"July 19, 2005
REVIEW & OUTLOOK
Kurdish Progress
July 19, 2005
A bomb hidden in a minibus ferrying foreign tourists along the Aegean shore killed four women and a man this weekend in Turkey. Kurdish separatists claimed responsibility for a similar bombing six days earlier, and are blamed, rightly or wrongly, for the explosion in Kusadasi as well.
In this hot and violent European summer, terrorism has lost a lot of its ability to shock. Many tourists, including British visitors to Turkey who saw their own capital attacked on July 7, vowed to stay on and finish their holidays. Tour operators report little change in bookings, in sharp contrast to the 1990s when tactical Kurdish terrorist strikes scared tourists away.
If Kurds are behind this renewed violence, Turkey offers a lesson about terrorism. In the past six years, since Turkey put itself on track for possible membership in the European Union, the government in Ankara has made remarkable progress in improving language and minority rights for the 10-13 million Kurds in the country. EU accession even helped make Kurdish culture fashionable. In other words, most of the past (and often legitimate) grievances of Kurds no longer apply in this rapidly changing country.
But violent extremists -- Northern Irish, al Qaeda or, in this case, Kurdish -- can never be satisfied with policy shifts. Demands and grievances are mere cloaks for a form of violence that's an end in itself. A struggle inside the Kurdish movement, some analysts speculate, may be a source of the recent outrages. Terrorists may be trying to outdo each other in a quest for power over a movement that's running out of steam.
In 1999, Turkey caught PKK leader Abdullah Ocalan, a man who led a terrorist campaign that killed more than 37,000 in 1984-99. That same year, Turkish forces crushed a rebellion in the Kurdish areas along the Iraqi and Iranian borders. In response, the formerly Marxist Kurdistan People's Party, or PKK, changed its name to Kongra Gel and lowered its goal to mere "autonomy" from "independence."
The Kurdistan Freedom Hawks Organization, a hard-line offshoot of the PKK, claims to be behind the previous bombing. The PKK-Kongra Gel and its military wing denied any responsibility for either Aegean strike. Yet violence begets violence. The PKK last year abandoned a unilateral cease-fire announced in 1999 and launched a fresh offensive. Ten Kurdish rebels were killed Sunday in skirmishes with government troops in south-eastern Turkey.
The bombings as well as the clashes in southeast Turkey pose no great existential threat. Contrary to conventional wisdom, most Kurds have, over the last millennium, integrated well, making up a large chunk of Turkey's business and political elite. Three of the country's 10 presidents have been Kurds. Yet, linguistic and cultural differences do matter, and EU pressure has helped Turkey adjust its policies.
A reopening of the Kurdish question still comes at a bad time. Too many people, inside and outside the country, want to see the current reformist wave peter out. The EU, slapped down in constitutional referendums in France and Holland -- supposedly by nativist resentments of immigrants -- seeks a way out of its commitment to put Turkey on track for membership. The Turkish military remains skeptical of reform as well, though now must defend the nation from attack.
Progress isn't irreversible. Anyone who cares for the Kurds will wish to see the EU honor its pledge to open membership talks this October. A clear benefit of Turkish membership in the EU would be greater political stability in this strategic corner of Europe. The latest bombings may signify nothing other than the ease with which terrorists can kill -- as was evident in London as well. But greater solidarity with Turkey would help all of Europe erect stronger barriers against terrorism."