The U.S. air drop Sunday of new weapons and supplies to Kurdish fighters in the besieged border town of Kobani marks an important escalation in Washington’s efforts to “degrade and destroy” the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL).

The operation, which included the provision of 27 bundles of small arms, including anti-tank weapons, ammunition, and other supplies, also helped trigger a major change in Turkish policy, according to experts here.

School turned into refugee camp in Erbil, September 2014. Credit: Annabell Van den Berghe/IPS

Until then, Ankara had strongly opposed providing help to Kobani’s Kurdish defenders, who are dominated by members of the Democratic Union Party (PYD) which Ankara considers a terrorist organisation linked to the Kurdish Workers Party (PKK).

Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu confirmed Monday that Kurdish peshmerga forces from Iraq will be permitted to transit the Turkish border to bolster Kobani’s fighters against ISIS, which has reportedly lost much of its hold on the city amidst heavy fighting and U.S. air strikes over the last few days.

“I think the Turks are doing damage control,” Henri Barkey, a Turkey expert based at Lehigh University in Pennsylvania, told IPS Monday. “Everybody wanted to save Kobani, and the Turks were essentially making it impossible. They’re doing this now to say ‘we’re doing something, too’.”

Despite recent and increasingly worrisome ISIL advances in neighbouring Iraq, particularly in Al-Anbar province, the battle over Kobani has dominated coverage of the two-month-old U.S. air campaign against the group, largely because the fighting can be closely followed by journalists from the safety of the hills on the Turkish side of the border.

Although senior Obama administration and military officers have repeatedly declared that Kobani’s fate is not critical to their overall strategy against ISIL, the town’s prominence in U.S. media coverage – as well as reports that the group has itself sent significant re-inforcements to the battle — has made it a politically potent symbol of Washington’s prospects for success.

Washington had largely ignored the battle until several weeks ago. As ISIL forces moved into the town’s outskirts from three different directions in the media spotlight, however, it began conducting air strikes which have steadily intensified over the last two weeks, even as Ankara, its NATO ally, made clear that it opposed any outside intervention on the PYD’s behalf.

“The government of Turkey doesn’t see [ISIL] as the worst problem they face,” former U.S. Amb. to Ankara Eric Edelman said during a forum at the Bipartisan Policy Center here last week.Erdogan is likely to bargain hard over U.S. requests to use Incirlik air base for offensive operations against ISIS in both Syria and Iraq.

He noted that senior Turkish officials have recently described the PKK, with which the government of President Recep Tayyip Erdogan is engaged in critical peace negotiations, as worse — an observation which, he added “gives you a sense of the hierarchy” of threats as seen by Ankara. The PYD is widely considered the PKK’s Syrian branch.

“They see Kobani through the lens of negotiations with the PKK and [want] to cut the PKK down to size,” he said.

That strategy, however, may have backfired amidst increasingly urgent and angry appeals by the PYD and the Kurdish Regional Government (KRG) in Iraq to come to Kobani’s aid, or, at the very least, permit Kurdish fighters to re-inforce the town’s defenders.

Even more important, Kurds, who make up about 20 percent of the Turkish population, mounted anti-government protests throughout the country. More than 30 people were killed in street violence before strict curfews were enforced earlier this month.

Moreover, the PKK threatened to break off peace negotiations, one of Erdogan’s signal achievements.

In addition to the domestic pressure, Washington and some of its NATO allies leaned increasingly heavily on Ankara to revise its policy.

Erdogan, however, insisted that it would help out in Kobani – and, more important strategically, permit the U.S. to use its giant Incirlik air base to launch air strikes — only if Washington met certain conditions regarding its overall Syria policy.

In particular, he demanded that Washington and its allies establish no-fly zones along the Turkish border that could be used as safe havens for anti-Syrian government rebels and target President Bashar al-Assad’s military infrastructure, as well as ISIL’s. While Secretary of State John Kerry indicated the administration was willing to consider such steps, the White House has remained steadfastly opposed.

Given the mounting symbolic importance of Kobani, Obama himself telephoned Erdogan Saturday to inform him that he had decided to authorise the resupply of Kobani’s defenders and urge him to open the border to Kurdish re-inforcements.

The initial resupply operation was carried out Sunday night local time by three C-130 cargo planes, marking a new level in Washington’s intervention in Syria.

Even as a few Democrats expressed concern about the latest escalation, the operation was hailed by Republican hawks who have called for much stronger action, including no-fly zones, as well as attacks on Syrian military targets.

“We support the administration’s decision to resupply Kurdish forces in Kobani with arms, ammunition and other supplies,” said Sens. John McCain and Lindsey Graham, the Senate’s most prominent hawks, in a joint statement.

At the same time, they complained that “this tactical adjustment should not be confused for an effective strategy, which is still lacking.” They urged the administration to deploy U.S. special forces and military advisers on the ground in Syria to assist “moderate” opposition forces against both ISIL and the Assad regime.

What remains unclear is whether Obama merely informed Erdogan that the air supply operation would go forward whether he approved or not or if the Turkish president extracted some further commitments in return.

“I think they got nothing in exchange; I think the Turks are doing damage control,” Barkey told IPS. “I would say that the Turks are shell-shocked now by the American decision.”

At the same time, he added, Erdogan is likely to bargain hard over U.S. requests to use Incirlik air base, which is located close to the Syrian border and much closer to both Syria and Iraq than U.S. aircraft carriers and bases in the Gulf, for offensive operations against ISIS in both Syria and Iraq.

Turkey has permitted Washington to use the base to carry out humanitarian flights and launch surveillance drones – which are also used to track PKK movements in eastern Turkey and Iraqi Kurdistan.

Jim Lobe’s blog on U.S. foreign policy can be read at Lobelog.com. He can be contacted at ipsnoram@ips.org

Edited by Kitty Stapp

Abdullah Ocalan, the jailed Kurdish rebel leader, has issued a long-awaited ceasefire declaration that would be a major step towards ending a 30-year conflict that has cost around 40,000 lives in Turkey.

The ceasefire announced on Thursday, which coincides with the Kurdish New Year, or Newroz, also calls for the withdrawal of his PKK organisation, likely to bases in northern Iraq.

Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan said the ceasefire call was a “positive development”.

“There are groups that are fed by terror in our country. This process will ruin their game,” he said, speaking during a visit to the Netherlands.

In Ocalan’s letter, read out by members of parliament Pervin Buldan, in Kurdish, and Sirri Sureyya Onder, in Turkish, the PKK leader said: “Let guns be silenced and politics dominate.

“The stage has been reached where our armed forces should withdraw beyond the borders … It’s not the end. It’s the start of a new era.”

The statement was read out to a sea of red-yellow-green Kurdish flags, in the Kurdish-majority city of Diyarbakir, where hundreds of thousands gathered for celebrations.

Erdogan expressed his disappointment because there were no Turkish flags at the Newroz celebrations in Diyarbakir.

“This is a provocative approach by the circles who wants to influence the process in a negative way,” he said.

Ocalan’s ceasefire is likely to be in return for wider constitutional recognition and language rights for Turkey’s up to 15 million Kurds.

The peace plan is the result of written consultations between Ocalan, pro-Kurdish legislators and PKK bodies in Europe and northern Iraq, under the close monitoring of Turkish agents.

Kurdish legislators say Ocalan might ask for commissions to be established to properly monitor the ceasefire, and call for safe passage for fighters wishing to leave Turkey.

‘Political career’

Erdogan and Ocalan both appear to have staked their political futures on the renewed push to end the conflict.

Al Jazeera’s Zeina Khodr, reporting from Diyarbakir, said Erdogan had made no secret that he was eyeing the presidency.

“He will need to amend the constitution and would like to increase the powers of the president. He cannot do that without the support of the Kurdish party, the BDP.”

Erdogan said he was putting his faith in the peace process “even if it costs me my political career,” in the face of accusations that Ankara was making concessions to Ocalan.

Ocalan, known as “Apo,” has said he wants peace for the greater good of his people.

“Consider Apo dead if this process fails. I am simply out,” the burly 64-year-old was quoted as saying in a rare prison meeting with Kurdish legislators last month.

Hard road ahead

If a ceasefire holds, the path to disarmament, and the reintegration of PKK fighters, will still be long and vulnerable to sabotage.

The fate of Ocalan also remains uncertain, but any move to release him would be strongly opposed by critics who see any settlement as threatening Turkish unity.

The prospect of talks with the PKK has outraged many Turks who revile Ocalan and hold him personally responsible for the bloodshed.

*Published under an agreement with Al Jazeera.

A Roboski solidarity march in Istanbul this past December. Credit: Jillian Kestler-D’Amours/IPS

By Jillian Kestler-D'Amours
ISTANBUL, Jan 15 2013 (IPS)

After over a year without accountability for a Turkish aerial bombing that killed 34 Kurdish men and boys, Turkey has come under heavy criticism for what many say is a widespread culture of impunity, especially when it comes to the treatment of its Kurdish citizens.

“It has been one year and there are no important steps we can see. Nobody has been arrested,” said lawyer Tahir Elci, head of the Diyarbakir Bar Association, which represents over 800 lawyers working in Turkey’s largest Kurdish-majority city.

“Usually, the prosecutors and other authorities protect the perpetrators and there are many barriers before the victims when they try to get justice,” Elci told IPS. “Even if perpetrators have not been punished, it is very important for relatives of victims to learn the truth.”

On Dec. 28, 2011, Turkish air force jets bombed a group of Kurdish villagers who were smuggling goods – sugar, fuel and cigarettes – from Iraqi Kurdistan back over the Turkish border along a well-known trading route.

Using drone footage of the area, Turkey reportedly mistook the group for fighters from the outlawed Kurdistan Workers’ Party, or PKK, which is deemed a terrorist group by the United States and the European Union, among others.

Seventeen children were among those killed in the bombing, known as the Uludere or Roboski massacre, after the name of the village (in Turkish and Kurdish, respectively) where it took place.

The government set up a commission of inquiry into the incident in January 2012, but conclusions are yet to be released. The prosecutor’s office in Diyarbakir, which has been tasked with leading a criminal investigation into the killings, has neither completed its work nor released any of its findings.

“The lack of progress in an entire year on completing any investigation of the Uludere (Roboski) incident is very troubling because it is consistent with (authorities’) overall reluctance to account to the public for the government’s wrongdoing,” said Emma Sinclair-Webb, a researcher on Turkey at Human Rights Watch, in a statement.

“Holding state authorities who killed civilians accountable is crucial to upholding democracy and the rule of law,” she stressed.

The murder of three Kurdish human rights activists – including a co-founder of the PKK – in Paris last week has also drawn international attention to the ongoing struggle for Kurdish rights.

Some analysts have said the killings, which local police described as professional executions, may have been meant to derail a potential peace agreement, as Turkish Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan re-started peace talks with imprisoned PKK leader Abdullah Ocalan in early January.

Umut Suvari is a board member of the Diyarbakir city council, and founder of the Youth and Change Association, which provides training and empowerment activities for Kurdish youth.

He explained that a young generation of Kurds is growing up more radical than their parents, thanks to increasing political pressure on Kurdish citizens.

Human rights groups estimate that the Turkish government has arrested thousands of Kurdish citizens over the past few years, including local mayors, academics, and lawyers. Many have been rounded up for alleged affiliations to the Union of Kurdistan Communities (KCK), a civil society group that the government views as the urban wing of the PKK.

In 2012, Turkey had jailed the most journalists of any country worldwide. Most of these journalists were Kurds imprisoned on terrorism-related charges.

According to the New York-based Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ), “Broadly worded anti-terror and penal code statutes have allowed Turkish authorities to conflate the coverage of banned groups and the investigation of sensitive topics with outright terrorism or other anti-state activity.”

Kurdish language instruction was also only introduced to Turkish public schools as an elective course earlier this year. Before that, students were prohibited from speaking their mother tongue.

“People don’t care anymore. They are joining demonstrations knowing they are going to be arrested,” Suvari told IPS from his office in Diyarbakir, referring to increasingly disenfranchised Kurdish youth.

“But we are teaching (youth) something different here. They can see how they are powerful when they get involved. When you give them a chance, they are doing great things.”

Twenty-eight-year-old Kurdish activist Emrah Ucar was raised in Diyarbakir, but never learned to speak his family’s native language. Despite this, he said growing up in the city gave him a heightened political consciousness at a young age.

“It would be different if I grew up in Istanbul, but I grew up in Diyarbakir and witnessed many things,” Ucar told IPS. “We’re not afraid to lose anything because a lot of family and friends are already in jail.”

Ucar helped organise an event in Istanbul in late December to commemorate the one-year anniversary of the Roboski killings. Dozens of intellectuals and artists participated, and the event was broadcast live online, where it has since garnered over 500,000 views.

“In order to understand Roboski, (people) have to understand history. Kurds have been killed regularly and systematically since the establishment of the (Turkish) Republic. You don’t have to be a guerilla in order to be killed by the Turkish state. The Kurdish question did not start with the PKK,” he said.

(END)