The PKK is not a legitimate force within the Kurdish national liberation movement
The reaction of the Democratic Union Party (PYD) and the Kurdistan Workers, Party (PKK) to the Erbil conference of Syrian Kurds signifies the polarization of Kurdish politics at the helm of chaos and the global/regional power struggle over the Middle East.
The Syrian Kurds gathered in Erbil to create a unified stance for the Kurdish national rights in Syria. The venue of the conference itself was crucial as it indicated the backing and explicit support of the Kurdistan Regional Government. At the opening ceremony, the attendance of President of Kurdistan Region, KRG Prime Minister and the Kurdistan Parliament Speaker along with other high-level representatives of Kurdistan Region's political parties, clearly demonstrated the indisputable solidarity of the KRG toward the Syrian Kurds, legitimate demands.
Kurdistan President Massoud Barzani's speech at the opening ceremony was a historical memory of Qazi Muhammed, who was the president of the first Kurdish Republic of Mahabad in Iranian Kurdistan in 1946. Following the demise of the Republic by Iranian forces, Qazi Muhammed was arrested, tried and later hanged. During the trial, Muhammed responded to the accusation of an Iranian prosecutor that he hosted foreign enemies on Iranian soil--referring to the legendary Kurdish leader, Mustafa Barzani, by saying that he was not a foreigner but he was in his home and only moved rooms. In other words, Muhammed courageously told his persecutors that Kurdistan is a single social, political and geographic entity, referring to the four parts of Kurdistan.
In his speech at the opening ceremony, the Kurdistan Region president clearly told the Syrian Kurds "you are in your home and count yourself not as a guest"; this indicates historical continuity from Mahabad to Erbil. It is this political perspective and national sentiment that makes the Syrian Kurds' conference in Erbil more powerful and significant.
Since the beginning of anti-regime demonstrations in Syria, the pages of The Kurdish Globe have repeatedly reiterated that the political future of Syria after President Bashar Al-Assad, and particularly that of Syrian Kurdistan, will be decisive for the entire Kurdish national movement and the future of the Kurdish nation in all parts of Kurdistan. It has been reiterated the main focus and concentration of Kurdish national political entities should be over Syria and the role of Syrian Kurds during the process of regime change. It is said that the entire Kurdish national political forces should assist and support Syrian Kurds to gain their national democratic rights with a minimum of a federal political structure. Any less achievement than federalism would not only mean the missing of a historical opportunity for the Syrian Kurds, but jeopardizing the federal experience in Iraq and Iraqi Kurdistan. A federal structure for Syrian Kurdistan would, on the other hand, mean any solution to the Kurdish national question in the Middle East has to take off from federalism as the minimum political solution.
For the Syrian Kurds to exploit the crisis of regime, they need to develop a coherent national-political program where the Kurdish political groups, individuals and intellectuals, and all other representatives of the Kurds of Syria, can unite. While the Syrian Kurds have to develop such a national strategic policy, it is the duty of all other Kurdish political groups and institutions to provide their support and experience to them. The Erbil conference, in that sense, was crucial as it indicated the strong bond between the Syrian Kurds and the Iraqi Kurds.
The Erbil conference; however, had other serious aspects apart from national solidarity and unity. It indicated that the KRG is an active regional player and would not remain idle regarding the chaotic development unfolding around it. This regional activity, nonetheless, will have serious consequences for the KRG that it has to prepare itself to face and challenge them.
KRG's open position against the regime in Syria and its open support for the legitimate Kurdish national demands will without doubt raise some eyebrows in the region. Despite the apparent conflict among the four states of the region that occupy parts of Kurdistan, namely Turkey, Iraq, Iran and Syria, they have a common objective to sustain the Kurdish national movement within their own borders and not to allow the solution of the Kurdish question as a national political question. The different political statuses of the Kurdistan Region of Iraq came about mainly thanks to the decades of national struggle and Peshmarga forces that were ready when the U.S. and Saddam Hussein's Iraq collapsed into each other. In comparison to the political and social status of millions of Kurds in other parts of Kurdistan, Iraqi Kurdistan is still a historical anomaly and its political status is temporary. It cannot be permanent and normal until the other parts of Kurdistan come near or to the same political status.
The conflict among the four states regarding their regional hegemonic interests have been exacerbated by the serious political upheavals in the region called the Arab Spring, where dictatorial regimes are falling one after the other with an uncertain political outlook in the near future. It is this period that provides a golden opportunity for the Kurdish national liberation movement to throw off its century-long oppressive chains put on them by global powers following World War I.
Aware of this potential opportunity, the repressive regimes attempt to manipulate the Kurdish movement not to take this historical opportunity. One of the methods that has been tried and succeeded, time and again, is to create artificial division and conflict within the Kurdish national movement. With the lack of a strategic national program and policy and national unity, the Kurds have unfortunately been prone to such unholy intrigues and fallen victim to them.
PKK: The weak point of the Kurdish national movement
The harsh reaction of the PKK and its affiliated arm, Syria's PYD, to the Erbil conference was indeed not only irresponsible but at the same time destructive in the way to prevent Kurdish national movements' unification. PKK's Acting Leader Murat Karayilan, in a statement published by PKK's news agency, ANF, blamed the initiative of KRG and particularly that of President Massoud Barzani for creating division among the Kurdish political groups in Syria. He claimed the organizers of the conference did not invite the PYD to Erbil. This accusation was officially denied by the Kurdistan presidency, and in a public statement the Kurdistan presidency informed that all the Syrian Kurdish parties, including the PYD, were invited to the event, but the PYD chose not to participate.
It is not a secret that both the PKK and the PYD have an understanding with Al-Assad's regime and use their influence over the Kurds not to stand against the regime. A close examination of the PKK discourse through their various publications indicates that the PKK took its position in the Iran-Syria axis and implicitly allies with traditional Kemalist circles in Turkey that stand for the existing status quo in the region. The PKK's legal arm, Peace and Democracy Party (BDP) has been flirting with the Republican Peoples' Party (CHP) which is the bastion of the traditional Kemalist elite and stands for the pro status quo both in Turkey and in the region at large.
So it is no coincidence that the Kurdistan presidency accused the PYD (PKK) stance regarding the Erbil conference as similar to the ultra-nationalist Turkish Nationalist Movement's leader Devlet Bahceli. It is the first time that the Kurdistan Regional authorities took such a sharp and strong position vis à vis the PKK.
The PKK's negative stance is not only against the KRG authorities, but also against all other non-PKK groups and intellectuals. Recently, top-level PKK members attacked an influential Kurdish political leader, Kemal Burkay, who recently returned to Turkey after 30 years of exile in Europe. The PKK accused Burkay of being the puppet and agent of the ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) in Turkey. This stance indicates the continuity of the PKK anti-Kurdish position since its birth. Beginning in its early period in the 1970s, the PKK accused all other Kurdish political groups of treason and called their agents collaborators of regional and international intelligence agencies, CIA, Mossad or Turkey's MIT. Such accusations have not been confined solely to the discursive realm but were followed by physical attacks against other Kurdish parties and assassinations of influential Kurdish figures. In the 1980s and 1990s, Europe became a theater of PKK assaults against other Kurdish groups and individuals.
Supported and protected by the Syrian regime since the 1980s and manipulated by the deep Turkish state apparatus, the PKK played the destructive role within the growing Kurdish national movement both in Kurdistan of Turkey and in Iraqi Kurdistan. The two PKK-affiliated groups, PJAK (Free Life for Kurdistan) and PYD in Iran and Syria respectively, hijacked the Kurdish national movement and put them into the service of those governments' internal and regional operations.
It is time to denounce the PKK as a legitimate force within the Kurdish national movement. It is not; this fact remains a strategic importance for the development of a healthy Kurdish national movement for independence and freedom. It is a sad reality to observe that such a party--with such a considerable support among the section of Kurdish people, particularly among the Kurds in Turkey--has such a negative and illegitimate role in the Kurdish national liberation movement.
All the Kurdish national groups, intelligentsia and institutions at home or abroad should unite around a strategic policy that safeguards the entire Kurdish national interests in such a turbulent and chaotic period. The Middle East is prone to radical changes, and what changes it may bring are not clear. One thing is clear: The existing political orders and borders are no longer stable and prone to change. It is now historic times that the Kurds should develop a vision to face the challenges of the time.
The Erbil conference was a huge step in bringing unity and order to the Kurdish house, and this should be continued despite the annoyances of others, whoever they are. The Kurdistan president is the legitimate national leader of the Kurdish nation. By bringing the Syrian Kurds to Erbil and urging them to unite their ranks and files for the upcoming radical changes, he played his national leadership historically. The next step should be conglomeration of all the Kurdish national parties and groups throughout Kurdistan and abroad in Erbil to give a united position of the Kurdish nation. It is this unity that is the key to bringing freedom and independence.
© The Kurdish Globe 2012
