Kurdistan Workers' Party insurgency

Turkey–Kurdistan Workers' Party conflict
Date 1978 – present Location Turkey, North of Iraq Result Ongoing
Belligerents
Turkey	Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK)
Commanders and leaders
Current Commanders İlker Başbuğ Yasar Buyukanit Aydogan Babaoglu Abdullah Gul Recep Tayyip Erdogan Past Commanders Kenan Evren Nurettin Ersin Necdet Üruğ Necip Torumtay Doğan Güreş Hakkı Karadayı Hüseyin Kıvrıkoğlu Yaşar Büyükanıt Turgut Özal Süleyman Demirel Ahmet Necdet Sezer	Abdullah Öcalan  (POW) Murat Karayilan Haji Ahmadi
Strength
Military: 514,850 Gendarmerie: 148,700 Village Guards:50,000-90,000	4,000-5,000 (3,000-3,500) in northern Iraq.
Casualties and losses
6,482 killed	32,000 killed 14,000 captured
5,560 civilians killed 1,000+ missing

Area inhabited by Kurds in 1992

The Turkey–Kurdistan Workers' Party conflict is between the Republic of Turkey and the militant ethnic separatist Kurdish guerrilla group. The conflict is located in the East and Southeast Anatolia and Northern Iraq. The campaign of armed violence began in 1978, the rural-based insurgency began in 1984 with the urban terrorism throughout this period.

The rebellion by the PKK is the latest and most comprehensive in a series of uprisings by the Kurdish minority since the formation of the modern state of Turkey, which is seen as denying Kurdish identity.

According to official figures released by the Turkish military for the 1984-2008 period, the conflict has resulted in the capture of 14,000 PKK members, and the death of 17,000 PKK members, 6,482 soldiers, and 5,560 civilians. The conflict particularly affected the tourism industry. For an analysis of the toll, see Effects of the Turkish-PKK conflict.

The current membership of the PKK is approximately 4,000 to 5,000 militants of whom 3,000 to 3,500 are located in northern Iraq.

Background

Main article: History of the Kurdistan Workers Party

The Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) began in 1974 as a Marxist-Leninist organization under the leadership of Abdullah Öcalan. In 1978 the organization adapted the name "Kurdistan Workers Party" and waged Urban War between 1978-1980. The organization restructured itself and moved the organization structure to Syria between 1980-1984 just after the 1980 Turkish coup d'état. The campaign of armed violence began in 1984. The rural-based insurgency lasted between 1984-1992. The PKK shifted its activities to include urban terrorism between 1993-1995 and later 1996–1999. The leader of the party was captured in Kenya in early 1999. After a "self declared peace initiative of 1999," returned to active stage in February 2004. Since 1974, it had been able to evolve, adapt, gone through a metamorphosis, which became the main factor in its survival. It had gradually grown from a handful of political students to a radical organization became part of targets of War on Terrorism.

With the aftermath of the failed 1991 uprisings in Iraq against Saddam Hussein the UN established no-fly zones in Kurdish areas of Iraq giving those areas de facto independence. The PKK soon found a safe haven from which they could launch attacks against Turkey, which responded with Operation Steel (1995) and Operation Hammer (1997) in an attempt to crush the PKK.

In 1992, General Kemal Yilmaz, declared that the Special Warfare Department (the seat of the Counter-Guerrilla) was still active in the conflict against the PKK. The U.S. State Department echoed concerns of Counter-Guerrilla involvement in its 1994 Country Report on Human Rights Practices for Turkey.

Öcalan was captured by CIA agents in Kenya on February 15, 1999, who turned him over to Turkish authorities. After trial he was sentenced to death, but this sentence was commuted to life-long aggravated imprisonment when the death penalty was abolished in Turkey in August 2002.

With the invasion of Iraq in 2003 much of the arms of the former Iraqi army fell into the hands of the Kurdish Peshmerga militias. The Peshmerga became the de facto army of northern Iraq and Turkish sources claim many of its weapons found their way into the hands of other Kurdish groups such as the PKK and the PJAK (a PKK offshoot which operated against Iran). This has been the pretext for numerous Turkish attacks on the Kurdistan region of Iraq.

As of June 2007, over 3,000 PKK fighters are believed to be in Iraqi Kurdistan.

As of 2000, the conflict had claimed lives of at least 157 Turkish teachers.

Major events, 1984-present

Kurdistan Workers Party supporters in London, April 2003

May 22, 2007: A suicide bombing hits Ankara, killing eight and wounding over 100. This attack was attributed to the PKK and the Turkish army decided to launch a military action against them.

May 27, 2007: The US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and Turkish foreign minister Abdullah Gül discussed the possible outbreak of Turkish-Kurdish hostilities. Immediately after American troops and civilians begin evacuating from northern Iraq.

May 30, 2007: American and Kurdish forces sign an agreement transferring the security of Iraqi Kurdistan to the Peshmerga. American forces are evacuated from all Kurdish areas except Kirkuk.

May 31, 2007: The Turkish military announced they were prepared to launch an incursion into Iraq. Leader of Iraqi Kurdistan Massoud Barzani announced that the Peshmerga will defend itself in case of a Turkish incursion.

June 2, 2007: American troops and civilians have withdrawn from all of Iraqi Kurdistan. Massoud Barzani again warns the Turkish military that any incursion will be fought against by the Peshmerga. An estimated 100,000 Turkish troops are mobilized on the border between Turkey and Iraq.

June 4, 2007: A PKK suicide bomber kills seven soldiers and wounds six at an army base in Tunceli.

June 5, 2007: There are reports of limited shelling and air strikes by the Turkish army attacking PKK bases in Iraqi Kurdistan.

June 7, 2007: Several hundred Turkish troops cross into Iraq on a "hot pursuit" raid against Turkish rebels. Turkey declares a three month martial law in Kurdish areas near the Iraq border and bans civilian flights to the area. It has been confirmed that 3 Turkish soldiers have been killed by a PKK landmine.

October 7, 2007: Yüksekova incident

Oct 17, 2007: Turkish Grand National Assembly approves a government request for their troops to cross the Iraqi border to attack Kurdish rebels. Action was delayed on request by the US government on the condition that "swift steps" were taken to deal with the militants.

Oct 21, 2007: 12 Turkish troops killed in PKK ambush on their army post, less than three miles from the Iraq border.

A demonstration against the PKK in Kadıköy, İstanbul on October 22, 2007

October 24, 2007: Turkish fighter jets bombed several PKK targets on the Iraqi side of the border.

February 21, 2008: Turkey launches a ground incursion into northern Iraq, sending 10,000 troops across the border supported by air assets.

July 27, 2008: Turkey blames the PKK for two bombings in Istanbul which kill 17 and injure 154.

August 7, 2008: The PKK claimed responsibility for the explosion that halted the operation of the Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan oil pipeline.

October 1, 2008: One Turkish security force soldier was killed, with another one wounded, in an attack staged by PKK militants in southeastern Turkey.

October 4, 2008: Fifteen Turkish soldiers were killed, with another 20 also wounded, after a PKK attack from northern Iraq with the firing of heavy weapons at a military outpost in the Semdinli region bordering Iraq and Iran. At least 23 members of the PKK were also killed.

Reaction

• A statement issued after an emergency meeting of the Counter Terrorism Higher Board, chaired by Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, said: "Our struggle against terrorism will be pursued under all conditions and above all other concerns through effective cooperation between state bodies and every measure will be implemented with determination."
• The British foreign office said: "The United Kingdom utterly condemns Friday's terrorist attack in Hakari, Turkey. There can be no excuse for the use of violence to achieve one's aims. The UK stands shoulder-to-shoulder with Turkey in its fight against terrorism and strongly supports ongoing efforts between the Turkish and Iraqi authorities to prevent the PKK from using northern Iraq as a base from which to mount attacks against Turkey."
• The European Union also condemned the on the gendarmerie station in a statement released by the Union’s French presidency, saying: "Europe expresses its complete solidarity with the Turkish authorities and offers its condolences to the families and friends of the victims."

Human rights abuses

Further information: [[:Human rights of Kurdish people in Turkey]]

Both the PKK and the Turkish army have committed numerous human rights abuses in the course of the conflict. Former French ambassador to Turkey Eric Rouleau states:

According to the Turkish Ministry of Justice, in addition to the 30,000 people killed in military campaigns, 22,500 Turkish Militants and Politicians were assassinated between 1984, when the conflict began, and 1998. An additional 1,000 people were reportedly assassinated in the first nine months of 1999.

Abuses by the PKK

Human Rights Watch has stated the following about the tactics of the PKK::

• Consequently, all economic, political, military, social and cultural organizations, institutions, formations—and those who serve in them—have become targets. The entire country has become a battlefield.
• The PKK also promised to "liquidate" or "eliminate" political parties, "imperialist" cultural and educational institutions, legislative and representative bodies, and "all local collaborators and agents working for the Republic of Turkey in Kurdistan."
• Many who died were unarmed civilians, caught in the middle between the PKK and security forces, targeted for attacks by inevitably, PKK suicide bombers.

According to Amnesty International, the PKK killed and tortured Kurdish peasants and its own members in the 1980s. A number of Kurds have been abducted and killed because they were suspected of being "collaborators" or "informers" and it was a common practice for the PKK to kill their whole families.

According to a 1996 report by Amnesty International, "in January 1996 the [Turkish] government announced that the PKK had massacred 11 men near the remote village of Güçlükonak. Seven of the victims were members of the local village guard force".

Abuses by the Turkish side

In response to the activities of the PKK, the Turkish government has placed South-eastern Anatolia, where citizens of Kurdish descent are in the majority, under military rule. The Turkish Army and the Kurdish village guards loyal to it have abused Kurdish civilians, resulting in mass migrations to cities.

The former ambassador Rouleau points out that the continuing human rights abuses of ethnic Kurds is one of the main obstacles to Turkish membership of the E.U.

Human Rights Watch notes that:

• As Human Rights Watch has often reported and condemned, Turkish government forces have, in the course of the conflict with the PKK, also committed serious violations of international human rights and humanitarian law, including torture, extrajudicial killings, and indiscriminate fire. We continue to demand that the Turkish government investigate and hold accountable those members of its security forces responsible for these violations. Nonetheless, under international law, the government abuses cannot under any circumstances be seen to justify or excuse those committed by Ocalan's PKK.

• The Kurdish Workers Party (PKK), a separatist group that espouses the use of violence for political ends, continues to wage guerrilla warfare in the southeast, frequently in violation of international humanitarian law, or the laws of war. But instead of attempting to capture, question and indict people suspected of illegal activity, Turkish security forces killed suspects in house raids, thus acting as investigator, judge, jury and executioner. Police routinely asserted that such deaths occurred in shoot-outs between police and "terrorists." In many cases, eyewitnesses reported that no firing came from the attacked house or apartment. Reliable reports indicated that while the occupants of raided premises were shot and killed, no police were killed or wounded during the raids. This discrepancy suggests that the killings were, in fact, summary, extrajudicial executions, in violation of international human rights and humanitarian law.

According to an article printed in the November 2002 issue of the International Socialist, monthly paper of the International Socialists, during the conflict (and still [as of 2002]), the Turkish army killed and “disappeared” members of the PKK.

In 1997, Amnesty International (AI) reported that, "'Disappearances' and extrajudicial executions have emerged as new and disturbing patterns of human rights violations ..." by the Turkish state.

See also

• List of terrorist incidents, 2008
• Iran–Party for a Free Life in Kurdistan conflict

External links

• Victims of the Conflict
• Turkish Gov’t Pushes to Disarm Kurdish Fighters by Cindy Jaquith, The Militant, April 13 2009