"The tussle for self-rule in Kurdistan has exerted a pull on world focus. The Kurds are a nation in a region of many nations. Turkey, Iran and Syria view Kurdish polarization as a geopolitical “domino” threatening their disintegration. Kurds hail for national self-determination and cultural revival. Following a long tradition, the Turkish government has defined the conflict prevailing in the region of Southeast as a scuffle against banditry and terrorism—much as it was done in Central Asia in the 1920s and early 1930s and in Afghanistan in the late 1970s and 1980s. This legitimizes Turkish course of actions, however ruthless the means, as a police function in the name of public order. The Kurds, meanwhile, refer to their war as a “struggle for national and political liberation”.
