Dear community of ecological economists and degrowers,
Asena Ulus, a turkish volunteer at Can Decreix, compiled here below basic information about last marking events in Turkey. Please diffuse as much as possible as social medias are being blocked in Turkey.
We are concerned with the latest developments in Turkey, which have recently been drifted into a civil war and call upon the international community to stand in solidarity with the peoples, activists and revolutionaries of Middle East who fight for democratic, liberitarian and egalitarian life.
The political atmosphere started to attain a more tumultuouse tone in the run-up to the general elections held on the 7th of June as the campaign offices, party vehicles of pro-Kurdish People’s Democratic Party (HDP) were attacked. And, on the 5th of July, two days before the general elections, HDP election demonstration in Amed -the largest city in Turkey’s Kurdistan- was bombed: 4 people killed and 100 injured. The investigation of the perpetrators have still not been completed -apart from the identity of the suicide bomber. Whilst the elections were not held in a fair democratic atmosphere but under the existence of electoral threshold (of 10%), media coverage and unfair monetary support for the rival parties, HDP attained 13 % of the votes and obtained 82 seats in the parliament, which implied the loss of majority in the parliament for Erdoğan’s party (AKP), popular rejection of his proposal for regime change and pointed to formation of a coalition government. On the 20th of July, in Suruç -a border village between Turkey and Syria, while the press briefing of a group of revolutionaries from Turkey who were going to Kobane/ Rojawa to support the reconstruction and recovery of the city after the war that Islamic State (ISIS) launched upon during last summer, a bomb exploded and 33 were killed. The investigation of this attack as well have not attained clear results. In the run-up to general elections, Erdoğan stated that he did not favor the peace negotiations formulated and agreed upon in the ceasefire in 2011 and, later, encroached by a total disregard of the Kurdish Issue. The discourse he and his party held during the last 4 months incited a further rise of nationalist sentiments pointed against HDP and Kurdish citizens. Over 120 party buildings of HDP have been attacked, several people beaten in the streets. In the mean time, the government launched operations under the name of “antiterrorism” which was represented in both the national and the international media as against ISIS although it was mainly HDP members, leftists and oppositions that were detained and arrested in Turkey as well as it was Qandil which was bombed not the ISIS camps. Within the last month, in several districts of Turkey’s Kurdistan including Silopi, Lice, Şemdinli, Silvan, Yüksekova and Cizre, the Turkish state imposed a curfew for several days and the cities were attacked severely by the police and special task force while all forms of communication (telephone, internet connection, press and human rights observers) between the inhabitants and the rest of the world have been cut down as well as access to food, water and health services. As it ended in a civilian massacre, more than 100 people -20 of which were babies, children- were killed by the state forces. In Ankara -the capital city of Turkey, on the 10th of October, three weeks before the repetition of general elections, a peace rally organised by democratic NGOs -with the support of HDP -was attacked with two bombs and recently reported number of the killed is 128 while it is predicted that more than 400 people were injured. The government representatives stated that there is no “security vulnerability” even though there was no measures of safety taken in the area of rally as it is the case also with previous attacks. Moreover, Twitter, Facebook -which are intensely used by activists in Turkey- were banned as regulations were taken to forbid the dissemination of news on the Ankara Massacre in any media channels, which turned into a total press blackout.
We condole with the peoples of Turkey and Kurdistan, yet at the same time call upon the international community for democracy, liberty and justice to put pressure on the Turkish government to end the sieges implied in the Kurdish-populated cities, guarantee the human rights to its citizens, secure the safe and fair execution of democratic elections on the 1st of November, to bring the perpetrators of these attacks into justice and to recuperate by taking steps on the principals of the peace negotiations fomulated and agreed upon in the ceasefire in 2011.
#edibese #artıkyeter #basta