Turkey’s Foreign Ministry’s Extraneous Statement

By: Adil Al-Baghdadi

Brussels 15 February 2005

On late Sunday on 13 February Turkey’s Foreign Ministry working over time and outside social hours made a statement which will be remembered for generation to come as an extraneous benchmark of the most farcical reaction to Iraq’s first democratic elections in its history.

In it the ministry said: “Results of Iraqi elections failed to ensure fair representation of all ethnic groups”.

This one single line sums up the folly of Turkey’s position and lack of vision and respect for the popular response to the elections in Iraq and in its federalist region of South Kurdistan, which the whole world has applauded 

Never in history of Iraq has so many of its cultural, religious and ethnic mosaic so much freedom to express their will against the backdrop of terror and intimidation, as they had done on 31^st of January 2005.

Never in history of Iraq has so many of Iraq’s constituents been so eager to come out in force dressed in their national costumes to cast their vote as they had done on that truly historical day.

And never in the history of Middle East has there been any similar manifestation of people’s power as it has been done on that glorious day, which humanity will remember as a day when human spirit triumphed over evil.

Ballot papers, posters and slogans and election advertisement in the two official languages of the new state of Iraq, as well as the existence of various TV stations, which cater for Iraq’s diverse ethnic and religious groups and seats in national assembly for all Iraq’s constituents can be hardly described as “Failed to ensure fair representation”.

What utter hypocrisy.

The statement is in fact a failure in insuring that truth is told to Turkish people and that a fair representation of the reality is conveyed by the long standing machines of lies and disinformation in the Turkish state.

A state which has long denied the existence of any ethnic group within its boundaries and eagerly pursued the most systematic ethnic, cultural and physical cleansing in the history of mankind, is now lecturing about fair representation of ethnic groups.

No country in the world has so sadistically pursued 80 years of racist policies against a large section of a population as Turkey has done with its draconian measures aimed at wiping anything Kurdish, whether history, language or people.

To this day Turkey still feels comfortable in denying the Kurds of North Kurdistan the right to speak Kurdish in public or in political rallies and conferences.

No banners, political posters let alone shop signs of the two or three private Kurdish language teaching centres are allowed to be written in Kurdish.

What election mechanisms have been set in place to insure fair representations of Kurds in Turkish parliament and to have their on regional of parliament in North Kurdistan?

And when political manifestos, posters, instructions on how to vote, ballot papers and directions to voting precincts will be published in both Turkish and Kurdish in Turkey?

The answer is these won’t ever happen while racist mentality pervades at the helms of Turkish government institutions, which are adamant that Kurds in North Kurdistan will not get political rights even if all the population of planet earth left for Mars.

In fact pictures of the mosaic of Iraqi and Kurdistani society taking part in elections would look like they have been beamed down from different galaxy altogether, as far as Turkey is concerned.

Shielded by international legitimacy, NATO membership and bogus claim of being the only democratic Muslim country, Turkey has violated every single tenet of human rights charter and every article of international laws and all known conventions.

Turkey not just denied individual rights and freedoms but the natural rights of human beings to be different and to feel different.

It has denied the rights for millions of people to be proud of their culture, heritage and history.

Foremost of these denials, Turkey has denied the right of an ancient and rich language to be spoken, written and to be celebrated in events.

No wonder that Kurmanji and Zaza Kurdish have only survived and developed outside Turkey and North Kurdistan.

That is why Iraqi elections and Iraq as a whole are far more representative and democratic than this aspiring and would-be EU member.

Surprising as it may sound a Middle Eastern country which is still reeling from years of tyranny and injustice is far more European in political practices and representation than Turkey is.

It is high time that Turkey looks into herself and examine why she is less representative and unfair to all of its other ethnic and religious groups in general and to the country’s second largest nation, the Kurds, in particular.

It would be also very appropriate for Turkey to face the reality of the just and legitimate aspirations of the Kurdish nation.

This nation wants to take its rightful place among all the colours of nations which make up this planet.

Turkey is colour blind and has no connection with outside world, perhaps a complete rethink of its strategy on the basis of embracing basic human values of freedom and true principles of democracy will help its ailing foresight and dwindling power of observation.