Turkish Kurdistan

See also: Kurds in Turkey

Kurdish-inhabited regions of Turkey according to The World Factbook

Turkish Kurdistan or Northern Kurdistan (Kurdish: Bakurê Kurdistan) is the portion of Kurdistan within the jurisdiction of Turkey, located in the Eastern Anatolia and Southeastern Anatolia regions, where Kurds form the predominant ethnic group. The Kurdish Institute of Paris estimates that there are 20 million Kurds living in Turkey, the majority of them in the southeast.

Southeastern Turkey (Northern Kurdistan) is considered to be one of the four parts of Kurdistan, which also includes parts of northern Syria (Syrian Kurdistan), northern Iraq (Iraqi Kurdistan) and northwestern Iran (Iranian Kurdistan).

The term Turkish Kurdistan is often used in the context of Kurdish nationalism, which makes it a controversial term among proponents of Turkish nationalism. There is ambiguity about its geographical extent, and the term has different meaning depending on context. Scientific papers and news media frequently use the term.

Geography and economy

Batman city

According to Encyclopædia Britannica 13 of the 81 provinces of Turkey have Kurdish majorities: Adıyaman, Ağrı, Bingöl, Bitlis, Diyarbakır, Hakkâri, Iğdır, Mardin, Muş, Şanlıurfa, Siirt, Tunceli, and Van.

In 1987, the Encyclopaedia of Islam described Turkish Kurdistan as covering at least 17 provinces of Turkey: Adıyaman, Ağrı, Bingöl, Bitlis, Diyarbakır, Elazığ, Erzincan, Erzurum, Hakkâri, Kars, Malatya, Mardin, Muş, Siirt, Şanlıurfa, Tunceli and Van, while emphasising that "the imprecise limits of the frontiers of Kurdistan hardly allow an exact appreciation of the area." (Since 1987, four new provinces—Şırnak, Batman, Iğdır and Ardahan—have been created out of the territory of some of these provinces.)

The region forms the south-eastern edge of Anatolia, in Upper Mesopotamia. It is dominated by high peaks rising to over 3,700 m (12,000 ft) and arid mountain plateaux, forming part of the arc of the Taurus Mountains. It has an extreme continental climate—hot in the summer, bitterly cold in the winter. Despite this, much of the region is fertile and has traditionally exported grain and livestock to the cities in the plains. The local economy is dominated by animal husbandry and small-scale agriculture, with cross-border smuggling to and from Iraqi Kurdistan (especially of petroleum) providing a major source of income in the Iraq-Turkey border area. Larger-scale agriculture and industrial activities dominate the economic life of the lower-lying region around Diyarbakır, the largest Kurdish-majority city in the region. Elsewhere, however, military activity and high unemployment has led to extensive migration from the region to other parts of Turkey and abroad.

History

Main article: History of the Kurdish people

Ottoman Kurdistan in 1855

Part of the Fertile Crescent of the Ancient Near East, Northern Kurdistan was quickly affected by the Neolithic Revolution that saw the spread of agriculture. In the Bronze Age, it was ruled by the Arameans, followed by the Neo-Assyrian Empire in the Iron Age. Classical antiquity saw the arrival of first Greater Armenia, then the Roman Empire. The early Muslim conquests swept over the region with the spread of Islam.

During the Middle Ages, the region came under the rule of local chieftains. In the 10th and 11th centuries, it was ruled by the Kurdish Marwanid dynasty. From the 14th century onwards, the region was mostly incorporated into the Ottoman Empire.

Kurdish principalities

A tax register (or defter) dating back to 1527 mentions an area called vilayet-i Kurdistan, which included seven major and 11 minor emirates (or principalities). The document refers to the Kurdish emirates as eyalet (state), an indication of the autonomy enjoyed by these principalities. In a Ferman (imperial decree) issued by Suleiman I, around 1533, he outlines the rules of inheritance and succession among Kurdistan beys i.e. the Kurdish aristocracy. Hereditary succession was granted to Kurdish emirates loyal to the Ottomans, and Kurdish princes were granted autonomy within the Empire. The degree of autonomy of these emirates varied greatly and depended on their geopolitical significance. The weak Kurdish tribes were forced to join stronger ones or become a part of Ottoman sanjaks. However, the powerful and less accessible tribes, particularly those close to the frontier with Persia, enjoyed a high degree of autonomy.

According to a kanunname(book of law) mentioned by Evliya Çelebi, there were two administrative units different from regular sanjaks: 1) Kurdish sanjaks (Ekrad Beyliği), characterized by the hereditary rule of the Kurdish aristocracy and 2) Kurdish governments (hükümet). The Kurdish sanjaks, like ordinary sanjaks, had military obligations and had to pay taxes. On the other hand, the Kurdish hükümet neither paid taxes nor provided troops for the Ottoman Army. The Ottomans preferred not to interfere in their succession and internal affairs. According to Çelebi, by the mid-17th century the autonomy of the Kurdish emirates had diminished. At this time, out of 19 sanjaks of the Diyarbakir Eyalet, 12 were regular Ottoman sanjaks, and the remaining were referred to as Kurdish sanjaks. The Kurdish sanjaks were Sagman, Kulp, Mihraniye, Tercil, Atak, Pertek, Çapakçur and Çermik. Çelebi lists the Kurdish states or hükümets as Cezire, Egil, Genç, Palu and Hazo. In the late 18th and early 19th century, with the decline of the Ottoman Empire, the Kurdish principalities became practically independent.

Modern history

Provisions of the Treaty of Sèvres for an independent Kurdistan (in 1920).

The Ottoman government began to assert its authority in the region in the early 19th century. Concerned with independent-mindedness of Kurdish principalities, Ottomans sought to curb their influence and bring them under the control of the central government in Constantinople. However, removal from power of these hereditary principalities led to more instability in the region from the 1840s onwards. In their place, sufi sheiks and religious orders rose to prominence and spread their influence throughout the region. One of the prominent Sufi leaders was Sheikh Ubeydalla Nahri, who began a revolt in the region between Lakes Van and Urmia. The area under his control covered both Ottoman and Qajar territories. Shaikh Ubaidalla is regarded as one of the earliest leaders who pursued modern nationalist ideas among Kurds. In a letter to a British Vice-Consul, he declared: the Kurdish nation is a people apart. . . we want our affairs to be in our hands'.'

The breakup of the Ottoman Empire after its defeat in the First World War led to its dismemberment and establishment of the present-day political boundaries, dividing the Kurdish-inhabited regions between several newly created states. The establishment and enforcement of the new borders had profound effects for the Kurds, who had to abandon their traditional nomadism for village life and settled farming.

Education

There has been significant conflict in Turkey over the Kurdish populations' linguistic rights. At various points in its history Turkey has enacted laws prohibiting the use of Kurdish in schools.

In 2014, several Kurdish NGOs and two Kurdish political parties supported a boycott of schools in Northern Kurdistan to promote the right to education in the Kurdish language in all subjects. While Kurdish identity has become more acceptable in Turkish society, the Turkish government has only allowed the Kurdish language to be offered as an elective in schools. The government has refused to honor other demands. In several southeastern cities, Kurds have established private schools to teach classes in Kurdish but the police have been closing down these private schools.

Conflict and controversy

Main articles: Kurdish–Turkish conflict and OHAL

Kurds generally consider southeastern Turkey to be one of the four parts of a Greater Kurdistan, which also includes parts of northern Syria (Rojava or Western Kurdistan), northern Iraq (Southern Kurdistan), and northwestern Iran (Eastern Kurdistan).

There has been a long-running separatist conflict in Turkey which has cost 30,000 lives, on both sides. The region saw several major Kurdish rebellions during the 1920s and 1930s. These were forcefully put down by the Turkish authorities and the region was declared a closed military area from which foreigners were banned between 1925 and 1965. Kurdish place names were changed and turkified, the use of Kurdish language was outlawed, the words Kurds and Kurdistan were erased from dictionaries and history books, and the Kurds were only referred to as Mountain Turks. Politicians were often prosecuted and sentenced to prison terms for speaking Kurdish.

In 1983, a number of provinces were placed under martial law in response to the activities of the militant separatist Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK). A guerrilla war took place through the rest of the 1980s and into the 1990s. By 1993, the total number of security forces involved in the struggle in southeastern Turkey was about 200,000, and the conflict had become the largest counter-insurgency in the Middle East, in which much of the countryside was evacuated, thousands of Kurdish-populated villages were destroyed, and numerous extra judicial summary executions were carried out by both sides. More than 37,000 people were killed in the violence and hundreds of thousands more were forced to leave their homes. The situation in the region has since eased following the capture of the PKK leader Abdullah Öcalan in 1999 and the introduction of a greater degree of official tolerance for Kurdish cultural activities, encouraged by the European Union. However, some political violence is still ongoing and the Turkish–Iraqi border region remains tense.

The 1965 Census: ethnic groups and languages

Kurmanji speakers in the 1965 Turkish census: in the dark green provinces a majority spoke Kurdish, in the light green one a plurality did. Because of Turkification, many Turkish Kurds no longer speak Kurdish.

Turkish Kurdistan is inhabited predominantly by ethnic Kurds, with Turkish, Arab and Assyrian minorities.

In the census of 1965, Kurdish-speakers made up the majority in Ağrı, Batman, Muş, Bingöl, Tunceli, Bitlis, Mardin, Şanlıurfa, Hakkâri, Siirt, Şırnak, and Van, and the plurality in Diyarbakır.

Since the 1990s, forced immigration from the southeast has brought millions of Kurds to cities like Istanbul, Ankara and Izmir.

Mother tongue	Populationa	Percentage
Kurdish	1,149,166	60.8%
Turkish	535,880	28.4%
Arabic	124,586	6.6%
Zazaki	60,326	3.2%
Other	19,965	1.1%
Total	1,889,923	100%

Notes

^a The source is the Turkish 1965 census. The provinces included are: Ağrı, Bitlis, Diyarbakır, Hakkari, Mardin, Siirt (including Batman and Şırnak) and Van.

See also

• Iranian Kurdistan
• Iraqi Kurdistan
• Syrian Kurdistan
• Kurdish people
• Kurds in Syria
• Kurdification
• Turkification

External links

• Maps of Kurdish Regions by GlobalSecurity.org
• Map of Kurdish Population Distribution by GlobalSecurity.org