin F-35s, people wouldn't be dying every day and this wouldn't be such a "sensitive" issue. As it is, the Ankara regime is directly responsible for all these deaths--on both sides.

Bianet has a report on the ongoing trial of the Trabzon police and their negligence in the Hrant Dink murder. Surprise, surprise, surprise! The police knew about the planned murder a year ahead of time and did absolutely nothing about it. I wouldn't call that negligence, however; I'd call it a conspiracy.

Before you get the idea that Americans are the most naive people on the planet, let the recent Pew Global Attitudes survey set you straight:

Majorities in 39% of nations polled believe that whoever replaces Bush will change U.S. foreign policy for the better, though in 20 out of 23 nations surveyed, more people have confidence in Sen. Barack Obama than in Sen. John McCain.

Let there be no mistake: There will be no change in US foreign policy anytime in the near future, no matter which nincompoop is elected in November. In the US, politicians do not represent power. They do not have any power. They are a facade.

Wikileaks has also published portions of the infamous US Special Forces Counter-Insurgency Manual (FM 31-20-3) on its website. This army manual is the blueprint for the kinds of atrocities that the US inflicted on Central America and then exported to Turkey. FM 31-20 was one of the US military manuals to be translated into Turkish, adopted by Turkish security forces, and applied against the Kurdish people by the Turkish Special Warfare Department (Özel Harp Dairesi):

Textbooks by American contra-guerrilla experts were translated into Turkish, and these special war methods were thus introduced into Turkey. Some of the textbooks written by American experts are: "U.S. Army FM 31/16" (contra-guerrilla operations), "U.S. Army Special Warfare School" (contra-guerrilla tactics and techniques), "FM 31/20" (special forces operational techniques), "FM 31/21 Special Forces Operations" (ST urban assignments, 31/21 guerrilla warfare and special forces operations ), "FM 31/21 A. Special Forces Operations (U)" (special forces secret operations). (6)

More at Information Clearing House. If this is merely "sensitive" stuff, it's hard to imagine how bad the classified information on counter-insurgency operations is.

Now you know where Turkish death squads got their training.

1 MAY 2008

"The finger of the counter-guerrillas was in the May 1 incidents."
~ Bülent Ecevit

May Day 2008 in Istanbul:
























Why are May Day celebrations the only celebrations that are forbidden in Taksim Square? Because of the Taksim Square Massacre--perpetrated by the state, naturally. From WSWS:

The Revolutionary Confederation of Labor Unions (DISK) organized a May Day demonstration in Taksim Square in Istanbul. Demonstrators filled the square, and the crowds flowed into the surrounding area. In Besiktas, hundreds of thousands of people had gathered in the early morning hours to march to the rally. By the time DISK General Chairman Kemal Turkler delivered his his May Day speech, all the roads leading into the area were still full of people marching. It was nearly 7 p.m. before the last contingents were able to reach the Taksim area.

The DISK general chairman was about to finish his speech when three gunshots sounded. First there was stillness, and then a deadly pandemonium broke out. The crowd of 500,000 dispersed in panic.

People who had been lying in ambush inside buildings in the vicinity of the meeting area, in the Intercontinental Hotel (now The Marmara Istanbul) and in the Water Authority building, rained bullets down on the crowd with automatic weapons. As the firing spread, armored personnel carriers went into action. Noise bombs and the firing of the automatic weapons suddenly turned the meeting area into a battlefield. Thousands of people lay down where they were, while others running to escape were shoved into corners and crushed by the armored vehicles.

[ . . . ]

While some characterized the incident as a provocation of the Nationalist Front [the right-wing government coalition] carried out under the management of the CIA, a portion of the police and bourgeois press advanced the idea that the firing was started by extreme leftists.

However, evidence presented in court opened the curtain of reality, even if only a crack. Police charged 98 people arrested at random with responsibility for the massacre. None of them were involved, and all were acquitted. While the judge called upon the authorities to renew the investigation and prosecute those genuinely responsible, successive military-dominated regimes suppressed the case.

During the trial, Oleyis [the hotel workers union] Branch Chairman Ali Kocaman had the information which he had received from hotel personnel placed in the minutes: “Three days earlier, the third, fourth and fifth floors of the Intercontinental Hotel were emptied and no one was allowed on the floors, which were under police control. Americans had come and stayed on the floors which the personnel were not allowed to enter. After the incident, these people checked out of the hotel.”

[ . . . ]

On May 7, 1977, Bulent Ecevit, later to become prime minister, attracted little attention with his statement at an Izmir meeting, “The finger of the counter-guerrillas was in the May 1 incidents.”

According to Article 102 of the Turkish Penal Code (TCK), the case expired due to the statute of limitations after 20 years had elapsed. And according to lawyer Rasim Oz, who witnessed the bloody May Day of 1977, “The case was deliberately brought to a point where it would be closed due to the statute of limitations.”

At least the state, including the Islamist AKP government, is consistent.

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!

CONTRA-GUERRILLAS AND KERKUK

"Some see the contra-guerilla as separate from the state. This is wrong, say the DHKP-C: in Turkey the contra-guerilla IS the state."
~ DHKP-C.

Early in the year, I posted some information about US-based Turkish mercenaries and some reasons why regimes may turn to a wider use of mercenary forces in the future. Among those reasons were the following:

1. A lack of other means: Many states lack the means to perform their own security effectively. . .

2. Plausible deniability: . . . Some states may wish to pursue policies covertly that would bring harsh and swift retaliation from their enemies if they were overt.Many states wish to pursue policies covertly that if pursued overtly would bring massive opprobrium upon them, from the press, their own electorate, their allies, or the "international community." The use of proxies in pursuing such policies might be one way to avoid such retaliationStateless actors might allow a bit of discretion or separation that would otherwise be impossible.

3. Circumvention of Laws: States may wish to circumvent their own laws or international regulations in the pursuit of certain policies. One solution is to make a deal with a stateless organization that can operate with much more extralegal freedom than can a state organization. . .

4. A Lack of Political Will: There may be times when states are compelled to pursue policies that their populations cannot stomach. . .

While mercenaries may be the new way to go for regimes who want to appear to keep clean hands, there is still the tried-and-true method of using black operatives or contra-guerrillas for similar work, and it looks like that is, in fact, part of the plan.


According to Özgür Gündem, a contra-guerrilla base has been founded in Amed (Diyarbakır) by the Ankara regime. These contra-guerrillas not only will operate against Kurds in the region of Amed and North Kurdistan, but also against Kurds in Iraq, Iran, and Syria.

The goal of the contra-guerrillas is to delay the Kerkuk referendum through black operations. Since Turkey cannot conduct a military operation in the South, it's initiating black operations through this contra-guerrilla group, operating in the same way it did in Semdinli, in the Council of State, and in the Hrant Dink murder. JITEM and the Patriots Movement were behind those operations.

Ostensibly the contra-guerrilla group raised donations from $500,000 per month to $1,000,000 per month for the Iraqi Turkmen Front (ITF). I say "ostensibly," because it's more likely that the "donations" are coming directly from the Ankara regime. In addition, the contra-guerrillas give rewards for each successful ITF operation.

Turkey is working in Iraq with 3 major Sunni radical groups: Ansar al-Sunni Army, Iraq Islamic Army, and the 1920 Revolution Battalion, especially within the last 6 months. Turkey is supplying technical and logistic support to them.

The contra-guerrillas contacted some Arab tribes in Mosul and promised economic assistance to the tribes if they encourage the Sunnis to attack KDP and PUK offices.

Turkey has also been in contact with Arabs in Kerkuk, who had moved there during Saddam's arabization. Turkey organized these Arabs into death squads and provided them with assassination lists of Kurdish leaders. Attacks against Turkmen leaders, including Iraqi Turkmen Front leaders, would be encouraged in order create chaos.

They have assassination plans for some Arab and Turkmen leaders in order to turn Kurds and other peoples against each other and create a basis for the justification of the assassinations of Kurdish leaders.

The goal is to delay the Kerkuk referendum and not to allow Kerkuk to become part of Kurdistan.

POST-ELECTION NOTES

"I dislike death, however, there are some things I dislike more than death. Therefore, there are times when I will not avoid danger."
~ Mencius

First of all, there's a finalized list of the Thousand Hopes (DTP) candidates at Özgür Gündem:

1- Diyarbakır: GÜLTAN KIŞANAK
2- Diyarbakır: AKIN BİRDAL
3- Diyarbakır: AYSEL TUĞLUK
4- Diyarbakır: SELAHATTİN DEMİRTAŞ
5- Batman: AYLA AKAT ATA
6- Batman: BENGİ YILDIZ
7- Mardin: AHMET TÜRK
8- Mardin: EMİNE AYNA
9- Şırnak: SEVAHİR BAYINDIR
10- Şırnak: HASİP KAPLAN
11- İstanbul 1. Bölge MEHMET UFUK URAS
12- İstanbul 3. Bölge SEBAHAT TUNCEL
13- Hakkari: HAMİT GEYLANİ
14- Hakkari: SABAHATTİN SUĞVACI
15- Muş: SIRRI SAKİK
16- Muş: M.NURİ YAMAN
17- Van: FATMA KURTULAN
18- Van: ÖZDAL ÜÇER
19- Dersim: ŞERAFETTİN HALİS
20- Bitlis: MEHMET NEZİR KARABAŞ
21- Siirt: OSMAN ÖZÇELİK
22- Urfa: İBRAHİM BİNİCİ
23- Iğdır: PERVİN BULDAN

It looks like we are still waiting to see what happens with the candidate from Adana, but for the time being some 13,000 votes are missing, as in not accounted for in the voting records. This is most likely the result of corruption.

Official results are supposed to be broadcast on 27 July.

There was a good summary of the elections on a map at Turkish NTV/MSNBC.

Shiraz Socialist has a well-balanced post on the elections. I don’t find too many that look at it in a more equitable way. Most on the extreme right-wing, fascist end of the spectrum in the US are hand-wringing over the Islamist thing. They trotted out Soner Çağaptay (of the neocon WINEP and ME Forum) today, on NPR, and he was trying to explain that there was a split in Turkey between Islamists vs Secularists, but it’s more than a split; it’s a crevasse of epic proportions.

One of the more interesting of Çağaptay's flights of fantasies was the suggestion that DTP renounce violence. I'm still trying to figure out how DTP can renounce what it has never engaged in.

I would point out that the ability of DTP to “beat off its previous excluded status”--to quote Voltaire at Shiraz Socialist--is incredible and is a measure of the determination of everyone involved with the campaigning. AKP has not communicated with DTP since the Amed Serhildan in March 2006. DTP politicians have suffered death threats and constant “legal” harassment, have been subjected to the state’s black operations–as has the entire Kurdish population–and finally, has had to function under conditions of “State of Emergency” or OHAL in three Kurdish areas.

If you recall the dirty war of the 1990s, you will know that OHAL, Turkey’s special version of martial law for the Kurdish people, was the period in which the most brutal human rights abuses took place. OHAL was finally lifted in 2002, but now it’s back.

As far as I’m concerned, DTP’s achievement in this election was nothing less than heroic.

Speaking of OHAL, we shouldn't forget that Turkey is planning to increase the number of special commandos to fight the PKK, and these were the same ones who were responsible for most of the atrocities against the Kurdish people in the 1990s. The possibility exists that this will happen again.

I'm not the only one concerned about the future, in spite of the achievement of DTP. Berxwedan at DozaMe has his concerns, too.

Finally, the Vineyard Saker blog has posted an interview with me in order to introduce some of his readers to the Kurdish situation and to help counter the recent propaganda aimed against the Kurdish people and their freedom movement by people like, you know, Soner Çağaptay.

THE RESURRECTION OF THE CONTRA-GUERRILLAS

"We struggle in Kurdistan not only for the rights of our people but also for the rights of ethnic Armenians, Assyrians, and Suryani-Chaldeans who also face a reign of terror. Yes, we have a problem of terrorism in our country, but it is Turkish state terrorism."
~ Abdullah Ocalan.

By now, most people should have heard that NATO's second largest army is going to end the use of conscripts to fight in Turkey's internal colony Kurdistan. The Paşas have decided to pollute Kurdistan with commandos instead of conscripts.

These commandos were established as part of the US program for psychological operations against the Kurdish people--a fact sold publicly as part of the Cold War's fight against Communist "aggression" in the region. But the reality was something else, as Desmond Fernandes has documented:

By 1969, moreover, Turkish "commandos, who had been trained by American specialists in counter-insurgency," were despatched into Kurdish regions "under the pretext of a general 'arms search'" to terrorise the population.39 These commando actions "rapidly became associated with arbitrary brutality and torture that had marked the suppression of Kurdistan four decades earlier."40

According to the journal Devrim, one commando report which focused upon its anti-Kurdish psychological warfare operations, ran along the following lines:

"Since the end of January, special military units have undertaken a land war in the (Kurdish) regions of Diyarbakir, Mardin, Siirt and Hakkari under the guise of hunting bandits. Every village is surrounded at a certain hour, its inhabitants rounded up. Troops assemble men and women separately, and demand the men to surrender their weapons. They beat those who deny possessing any or make other villagers jump on them. They strip men and women naked and violate the latter. Many have died in these operations, some have committed suicide. Naked men and women have cold water thrown over them, and they are whipped. Sometimes women are forced to tie a rope around the penis of their husband and then to lead him around the village. Women are likewise made to parade naked around the village. Troops demand villagers to provide women for their pleasure and the entire village is beaten if the request is met with refusal."41

As Fernandes goes on to show, this is the established pattern of the American Empire and the pattern is strictly adhered to by America's fascist client states, such as Turkey, and that similar atrocities were perpetrated by the Ankara regime even through the relatively "peaceful" 1970s. The murder after surrender of HPG şehîd Fatıh Ekmekçi is the most recent example of this same kind of atrocity, proving that the Ankara regime remains dedicated to the employment of terrorism against the Kurdish people.

According to an article in Zaman, the commandos will take over full duties for committing new atrocities against the Kurdish people in 2009 and this brings up a question: If commando operations will formally begin in 2009, how long will the current OHAL remain in place for the Sêrt, Culemêrg, and Şirnex regions? Will the OHAL continue until 2009 and beyond?

The author claims that "none can complain that the Eğirdir announcement did not constitute a positive step," but she's not counting the opinion of Kurds; in fact, if true to form and history, she's never bothered to ask Kurds what they think about the extended presence of more of these US-trained Turkish barbarians in "The Region". What she's really concerned about are Turks:

But the real question is how much longer Turkish people can live with the PKK terror problem and its impact on their daily existence instead of enjoying a more normal life.

No, the real question is how much longer the Kurdish people can live with the Ankara regime terror problem. Its brutality is something that has been well-documented by human rights organizations and the European Court of Human Rights. After all, nobody pays fines to the ECHR like the Ankara regime does. Yet there's an easy answer to end the trauma of the Turkish people which has been offered for many years and it's one that Ocalan proposed in 1994, as documented by Lord Avebury, the chairman of the UK Parliamentary Human Rights Group:

It should be noted that in March 1994, the PKK Leader Abdullah Ocalan said he would stop all armed activity if a basis was established for a political solution, based on dialogue within a democratic framework. He suggested a cease-fire under international supervision, and discussion of various alternatives, including federation. (He has given even more prominence to the concept of federation in subsequent pronouncements).

It should be noted, too, that Lord Avebury's paper documenting the atrocities and politics of the 1990s was presented in the US.

Ocalan's statement that all armed activity would stop if dialog toward a political solution within a democratic framework were established and a ceasefire were supervised by international observers. This is the very same offer that was made beginning last August with the proposal of a democratic solution by the PKK, a solution that was rejected not only by the Ankara regime, but by the corporatocracy which poses as a government in the US.

It's not enough that the author is concerned simply with Turks. What is worse is that the author is more concerned for any psychological problems that the commandos may suffer as a result of the atrocities they will commit against Kurdish civilians. What about the psychological effects on those Kurds who've lived through Ankara's Dirty War? Where are the battalions of psychiatrists to assist torture victims or those who've been forcibly displaced from their homes, or who've had loved ones "disappeared?"

On the other hand, it's appropriate indeed that the author's brought up the subject of Abu Ghraib:

A Western diplomat told me recently that Turkey has one of the best treatment centers -- the Ankara-based Gülhane Hospital -- for those injured in combat with the PKK. But he noted that what Turkey was really lacking was psychiatric care for those badly wounded in military operations.

He then recalled the Abu Ghraib Prison abuse scandal perpetrated by US soldiers, some of whom have been sentenced or are still awaiting trial for the brutal treatment -- including alleged torture, and even rape, in some cases -- of prisoners held there.

Those Abu Ghraib incidents took place despite the fact that US soldiers -- all professionals -- had received adequate training in the fight against insurgents and terrorists, as well as psychological training, the same diplomat stressed.

"Those professionals who are fighting against mainly irregular groups are, in other words, assassins. They kill people. This has a serious psychological impact on those soldiers. For example, when they get leave and see the world and are no longer killing people, they wonder what they were doing as assassins," said the diplomat.

Yeah, let's not worry about the "serious psychological impact" on the victims. Let's only worry about the guilty.

The author adds, in a brilliant stroke of deadpan:

I am sure, based on such experience, the TSK will consider a psychological training program for their professionals in the fight against terror.

Would there be any American soldiers in prison awaiting trial for their performance at Abu Ghraib if there had not been a huge scandal and outcry against it in the US and around the world? Does anyone honestly believe that there will be a similar scandal and outcry against the atrocities committed against the Kurdish people which the Ankara regime has enslaved for the last 84 years, either in Turkey or around the world?

Based on experience, I can guarantee you that there won't be, because there never has been any such outcry by anyone throughout the history of the Ankara regime's repression of the Kurdish people. There are no Mehmetçiks or other Turkish security forces sitting in prison awaiting trials for their crimes, and Amnesty International agrees with me. Not even the author of the Zaman piece bothered to mention the atrocities that the Kurdish people under Turkish occupation have suffered, much less did she raise a hue and cry about it.

The piece closes with references to the rule of law in Turkey and the need to "restore" it. What an absurdity! Which law should be "restored?" The law which permits anyone to murder Kurds without fear of punishment? The law which forbids the use of certain letters of the alphabet because they're "Kurdish" letters? The law which forbids Kurdish to be used for political purposes? The law which removed a Kurdish mayor and Kurdish municipality for supplying local services in other languages in addition to Turkish? The law which permitted state assassins to walk free after a show trial in a kangaroo court for murdering a Kurdish father and his son in cold blood? The law which cultivates impunity among state assassins? The law which allows prosecutors to be fired and disbarred for attempting to investigate the Chief of the Turkish General Staff for belonging to the armed gang that goes around throwing grenades into bookshops?

The rule of law does not need to be "restored" in Turkish occupied Kurdistan because it's already functioning there in the form of the new Turkish Penal Code, the new Anti-Terror Law, the Paşas' constitution, and the military law of the new OHAL.

And with all of this, who in the hell needs the rule of law?

In the meantime, check out a terrific article from The Nation on "The Other War" in Iraq. It's eleven pages long and definitely worth the read. In it, you will get an idea of the utter lawlessness of indiscriminate violence against civilians and even animals, and the desecration and mockery of the dead. Why?

Spc. Patrick Resta, 29, a National Guardsman from Philadelphia, served in Jalula, where there was a small prison camp at his base. He was with the 252nd Armor, First Infantry Division, for nine months beginning in March 2004. He recalled his supervisor telling his platoon point-blank, "The Geneva Conventions don't exist at all in Iraq, and that's in writing if you want to see it."

I guess what's good for Guantanamo is good for Iraq, too.

And to prepare yourself for the next false flag operation in the US, brought to you by the corporatocracy that's turning the world into a fascist planet, check these links:


"West Needs More Terror to Save Doomed Foreign Policy"--from America's good neighbor, Canada.

"Praying for a Terrorist Strike"--America's politicians laying down the propaganda just so they can say, "We told you so."

"Chertoff Has 'Gut Feeling' about More Terror"--I'm relieved to know it's his "gut feeling" and not his Magic 8-Ball.