All benefit from Turkish-Kurdish amity
April 19, 2013 12:59 AM
By Moritz Pieper, Octavius Pinkard
Ten years from now, what will be said of Turkey’s reconciliation with its Kurdish population? How will Turkey’s resolution of a seemingly intractable conflict affect regional security, and will it provide a model for others to follow? The answers hold serious implications not only for Turkey, but also for Turkey’s neighbors – Syria, Iran and Iraq. The “Kurdish question” has long been one of Turkey’s most pressing political concerns. In post-Kemalist Turkey, societal assimilation of Kurds was not a vision shared by Turkish rulers, who belied that multiculturalism and nation building could not coexist. Ever since the founding of the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) in the late 1970s, Turkey has been plagued by terrorist activities, while the Kurds have been subject to statist discrimination. It is therefore not surprising that when PKK leader Abdullah Ocalan recently called on the party to lay down its arms, he raised hopes in the region and beyond that Turkish-Kurdish reconciliation was a distinct possibility.
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