-Caveat Lector-
The Kurds in pivotally-important-to-NATO Turkey are standing in line
hoping to become the next ethnic minority entitled to NATO firepower -- but
NATO is foursquare behind the fascist military dictatorship that presently
governs Turkey, so the persecution of 12 MILLION people --treated worse by
Turks than the Kosovars by the Serbs-- is not so urgent a "holocaust" as a
few hundred thousand Albanians across the Straits ...
Pro-Kurdish Pols Winning in Turkey
By SELCAN HACAOGLU
.c The Associated Press
KIZILTEPE, Turkey (AP) -- Cihan Sincar, running for mayor in Turkish
elections, pledges to struggle as long as she lives for the rights of
minority Kurds. But she knows that politics can turn deadly.
Her husband, Mehmet, a pro-Kurdish legislator, was killed in 1993, shot in
the back of the head.
Now Sincar and a half dozen other members of a pro-Kurdish party are expected
to win local elections Sunday in key towns in Turkey's predominantly Kurdish
southeast.
Their successful campaigns have created tensions with the government, which
is engaged in a bloody war with Kurdish rebels and is extremely wary of any
expression of Kurdish identity.
The vote is the first time that the People's Democracy Party, or HADEP,
Turkey's only legal pro-Kurdish opposition party, has contested the local
posts.
The party calls for greater cultural freedoms for Kurds. Prosecutors have
accused it of taking orders from Kurdish rebels fighting for autonomy in the
region since 1984.
Club-wielding police broke up a HADEP rally in the region's main city of
Diyarbakir on Tuesday, beating party supporters even as they fled the rally.
Dozens of police backed by an armored personnel carrier raided Sincar's
campaign office in the town of Kiziltepe a day later, recording the names of
party workers and frisking them.
Tensions are also higher in the region following a number of bombings thought
conducted by Kurds angered by the February arrest of rebel leader Abdullah
Ocalan, who now faces treason charges.
Sincar, 44, who faces trial on charges of aiding Ocalan's Kurdistan Workers
Party and was detained for nine days in November, vowed to continue her
fight.
``I will struggle for my people as long as I live,'' she said.
``There is an obstinate denial of a Kurdish entity,'' she said, sitting in
her apartment surrounded by scores of supporters. ``We are citizens of
Turkey, but we are Kurds.''
Sincar is widely expected to win the race for mayor of Kiziltepe, a town of
113,000 just north of the Syrian border. The town has often been the scene of
gunfights between Kurdish guerrillas and Turkish soldiers.
Two of Sincar's brothers-in-law were guerrillas killed in shootouts with
soldiers. She named her youngest son after one of them -- Kamuran.
Among the freedoms HADEP seeks is the right to use the Kurdish language --
which was only allowed to be used at all in 1991 -- in schools and
broadcasting.
But the issue is sensitive in Turkey, where the government is quick to see
any expression of Kurdish identity as a veiled attempt to break up the state.
The government denies discrimination against its 12 million Kurds and points
to Kurdish success stories, such as late President Turgut Ozal.
HADEP ran in 1995 national elections but did not get enough votes for a
parliament seat.
Pro-Kurdish candidates also demand more funding for the poor, largely rural
southeast, where many villages still lack running water and electricity.
The area is under a visible military presence. Four army checkpoints dot the
75-mile road between Diyarbakir and Kiziltepe. Nearby shantytowns are
populated by Kurdish villagers forced from their homes by government troops
during a scorched earth campaign to deny the rebels local support.
Sincar refused to speak about the upcoming trial for Ocalan or about the
rebels. But she said some of her supporters have sons fighting as guerrillas
and hiding in the nearby mountains. The fight has left 37,000 dead since
1984.
``I don't want Turkish or Kurdish mothers to suffer,'' said Sincar. ``I
pledge to my supporters to try to bring their sons from the mountains. We
need peace.''
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