Dilar response of on my article about PKK and my reply
Dear Zaher,
24/01/2018
Thank you for your article. I hope you are well.
I disagree with many of the things that you have written, mostly because I don’t think you have backed up your arguments with substance, but of course I will try to be constructive in my criticism. Thank you for your work.
I believe your piece reads more like a stream of accusations more than criticism, especially when you write that Karayilan and others speak “nonsense”. Nuance is required when making such severe arguments.
First of all, it is simply not true that the PKK has not organized anything in Iraqi Kurdistan. I have personally visited many places and seen the work done in different localities with my own eyes. Just because they don’t put the name “PKK” on their work, it does not mean they do not organize, especially not when Iraqi Kurdish parties criminalize them. For my fieldwork, I have personally attended educations in Slemani that were given to women (that was the first time I saw ordinary, usually lower class women from Iraqi Kurdistan engaged in something political). I interviewed young women who joined the PKK explicitly after they got in touch with the PKK members organizing in their local communities. In fact, the PKK has been politically organizing in Iraqi Kurdistan since the early 1990s, but it is very hard in the conditions set by the ruling parties. Also, for example, in Daquq, there is a PKK academy, where local people were able to get involved and where educations are given. I visited many such places in 2015 and they had existed for quite a while. They operate in spite of the criminalization and also, it is difficult to get the local population mobilized. As you might remember, I once needed help with finding Iraqi Kurdish anarchists for an interview. People could not even share their names with me. Is there any leftist group which has any substantial influence or success in organizing in Iraqi Kurdistan? If not, why expect the PKK to perform miracles? But they are definitely trying and this work cannot be dismissed as non-existent. Of course there is also the legally registered Tevgera Azadi party. And what about Sinjar? Why ignore the fact that the PKK has helped build autonomous armies and councils in an entire region after the ISIS massacre? There is a lot of work being done!
Secondly, I think it is rather harsh to blame the PKK for the current war, especially provided the information we have today. And your proposal to return to the 1990s or to declare yet another unilateral ceasefire is not really an option for millions of people. I am not sure about a conflict between PKK leaders and Öcalan. In the Imrali talks, which have been well-documented and are out as a book now, he says on several occasions that revolutionary people’s war is a resort in case the state choses war over peace.
Amed Dicle, a Kurdish journalist has recently published a book about the peace process, in which it is very clear what the peace process was like – namely, the AKP was never interested in a solution. He spoke with the people who were involved in PKK-Turkey talks since 2005 and it is very obvious also from all the information that we have today and which is publicly known that the government had already decided in 2014 to re-escalate war. Apart from that, there is in fact a lot of material (including in Dicle’s book) about how PKK leaders criticized themselves for some of the initial stages of the 2015 escalations. Besides, from all that we know, it was in the beginning the youth of the cities who took the fight to the streets, the guerrillas reinforced them in some places only later on.
In general, it is difficult to me to follow your argumentation, because I see a conflict in placing the PKK as the main agent of politics in Bakur (or Rojava) and expect everything to be done by the, whilst demanding anti-authoritarian and wide scale mobilzation without vanguard party style leadership. It seems contradictory to demand both a) implementation of democratic confederalism and anti-authoritarianism and at the same time b) PKK’s unconditional implementation thereof, without taking into consideration that you cannot simply force people to accept a new system. Keep in mind that just because Öcalan and KCK advocate a libertarian system, it does not mean that other options for politics (like representative democracy) are no longer valid in the people’s eyes. Should they just refrain from elections for example? Who has the right to demand such a thing? This is connected to my third point:
For instance, you mention KCK members arguing in favor of a KRG government, etc. I think your citations are very selective and interpreted dogmatically. People like Cemil Bayik have to take world politics into account in every single sentence they say. It would be unralistic to expect them not to respond to current conjunctures in geopolitics. Strategy and tactics are reconsidered at every point.
Here is an article where Cemil Bayik explicitly explains why continuing the same politics is not going to work, how a new government will NOT solve issues:
https://anfenglish.com/features/bayik-a-new-democratic-gov-t-can-resolve-the-issues-in-bashur-23814
Here is the KCK statement on Bashur protests:
https://anfenglish.com/kurdistan/kck-democratization-is-the-solution-for-southern-kurdistan-23765
Besides, should KCK simply dismiss the KRG government and expect revolution in Iraqi Kurdistan, where not a single leftist group is active on a large scale? How helpful is it to demand an overthrow in such a radical manner in a deeply corrupt system, without any conditions ready? Relying on what? I think one needs to make a distinction between principles and politics. For instance, calling for national unity is not necessarily a nationalistic chauvinistic call, but rather a vocabulary to pressure KRG parties, etc. With every call for Kurdish unity, the same KCK has helped Arabs, Turks, Christians etc. to build their democratic autonomous structures. I think you focus too much on words and less on actions.
So in general, I can understand your argument, but I think the way you have framed it is not constructive and sometimes borders unfounded claims.
I hope the comments were helpful! Thanks again for your work and for sharing it! Wishing you the best of success with your great work!
All my best,
Dilar
My response in Jan 2018
Dear Dilar,
Many thanks for taking the time to read my article and for your comments / feedback and also thanks for being patient with me.
I am trying to answer the points where we disagree. As you know it is very natural to have a different idea and opinion with anybody including the close comrades.
In my article I have not made any accusation. I referred to the evidence from real life. I always believe when arguing any case, we need to look back at reality and not to the paragraphs in the text books. I was talking about PKKs response to Erdogan’s vicious war against our Kurds and talked about our self- destroying resistance. In this situation to see the right or wrong I looked into every step in real life from politics to military action to see whether that makes us closer to our aim or the society we struggle to build. In this case I will reject the speeches and advice of the leaders to say what has been done is good things and she/he refers to the paragraphs of the sacred books because it is a god justification in this situation.
We all know the war has been launched by Erdogan and his State. The war was Erdogans intention and was nothing to do with killing a couple of police or some suicide operation. But regardless of whether the war was intent or not, the PKK should not be involved in it. In other words, it should not have fallen into the trap that Erdogan and his MIT set up for them. The question here is, can anybody tell me what we won by involving the war especially in the towns and the cities? How much this resistance took forward our aim? How far this kind of resistance goes with Ocalan plan and his strategy?
I did not say “PKK has not organised anything in Iraqi Kurdistan” What I said was this “In Iraqi Kurdistan where the PKK has a very strong military base and is ideologically strong, they have not built one single local group in the last 20 years. They have not even worked at introducing the experiment of Rojava and Bakur to the Kurdish there. They did not help their supporters in that part of Kurdistan to do anything more effective than recruiting them as fighters” What I said is true. They have not done much except forming Tevger Azadi which was turned up to be a useless organisation. Their main activities was a demonstration and protest in Erbil for releasing Ocalan as if Ocalan imprisoned by Barzani and he is being in Erbil prison. Their other activates are marching against Barzani and KDP from time to time. They were very active to take the TV Microphone to give useless interviews to show off. They never supported the ordinary people demo and protest by taking a part or participating not on 17-02-2011, neither in last year nor the very recent one aswell. This actually was the criticism from the Kurdish activists in Bashur.
When I went back to Bashur in 2011, 2014 and 2016 I had a meeting with a few local groups that were working at the time under different names, when I asked the participants where are our friends from PKK or Tevgara Azadi? I was told “in the beginning of forming any groups sometime they come but as soon as they know they cannot lead the group or control it , they never come back” .
There was a long discussion two months ago on Facebok regarding Tevgera Azadi’s role and their activities, even some of the comrades who are very close or members of PKK or some of them working in PKK or Rojava Media they had complained about them. Now they were permitted to form a political party. Do you know why? To take a part in May’s election. This is disaster, our problem in Bashur is not lack of existing parties, in fact exactly the opposite. Do you know up to 31/12 /2017, 204 political parties in Iraq registered themselves to take part in next election including 32 and now 33 with Tevgera Azadi political parties and organisations are just in Kurdistan. This is far too many for probably less than 4 Million people.
Yes, I am aware you were in Bashur and contacted somebody in KAF to introduce anarchist women there to you and also you asked KAF many questions. KAF wrote back to you but never received back the answer. Yes, it is also true our comrades in Bashur did not want to disclose themselves because of the suppression of PUK and KDP.
I know that “PKK has academy” in some places in Bashur for women and men . But be honest most of the time people there just taught how to love and sacred the leader, Ocaln, how important history PKK have with many more rhetoric. So the purpose of the opining the academy was for that and recruiting them either for organisational work or to be a fighter. In fact what important to be done in the academy is to teach and support people to be independent and also to be aware of the experiment of Rojava and the building all these local groups in Bkur . And explain the struggle how PKK manged to have a state within the Turkish State in Bakur. The Kurds in Bashur need to learn from the experiments of Rojava and Bakur not to be a fighter of PKK, indeed to build their own organisation, non political party as a ground work. This is the big support for people in Bashur and help continuing the struggle and wining it in the other parts of Kurdistan.
I agree with you it is difficult for people to be a member of PKK or supporters of them but if they try the same way as people tried in Bakur and Rojava they will be fine and successful without putting their life in risk at least in the first stage of self-organising in local groups, committees and communes.
In Singar, yes the PKK have done a very good job but they could lay the foundation for what they have done now a long time ago and probably could of saved so many lives. Do not forget what PKK did in Singar was forced to do that during a very difficult time and in the opposition of KDP and KDP forces. Having said that I do not mean to undervalue what they did and built.
As I said in the beginning, I always believed it was the State who launched the war and forced the PKK to be involved. I do not believe Erdogan and AKP want peace but in the mean time I believe choosing to fight with the State is not the solution at all. So far as you know all ceasefires were unilateral but still the PKK and Kurds there were the winner not the State of Turkey. This was the reason as to why Erdogan announced the war against Kurds because he knew and knows very well the peace in the interest of Kurdish and PKK and the fighting is the opposite.
In Ocalan’s letter that he sent out via his brother Mohamad, PKK media only disclosed just few lines about what Ocalan said regarding the current situation in Turkey. My understanding of these lines was Ocalan is not happy about it.
To be honest I do not believe in Political party propaganda, once, I hope when Ocalan is released we will see a lot including criticising PKK politics even firing those involved in designing wrong polices. Wishing his release soon.
Whoever came on the street to fight the State whether old, young, men and women, obviously they were under influences of PKK or at least PKK could influence them. But it did not. Anyway, where did these people get weapons to fight the vicious forces on the street if it is not from PKK?
We can have two kind of movements either political party movement or people, mass movement, and it is true wherever the political party movement strong the mass movement is weak and the vice versa is correct. The PKK certainly played a big role in introducing the Kurdish question inside Turkey and abroad but now the PKK has passed that stage and entered another stage especially when Ocalan and some of his Comrades have a new Idea: the democratic confederalism as it is the solution, not the nation-state. Building or achieving democratic confederalism is not the job of political party or gruella war it is the job of people / mass through the social movement [ I come back to this point in my next article that will be ready by the mid of Feb]
Of course we cannot force people to choose their way to politics but it is our duty to work and educate and support them in organising themselves outside of the political parties to arrive at the destination of democratic confederalism. in addition, we should stop saying things that still in ‘people’s eyes’ so these cannot be touched while we see them wrong. Many things in our culture are wrong. Do we have to stop from educating people about it? I am asking the question is it more difficult for the Kurdish community to believe that Parliamentary system as the biggest lie in the history of human beings more than the educating people in our community about women’s rights, about gender equality?
I believe somebody like Byik should be very, very honest about his own politics and principle, He cannot have double standards: to accept something for Bakur and Rojava but another one for Bashur and Rojhalat. The principle is principle. I am not saying they should fight KDP or PUK, I am not with war for PKK with any parties or any sides. If PKK followed Ocalan principle and advice probably they would not have the worst relationship with KDP as they have had for a while.
About Karayilan:
In my opinion Karayilan sometime talks nonsense, this is not the first time. I have come across his interviews often, unfortunately he is not a great speaker. In my article of Jan 2016“ Our attitude towards Roajva must be critical support “, please see the link: http://zaherbaher.com/2016/02/04/our-attitude-towards-rojava-must-be-critical-solidarity/
I referred to some of his interviews that did not make sense. My English understanding of the word “nonsense” means people’s talk does not make sense. So I am not sure what’s wrong with using this word? Or is it simply he cannot be criticised just because he is a leader?
About the Links you referred to:
In the first link Byik doses not say something different or against what I refer to in my article. He believes that the problem in Bashur is none unity. Can he or anybody else tell me is nation’s unity exist? I never seen it, while the Kurdish people divided in to classes, categories and each of this classes has its own interest that is different from the others so never be united. People in one city cannot be united let alone in one part of Kurdistan. Are Kurds in Bakur , Rojava , Rojhalt untied ? Of course not and never will be.
Bayık talked about the situation in South Kurdistan and stressed that “ the fundamental reason for them is that the Southern Kurdistan government does not agree to Kurdish national unity………………………One of the reasons the situation in the South got to where it is today is that the Southern Kurdistan government does not agree to national unity and acts in accordance with their own interests instead…………………………………..If national unity had been achieved, these situations wouldn’t have come to pass. And invaders couldn’t easily target Kurds’ gains and destroy them”
And he thinks the solution is new and democratic government “A new government should have been formed and old politics should have changed. If there was a democratic government, if all different powers and democratic circles found representation in the Southern Kurdistan government, this crisis wouldn’t have gotten worse. Because a democratic government could have created solutions to the problems in the South and formed policies based on democratic foundations with regional states like Turkey, Iran, Syria and Iraq………hey should put a stop to their wrongful policies. They should give accounts to the people. They should form relationships with all democratic forces and form the government. Only a new, democratic government can be a force of a solution to the current issues. The new government should focus on national unity and democratization. That way the problems of the people can be resolved.”
Is any government in the world democratic? Is any democratic government in the world sincerely representing its own people or the business? If Byik does not know this he really needs to read Ocalan’s books to educate himself. If he does know, why does he say differently? I leave the answer to you.
The second link, the statement about the recent demos and protest in Bahur started from. I do not need to write about as it is a very normal political party statement, it starts with “The co-presidency of KCK’s Executive Council declared support for the protesters in Southern Kurdistan and called upon all political powers to take responsibility to resolve the problem”.
They have to support it if not they lose credibility they lose power, members and supporters.
Finally I must say this statement is nothing different from the first word to the end from any other opposition parties in Bashur from Goran, Barham Salih new party, New Generation to one of Islamic political party ( Komala). I regret to draw your attention to that unfortunately, the PKK main leaders even between themselves cannot reach the same conclusion. For Ocalan, the solution is democratic confederalism. For Byik, it is a new government, new democratic government and for Karyilan it is a commission from different political parties to know what the people want.
Wishing you very best
In solidarity
Zaher