US embassy cable - 04ISTANBUL376

C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 03 ISTANBUL 000376 
 
SIPDIS 
 
 
POST FOR HQ COALITION PROVISIONAL AUTH 
 
 
E.O. 12958: DECL: 02/24/2014 
TAGS: PREL, PGOV, PHUM, PTER, IZ, TU, Istanbul 
SUBJECT: ISTANBUL KURDS FOCUS ON IRAQI "KURDISTAN" 
 
REF: A) 03 ANKARA 6163 AND 4315 B) 03 ANKARA 4499 
 
 
Classified By: Consul General David Arnett for reasons 1.5 (b & d) 
 
 
1. (C) Summary: Previously polarized and defined by their 
degree of support and sympathy for the PKK (later KADEK, now 
KONGRA-GEL) and imprisoned former PKK leader Abdullah Ocalan, 
Istanbul Kurds tells us they have increasingly adopted Iraqi 
Kurds and their experiment with autonomy as their new cause 
celebre.  The ongoing efforts by the Patriotic Union of 
Kurdistan (PUK) and the Kurdish Democratic Party (KDP) to 
secure a high degree of autonomy within a federal Iraq enjoy 
widespread support among Kurds in Istanbul.  This shift 
appears to have undermined some support in Istanbul for the 
PKK and for those who have traditionally adopted anti-U.S. 
positions (Embassy Note: We have not seen a similar shift 
among Kurds in Ankara or the Southeast. End Note).  Our 
Istanbul Kurdish contacts remain concerned, however, about 
the plight of their "children in the mountains" and disparage 
the Turkish government's inadequate PKK-related Reintegration 
Law and its overall policy on the Kurdish issue.  Pessimistic 
about the ongoing EU reform process and short-term prospects 
for a positive shift in government policy, moderate Kurds in 
Istanbul hope that when Ankara sees that an official Kurdish 
entity (as part of a federal Iraq) represents no threat to 
its interests, the Turkish Government and State will 
eventually be more forthcoming in response to local demands 
for Kurdish cultural rights.  End Summary. 
 
 
Istanbul: The Largest Kurdish City in the World 
--------------------------------------------- -- 
2. (C) With up to 2 million Kurds, Istanbul is, by most 
accounts, the largest Kurdish city in the world.  While many 
Kurds here and in other large Turkish cities enjoy more 
economic opportunities and a less oppressive political 
climate than Kurds in the Southeast, most of our contacts 
still say that "in their hearts" they aspire to an 
independent Kurdish state.  Few would ever choose to leave 
western Turkey, however, to return to an independent 
Southeast.  One Kurdish lawyer from Diyarbakir said, 
moreover, that if many in the Southeast were forced to choose 
between being able to hop on a bus to Istanbul and being 
confined to an "independent Kurdistan," they too would 
reconsider their separatist aspirations.  Educated Kurds we 
have talked to are generally realistic and admit that they 
would be satisfied with true protection of their cultural and 
human rights, something to which they are convinced, however, 
that Ankara remains uncommitted. 
 
 
"Winning the Peace": Kurdish Cultural Rights 
-------------------------------------------- 
3. (C) The widespread view of Kurds in Istanbul is that the 
Turkish State distrusts the Kurds and systematically 
discriminates against them (ref A reports on similar views 
among Kurds in the Southeast).  They argue that the State and 
successive governments have never paid more than lip service 
to protecting Kurdish cultural rights.  Our Kurdish contacts 
see the recent reforms to allow Kurdish language instruction 
and broadcasting as the bare minimum required for Turkey's EU 
membership.  Moreover, they note that there has been little 
progress in implementing even these insufficient reforms. 
Sefik Beyaz, Chairman of the Istanbul Kurdish Institute (an 
organization that seeks to bring together disparate Kurdish 
groups to promote Kurdish culture) and also a left-wing 
alliance mayoral candidate for his home town Bitlis in 
Eastern Turkey, told poloff that implementation of these 
reforms is not "sincere" and that there have been no "real 
steps" taken.  On the importance of the language issue, 
however, Beyaz added that "if you accept only one language 
(i.e., Turkish), you are condemning Kurdish and Kurdish 
culture to death." (Note: Despite recent reforms, no Kurdish 
language schools have begun classes to date, although this is 
expected to happen soon.  There are also no Kurdish-language 
broadcasts as yet under these reforms.  End Note). 
 
 
4. (C) ConGen's Kurdish contacts believe that neither the 
ruling AKP nor the opposition CHP have demonstrated a 
forward-leaning position or any creative thinking on the 
Kurdish issue.  Kemal Parlak, a former Istanbul Chairman of 
the Kurdish political party DEP, said that "Kurdish Kurds" 
were largely kept off the November 2002 party lists by both 
AKP and CHP.  Mustafa Ayzip, a prominent Kurdish lawyer and 
occasional human rights advocate, acknowledged current 
Interior Minister Abdulkadir Aksu's Kurdish origins, but 
pointed to his previous work as a police chief and governor 
in dismissing him as a "product of the state."  (Note: Aksu's 
son Murat confessed to poloff separately that the family 
never spoke Kurdish at home. End note.)  This political 
disenfranchisement has contributed to a stifling of the 
public debate among the Kurdish community in Istanbul. 
Moderate Kurds who engage in political activity are routinely 
harassed, arrested, and often brought to trial by the state 
on little more than suspicion of affiliation with the PKK. 
Ironically, these same people are castigated and discredited 
within the Kurdish community by leftist, radical PKK 
sympathizers for their moderate policies.  As a result, there 
is a dearth of moderate leaders and an exchange of ideas 
within the Kurdish community. 
 
 
The PKK and Ocalan: Previously the Only Game in Town 
--------------------------------------------- ------- 
5. (C) Until now debate among our Kurdish contacts in 
Istanbul has focused on the PKK and its now-imprisoned leader 
Abdullah Ocalan.  Istanbul reps of successive Kurdish 
political parties, including DEP, HEP, HADEP, and now DEHAP, 
are openly sympathetic to the PKK's separatist agenda and are 
widely believed to have informal links with the PKK itself. 
Other Kurdish organizations based in Istanbul, despite 
official harassment and legal challenges, have generally 
maintained their distance from the PKK, but remain 
battlegrounds for Kurdish intellectuals arguing over the 
extent to which they should show sympathy to a separatist 
agenda.  Hasan Kaya, the former chairman of the Kurdish 
Institute, told us last year that he resigned under pressure 
from more extremist members for his criticism of the Kurdish 
party DEHAP/HADEP and for not pursuing a more pro-PKK agenda. 
 DEMOS, a group of Istanbul Kurdish intellectuals that first 
came together in 1998 to seek a solution to the "Kurdish 
issue," has been criticized and torn apart by debate on the 
same issue.  "Ninety-five percent of Kurds do not agree with 
the PKK (and its methods), but many feel compelled to support 
(it) to a certain degree," Kaya claimed.  The PKK's lack of 
hard-core support, Kaya continued, is immediately obvious 
when one examines the public turnout for pro-Ocalan rallies 
(usually no more than a few thousand) and the annual Newroz 
(Kurdish New Year) celebrations (as many as 500,000).  That 
being said, "even I don't want to be characterized as 
anti-PKK," Kaya confessed. 
 
 
A New Cause Celebre: Iraqi Kurdistan 
------------------------------------ 
6. (C) According to Kaya, Ayzit, Parlak and others, the 
U.S.-led intervention in Iraq has now completely changed the 
debate within the Kurdish community.  Although our contacts 
say that cultural and linguistic differences continue to 
separate them from Kurds in Iraq, they see Iraqi Kurdish 
aspirations for an ethnic federation as a proxy for their own 
unrealized ambitions.  The tantalizing prospect of a 
permanent, legal Kurdish autonomous entity (albeit within an 
Iraqi federation) has proved to be an inspiration and 
unifying cause for Turkish Kurds, our contacts assert.  Many 
of our contacts in Istanbul now also feel more comfortable in 
challenging the PKK's rhetoric.  Kemal Parlak indicated, for 
example, that he and others had disagreed with the PKK and 
HADEP when they labeled the PUK and KDP as "collaborators and 
traitors."  Still others told us that the new focus on Iraq 
has undermined support in the Kurdish community for the PKK 
and for those adopting anti-U.S. positions.  Rusen Cakir, a 
columnist for Vatan newspaper and an expert on the Kurdish 
issue, told poloff that while support for the PKK among 
Turkish Kurds has decreased, Kurdish nationalism, including a 
sub-current of separatism, appears to be on the rise. 
 
 
7. (C) This sympathy for Iraqi Kurds underlies the logic that 
our contacts assert led most Istanbul Kurds to support the 
U.S.-led intervention (although most Turks did not), but to 
oppose a parliamentary measure that would have allowed Turkey 
to deploy troops to northern Iraq.  (Embassy Note: Embassy 
Kurdish contacts in Ankara and the Southeast asserted that 
Kurds in the Southeast opposed the invasion, if only out of 
fear of a Turkish crackdown in the Southeast and Northern 
Iraq.  After the Iraqi regime was routed, without a Turkish 
military incursion and with Kurdish support, they began to 
tell us it had been a good thing after all  End Note). 
Istanbul Kurds also split with their fellow Turkish citizens 
upon hearing reports of ethnic clashes between Iraqi Kurds 
and Turkmen in Kirkuk.  Many Istanbul Kurds were upset that 
Turkey appears to be cooperating with Syria and Iran to 
oppose Kurdish demands in Iraq and are now worried about 
reports that the U.S. may pressure the Kurds to back down as 
well.  More than one Kurdish contact has remarked to us that 
"nobody" seems to question Palestinian demands for an 
independent state or Turkish Cypriot demands for an 
"ethnically-divided confederation," but that Kurdish 
aspirations are always seen as overreaching. 
 
 
"Our Fates Are Intertwined" 
--------------------------- 
8. (C) Looking forward, our contacts are nervous that Kurdish 
aspirations may once again be frustrated, but are also 
cautiously optimistic that developments in Northern Iraq 
could have a positive impact on their situation in Turkey. 
The "positive scenario" that our contacts have laid out 
envisions Turkey at peace with a "Kurdish neighbor" within a 
federal Iraq.  Our contacts say that when Turkey's worst 
fears about Kurdish separatism go unrealized, they hope that 
the Turkish state will change its fundamental approach 
towards its own Kurdish population.  The "negative scenario" 
centers on a clash between Iraqi Kurdish demands for autonomy 
and/or Kirkuk and Turkey's opposition.  The ethnic conflict 
that may ensue if the Iraqi Kurds feel that they are being 
forgotten "once again" will exacerbate tensions among the 
Istanbul Kurdish community and harden Turkey's stance on the 
Kurdish issue. 
 
 
9. (C) Most Istanbul Kurds we have spoken with believe that 
the U.S. will play the determining role as this drama 
unfolds.  "We have cast our lot with (the U.S.)," Mustafa 
Ayzit explained.  Our contacts are less specific, however, 
when it comes to the details of the Kurdish demands for 
autonomy in northern Iraq.  Kirkuk appears to be a powerful 
symbol of Kurdish identity, but most stopped short of 
insisting that its inclusion in a Kurdish region was a sine 
qua non (one mentioned interim international administration 
of the city as a possible compromise).  The unresolved issue 
of PKK militants in Iraq is also a major concern.  While many 
we spoke to harbor little sympathy for the PKK leadership, 
most feel that any military action against their "children in 
the mountains" (i.e., the rank and file) would prompt 
widespread outrage and condemnation among the Kurdish 
community here.  Despite the failure of last year's 
Reintegration Law (ref B), all of our Kurdish contacts 
expressed the firm belief that a "genuine" amnesty would 
solve the problem. 
 
 
10. (C) Comment: Most Kurdish contacts in Istanbul credit the 
U.S. with giving Iraqi Kurds an opportunity to achieve 
long-standing aspirations for cultural identity.  Our 
contacts believe that the outcome of the ongoing developments 
in Iraq will be more significant for their own future in 
Turkey than any ongoing domestic reforms or even Turkey's EU 
membership process. 
 
 
BAGHDAD MINIMIZE CONSIDERED 
ARNETT