5
December 2005
1. "HPG War Balance for November 2005", HPG's Commandership Headquarters published the war balance for November. The war balance includes numbers from clashes with both the Turkish and the Iranian army.
2. "Kurdish guerrillas attacked Turkish military base: 4 soldiers killed", four Turkish soldiers were killed and two others were wounded when Kurdish HPG guerrillas attacked the Turkish gendarmerie base of Albayrak in the province of Van in northern Kurdistan (southeastern Turkey) on Nov. 30, the HPG Press and Liaison Office (HPG-BIM) reported.
3. "Voice of the unheard Kurds", there is a channel called ROJ TV, which exists to highlight the truth about the plight of all Kurds in Kurdistan.
4. "Leading Turkey reporters charged", a prosecutor in Istanbul has filed charges against five prominent Turkish newspaper columnists who are accused of insulting the judiciary. It is the latest in a series of cases brought against some of the best-known writers under a controversial Article 301 of the new penal code.
5. "European Human Rights court upholds Turkish hijab ban", the Turkish government's obsession with EU membership is certainly preventing it from addressing more pressing issues, such as the Kurdish question, its relations with other Muslim countries.
6. "Damage to Israel-Turkey relations feared", Foreign Ministry sends calming messages to Ankara following publication on contracts won by Israeli companies to train Kurdish security forces in northern Iraq, claiming companies acted on their own initiative.
1. - DozaMe.org - "HPG War Balance for November 2005":
1 December 2005
HPG's Commandership Headquarters published the war balance for November. The war balance includes numbers from clashes with both the Turkish and the Iranian army.
Numbers from the war balance:
* Iranian military operations: 1
* Turkish military operations: 9
* Clashes during these operations: 23
* Turkish soldiers killed: 44, of them 6 Turkish officers
* Iranian soldiers killed: 6
* Turkish vehicles destroyed: 3
2. - DozaMe.org - "Kurdish guerrillas attacked
Turkish military base: 4 soldiers killed":
3 December 2005
Four Turkish soldiers were killed and two others were wounded when Kurdish HPG guerrillas attacked the Turkish gendarmerie base of Albayrak in the province of Van in northern Kurdistan (southeastern Turkey) on Nov. 30, the HPG Press and Liaison Office (HPG-BIM) reported.
The attack was announced as a retaliation for the Turkish
state's attack on the Kurds in the cities of Shemzinan (Semdinli) and
Gever (Yuksekova). 
3. - Kurdish Media - "Voice of the unheard Kurds":
4 December 2005 / by Aryana Qendil
Every day millions of people across the planet wake up to a new day
and have their first meal of the day. Some hurry off to work, others
sit in idle contemplation, others suffer just as they have done every
day that they can remember.
Where I live, people have many choices, the many choices
of what kind of information to feed their brains on a daily basis. Mind
you some of us have nothing good to put into our grey matter anyways.
We can read numerous newspapers and have a myriad of television channels
to look at.
How many of the millions of us afforded this opportunity know at this
very moment there is a television channel trying to lend a voice to
millions who have little or no say in the Middle East?
There is a channel called ROJ TV, which exists to highlight the truth about the plight of all Kurds in Kurdistan. Kurdistan here is the mass of land that has been subdivided into four amongst Turkey, Syria, Iran and Iraq. Let not the naïve continue to believe that it is exists only in the north of Iraq. Yes in Iraq the Kurds have their own television channels but these only pay heed and reach the audience of Kurds in South Kurdistan (Kurdistan of Iraq).
Millions of their brothers and sisters face oppression on a daily basis from the Turkish and Iranian governments. It is for these unfortunate and in fact the downtrodden and all people without a ‘voice’ that ROJ TV exists. ROJ TV operates from its offices located in Brussels under permission of the Danish government.
In East Kurdistan (Kurdistan of Iran) where any Kurdish form of media is banned, ROJ TV exits as the Kurds’ eyes and ears to their fellowmen in other parts of Kurdistan and the world.
Currently the Turkish government along with EU counterparts is working towards the closure of ROJ TV. Though the Danish government has stood firm by its decision to allow ROJ TV’s operations to continue, this time may be soon at an end. The continued pressure by Turkey with the aid of the US exerts more pressure to Denmark and the EU. The end result may be the final submission to the external pressures from outside the EU for permanent closure.
The EU has already recommended that Turkey address its
human rights policy for which Turkey has adopted a partial reform. Partial
indeed, for on one hand the death penalty has been abolished but there
is the issue of the two Turkish security officials who were caught in
North Kurdistan
(Kurdistan of Turkey) with weapons and a list of civilians to be targeted.
Kurds, the diplomats and peaceful people that they are, handed these
men over to the Turkish officials. But where is the true meaning of
human rights in Turkey? It seems to be very one sided indeed.
ROJ TV brought to light these events but why is there no coverage in the Western media of the atrocities faced by these people on a daily basis?
The EU preaches human rights for all and yet seeks to close this television station. Yes indeed appease the majority of the EU by ‘addressing’ human rights in Turkey and at the same time keep the Turkish government smiling so as not to lose economic benefits. This is the same as what happened at the Lausanne treaty.
The world and many governments consider Kurds as terrorists, but the question of terrorism all begins with the man in the mirror. All the Western governments and officials have to do is just look at themselves and their previous legacies, to know that oppression and terrorism (if one may say so) begins right with them.
So why then further oppress the downtrodden and the people
who have no voice by taking away their one means of letting the world
know that they exist. Kurds also are the voices unheard, longing for
the rest of the world to truly hear their plight.
4. - BBC - "Leading Turkey reporters charged":
ISTANBUL / 2 December 2005 / by Sarah Rainsford
A prosecutor in Istanbul has filed charges against five
prominent Turkish newspaper columnists who are accused of insulting
the judiciary.
It is the latest in a series of cases brought against some of the best-known
writers under a controversial Article 301 of the new penal code.
More than 60 of them are on trial under Article 301 that makes it a crime to insult Turkishness or state organs.
EU officials say Article 301 is the cause for serious concern.
Sensitive subject
There is a very thin line in Turkish law between criticism and insult, and writers and publishers here keep on stepping over it.
Now another five men have joined their ranks, this time accused of insulting the judiciary.
They all wrote newspaper columns in September after a court intervened to stop a controversial academic conference on the fate of the Ottoman Armenians.
It is one of the most sensitive subjects in the country.
The columns called the court ruling nonsense, a travesty of justice and an attack on the academic freedom of universities.
But a group of nationalist lawyers took that as an insult and the men now face trial and potentially up to nine years in prison.
The EU has expressed serious concern about the limits on freedom of expression in Turkey and the restrictive way Article 301 is interpreted.
Turkey's best-known novelist, Orhan Pamuk, goes on trial in a fortnight charged under the same law.
Many see that case as a test of Turkey's commitment to democratic reforms, but the list of the accused is growing despite pressure from Europe.
The cases are becoming a trial of strength now between
those who see Turkey's future within Europe and strong conservative
and nationalist forces here who see the EU as a threat.
5. - Media Monitors Network - "European Human Rights court upholds Turkish hijab ban":
"The Turkish government's obsession with EU membership is certainly preventing it from addressing more pressing issues, such as the Kurdish question, its relations with other Muslim countries..."
4 December 2005 / by M. S. Ahmed
Since it agreed to start accession talks with Turkey in October, the European Union has been highly critical of Turkey's human-rights record, including its treatment of the Kurds, who are concentrated in the south east of the country. But, with the entry talks scheduled to last between ten and fifteen years, it is obvious that the EU does not really want Turkey as a member, although it values it as an economic and political ally – a role which is now enhanced by the West's declaration of the so-called ‘war on terrorism'. It is equally obvious that Brussels is not that interested in securing human rights for the Turkish people or enhanced political rights for the Kurds. If there is one ‘human right' – a highly dubious one in a Muslim country – that the EU is determined to uphold, it is the ‘right' of the secular political establishment to keep at bay the introduction of Islamic rule in a state that was once Islamic.
As far as human rights are concerned, little is more basic than the right of a Muslim girl to wear a headscarf in her own school or college – particularly since wearing a hijab does not mean covering up and hiding one's identity. But such a right is denied in secular Turkey, and the EU backs Ankara on this, as a recent decision by the European Court of Human Rights shows. On November 10, the court turned down the appeal by a Turkish medical student seeking to have the ban on wearing the headscarf in Turkish colleges overturned. According to Europe's highest human-rights court, the purpose of the restriction is "to preserve the secular character of educational institutions", adding that the ban met the "legitimate aims of protecting the rights and freedoms of others and maintaining public order."
The court made no attempt to conceal the fact that its decision was intended to side with the Turkish secularists against those fighting to have the ban on wearing the hijab lifted. "When examining the question of the Islamic headscarf in the Turkish context, there had to be borne in mind the impact which wearing such a symbol, which was presented or perceived as a compulsory religious duty, may have on those who chose not to wear it," it ruled. It went even further when it added that limitations on the right to wear a hijab could be "regarded as meeting a pressing social need."
In 1998 the vice-chancellor of Leyla Sahin's university declared that any students wearing beards and headscarves would be refused entry to classes. Her resort to the Turkish courts failed, so she appealed to Europe's top human rights court, which, not unexpectedly, also let her down by a huge majority : it reached its decision by 16 votes to one.
The decision is naturally not an isolated one, since it will affect not only other cases in Turkish courts but also attempts by European Muslims to introduce the right of Muslim women to wear the hijab. Some days after the court's ruling that Turkish law is consistent with the European Convention on Human Rights and with the protection of women's rights in general, a commission in the Netherlands ruled that a Muslim woman has the right not to wear the hijab. The woman in question, 32-year-old Samira Haddad, won her case against the Islamic College of Amsterdam, which insists that all Muslim women wear the hijab. The country's Equality Commission said that the college had discriminated illegally against her on the grounds of her religion.
But the dual ruling by the European Human Rights Court and the Netherlands' Equality Commission becomes absurd when applied to give a Muslim woman the right not to wear hijab, while denying another the right to wear it. The fact that the Islamic College of Amsterdam cannot compel Samira Haddad to wear hijab while the vice-chancellor of Leyla Salim's university can force her not to wear it, is more about secularism than about human rights. Small wonder that secular activists in Turkey and those campaigning for EU membership are celebrating both decisions, not least because this has come at a time of intense public debate about secular and Islamic issues in the country.
Secularists are particularly eager to exploit the decisions, and the European Commission's frequent criticism of Turkey's poor performance as far as human rights are concerned, to blame Islamic activists for the EU's obvious determination to withhold membership. But the commission – in a transparent attempt to help the secularists and to create the impression that Turkey's Islamic faith has nothing to do with the issue of membership – makes the occasional vague announcement that Ankara is beginning to comply with some membership condition or other. In mid-October, for instance, Reuters quoted it as saying that it would declare Turkey a "functioning market" in November. Since having such an economy is one of the many conditions of membership, Reuters said this would be a boost for Turkey's hopes of joining the EU. But in November the commission issued strong statements on Ankara's human-rights failures and its treatment of ‘Kurdish separatists’.
The Turkish government's obsession with EU membership is certainly preventing it from addressing more pressing issues, such as the Kurdish question, its relations with other Muslim countries, the need to resist the virulent war on Islam (disguised as a "war on terrorism"), and the desirability of establishing close relations with the Muslim former members of the Soviet Union, such as Azerbaijan and Uzbekistan. Turkey has closer religious, cultural and linguistic ties with the new states in the Caucasus than either the US or Russia has. Yet it is those two non-Muslim countries that are competing to establish close strategic and economic relations with them, leaving Turkey out.
There is an encouraging sign that Recep Tayyip Erdogan,
the Turkish prime minister, is taking the Kurdish issue more seriously
since the recent fatal bombing. Erdogan convened parliament to discuss
the bombing, and also paid a rare visit to the southeast of the country.
But he and other leaders need to do more to settle this issue, which
must never be allowed to divide Turkey, a potentially powerful Muslim
country that the enemies of Islam are keen to see split up.
6. - ynet News - "Damage to Israel-Turkey relations
feared":
3 December 2005 / by Itamar Eichner*
Foreign Ministry sends calming messages to Ankara following publication on contracts won by Israeli companies to train Kurdish security forces in northern Iraq, claiming companies acted on their own initiative
Last week's publication by Israel's leading newspaper Yedioth Ahronoth on Israeli companies winning contracts with the Kurdish government to train and equip Kurdish security forces in northern Iraq has caused tension in the relations between Israel and Turkey, Yedioth Ahronoth reported Sunday.
The affair received widespread coverage on the website of Turkey's popular newspaper Zaman, which reported that the new information revealed has caused tension between the two countries.
Foreign Ministry officials, aware of the fact that they were dealing with a very complex and sensitive issue, hastened to send calming messages to Turkey over the weekend.
The main message conveyed by the ministry was that the Israeli companies acted on their own initiative and that the official State of Israel does not operate in the discussed areas.
'Risk of human life for lucre'
Israel approached Turkey last year with an update on a number of private Israeli companies operating in northern Iraq. The Turks were told that Israel opposes any Israeli presence in northern Iraq.
At the same time, the Foreign Ministry harshly criticized the involvement of Israeli companies in northern Iraq, defining it as "scandalous and irresponsible."
A senior ministry official said that "this is a very serious issue, and that Israel knows about it and is not doing enough in order to prevent it."
"It is severe because the people who go there are risking their lives and could be hurt or kidnapped. Every year dozens of people are abducted there. What do we want, another (former Hizbullah captive Elhanan) Tennenbaum?" he said.
"This is an unnecessary risk of human life for lucre," he said. "In addition, this activity only complicated and endangers our relations with our ally Turkey. An entire country is in risk so that a businessman will make a profit."
'Turkey understands Israel could not prevent it'
The Turkish government showed interest in Yedioth Ahronoth's publication. The Turkish embassy in Israel translated the article and sent it to Ankara, waiting for instructions on how to respond.
Israeli officials estimated that Turkey would ask Israel for clarifications on the matter.
A senior Turkish official said that as long as only private companies are involved, this may be a source of concern for Turkey, but they understand that Israel could not prevent it.
However, he said if Turkey discovers that intelligence officers or Israeli officials were involved, his country would see it as a completely different story that may lead to a rift in diplomatic relations.
Meanwhile, Yedioth Ahronoth has learned that Turkey is concerned with the ease in which Israelis managed to cross the border from Turkey to Iraq, and that steps will now be taken to examine the issue.
* Tsadouk Yakhiskeli and Anat Tal-Shir contributed
to the report.