·  ECEVIT: OPERATION AGAINST PALESTINIANS "GENOCIDE";
TURKEY CONTINUES TO HONOUR ARMS CONTRACT WITH ISRAEL.
On 4 April, the Turkish Prime Minister, Bülent Ecevit, for the
first time described the Israeli Army's operations as "genocide" by
declaring "the Palestinian people is a victim of genocide under the eyes of
the whole world".

The Turkish opposition in Parliament had, on 2 April, sharply called on the
government to cancel an arms contract of a value of $ 668 million signed a
month earlier with Israel for the modernisation of 170 M-60 A1 heavy tanks.
The Turkish press had also rallied to demand the suspension of this
contract to show Ankara's lively disapproval of Ariel Sharon's policy.
 

· ANKARA SENDS EMISSARY TO SADDAM HUSSEIN. Anxious to
avoid any US intervention in Iraq, a Turkish Secretary of State, Tunca Toskay, visited
Baghdad on 2 April to meet Saddam Hussein and give him a personal message
from Prime Minister Bülent Ecevit, asking him to take "steps to avoid
developments that might have an impact on us all". 130 Turkish firms are in
Baghdad to take part in a trade fair of Turkish products.

Elsewhere, the Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP) announced on 4 April, that
a US State Department delegation, led by Ryan Crocker, Under Secretary of
State for Near Eastern Affairs had met Kurdish leaders in Iraqi Kurdistan.
The US delegati0on met the KDP chief, Massoud Barzani, at his headquarters
in Salahaddin as well as the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK) chief in
Suleimaniah. "The US delegation stressed (Washington's) commitment to
continuing its humanitarian support for the Iraqi people in Kurdistan", the
communiqué added.
 

· JONATHAN RANDAL IN ISTANBUL FOR BOOK TRIAL.
On 3 April, the American journalist, Jonathan Randal, appeared before the
Istanbul State Security Court, without being heard, for the trial of one of is books,
banned in Turkey, whose publisher is being charged with "separatist
propaganda". "We are doing all we possibly can to avoid the imprisonment of
the Turkish publisher" declared J. Randal, author of "After such Knowledge,
what forgiveness? ­ my encounters in Kurdistan". He deplored the fact that
the State Security Court had not deigned to hear his evidence, as he was
not, himself, being charged.

The book, translated into Turkish after having already been published in
Kurdish, Arabic and Persian, was seized by the police in January 2002. The
publisher, Abdullah Keskin, who runs the Avesta publishing house, faces 3
years imprisonment and a fine of 3 billion Turkish lire (about 2,500  euros).

"What I have heard leads me to think that things will go all right, at a
time when Turkey is trying to join the European Union" judged Jonathan
Randal who travelled to Turkey to attend the hearing. "Censoring books and
jailing publishers is quite unacceptable" the American journalist further
considered. The trial, to which the US Consul and the association for the
defence of journalists, Reporters sans frontières, was adjourned to 7 June next.

The Turkish authorities accuse the book of using words that are tabooed in
Turkey, such as "Kurdistan", although the author does not denounce Turkish
policy towards its Kurdish population as such, nor is he sparing in his
criticisms of the Kurdistan Worker's Party (PKK), which laid down its arms
thirty months ago. The charge sheet states that "the book mentions the
existence of a distinct Kurdish nation and of a Kurdistan within the
Turkish Republic, thus conducting propaganda against the integrity of the
country and nation". Abdullah Keskin, questioned on 3 April by the English
language Turkish paper Turkish Daily News declared that "(J. Randal) is a
credible journalist to the whole world   For example, before coming to
Istanbul   the International Criminal Court on ex-Yugoslavia, at the Hague,
had asked to hear him as witness because of his reports on Bosnia and
Kosovo. The writer who has just appeared before the State Security Court
has still the dust of the Hague on his shoes". "After the American
intellectual Noam Chomsky, it is the turn of the American journalist
Jonathan Randal find himself in the dock in Turkey" ironically remarked Gul
Demir, staff journalist on Turkish Daily News.
 

·  ASSESSMENT OF HUMAN RIGHTS VIOLATIONS: OCTOBER, NOVEMBER
 AND DECEMBER.  On 30 March, the Turkish Association for Human Rights made
public its score of Human Rights violations for the months of October,
November and December 2001. Here are extracts from their assessment :

- Number of "unsolved" murders  36
- Number of victims of "extra-judicial executions"
 or people dying in detention   12
- Number of victims of torture or ill treatment 142
- Number of people taken into detention         8792
- Number of arrests     311
- Number of villages/hamlets forcibly evacuated or burned down  1
- Number of civilian organisations, political parties, press organs or cultural centres closed down   81
- Number of publications banned         161
- Numbers of prisoners of opinion       101
 

·  TURKISH ARMY ACCEPTS LEADERSHIP OF AFGHANISTAN FORCE:
 On 1 April, the Turkish Army announced that, after long negotiations with the
United States and Great Britain, Turkey accepted in  principle to take the leadership
of an International Security and Assistance Force (ISAF) in Afghanistan.

Turkey had demanded guarantees of financial support, a long-term
participation of other NATO members in the mission and restrictions on the
geographic extent of the ISAF mandate. Yilmaz Karakoyoglu, ministerial
spokesman form the Turkish government, stated, after a cabinet meeting,
that an aid of $ 228 million (260 million euros) that the Bush
Administration intended to submit to Congress for approval, would be enough
to help Turkey meet the cost of the operation. Ankara also demanded that
the United States supply it with cargo transporter planes and that Great
Britain, after its departure, leave behind certain installations that it
had built near Kabul for the force's use. The interim Afghan Prime
Minister, Hamid Karzai, arrived in Ankara on 4 April to discuss the
transfer and Turkish contribution to the reconstruction of Afghanistan.
London wants to leave the ISAF command at the end of April, before the
force's mandate expires in June. Turkey, the only Moslem country
participating in the ISAF, already has 267 men in the force.
 

·  KURDISH LANGUAGE'S TORTUROUS  COURSE THROUGH MINEFIELDS. 
Can Dundar, a staff journalist on the Turkish daily
Milliyet, returned, in his 7 April column to the vicissitudes of the
Kurdish language, subjected to the whims of the Turkish authorities, but
also to the public pronouncement of Turkish politico-media circles that are
far from the realities. Here are extensive extracts from his article.

In 1980, two young men from Hakkari, taking a stroll in Aksaray, met a
fellow countryman, Firat Baskale (Editor's note: a Kurdish musician from
the same region).

Baskale was a revolutionary musician whose voice was similar to that of
Sivan Perwer (Editor's note: the most popular of Kurdish musicians). At F.
Baskale's invitation they went to the hotel where he was working

These young men had such a strong longing for Kurdish music that
Firat, looked around suspiciously to see if there was anyone around   "If
anyone hears us, we'll be denounced and our lives won't be worth a light"
he warned them.

Then he led them to a dark and tiny room in the hotel cellars and picking
up his guitar sang in Kurdish.

A few minutes later these two young men, certainly as frightened as if they
had been taking part in an illegal demonstration, felt as happy as if they
were back in their native mountains.

On of these youths was none other than Yilmaz Erdogan (Editor's note: a
popular Kurdish comedian). As for the other, he was Muhsin Kizilkaya, who,
some years later mentioned this incident in his biography of Erdogan.

When this paper Milliyet (on 5 April 2002) carried the front page headline
"A Kurdish song in the barracks" this made Muhsin think back.
 
The news item said that the Bitlis gendarmerie had sung the song "Zeyno" in
Kurdish and that the officers had joined in and applauded.

In Istanbul, there were posters advertising Sivan Perwer's latest album.
And the National Security Council (MGK) had the question of broadcasting in
Kurdish on its agenda.

Those who, for nearly a century had denied that such a language even
existed, who persecuted those who spoke that language, who had arrogated to
themselves the right to pedantically assert that "if we gave them the right
to speak that language they wouldn't understand it" now, whether pushed by
an "outside dynamic" or thanks to the ending of terrorism, all of a sudden
were recognising the "Kurdish reality".

In fact it was seen that, of the 500,000people who danced at the Newroz
celebrations in Diyarbekir, barely 500 bought books in Kurdish. Books in
Kurdish by Mehmet Uzun sell 2,000 copies at most. But, nevertheless
Kurdish-Turkish dictionaries are coming out      spelling books are being
prepared   After the debate about Kurdish language broadcasts the question
of teaching in Kurdish is now being discussed.

Last week Muhsin Kizilkaya raised another problem, in the course of a
conference in Vienna: "Who will be put in charge of Kurdish broadcasting?
Who will teach Kurdish? Are there any experts? Are there any teachers or
professors? There is a Department of Sumerian at University, but not of
Kurdish. A Turkish intellectual may be able to speak Russian, but has no
interest in Kurdish, which is, nevertheless, spoken by millions of people
in his own country".

Ferhat Tunç (Editor's note: a Kurdish musician) who has just brought out
his latest album, tells how he was taken into detention for singing in
Kurdish in Kayseri

Where have we come from? From being listened to secretly in the cellars of
a hotel in Aksaray, Kurdish has passed through the interrogation chambers
to barrack concerts

Yilmaz, one of the two young men from Hakkari who listened in secret to
Kurdish songs is today Turkey's best-loved humorist

As for Muhsin, who learnt Turkish by having it beaten into him at school,
and learnt his mother tongue in prison, during the defence of the
Association of Revolutionary Clubs of Eastern Culture (DDKO), he is one of
the most famous Turkish language writers

If we want to live in real brotherhood, we must respect and understand one
another's language ­ there is no other solution".