US embassy cable - 04ADANA146

UNCLAS SECTION 01 OF 04 ADANA 000146 
 
SIPDIS 
 
SENSITIVE 
 
E.O. 12958: N/A 
TAGS: PREL, PHUM, PREF, TU, ADANA 
SUBJECT: MINORITY LABEL GRATES ON SOUTHEAST TURKEY 
 
REF: ADANA 133 
 
1. (SBU)  Summary:  Kurdish and Alevi community contacts grated 
at both recent EU and Turkish-government linked reports 
characterizing their respective communities as "minorities" in 
discussions last week with PO.  The Malatya Security Director's 
recent warning to local media appears aimed at Sunni religious 
radicalism, not use of Kurdish language.  Finally, contacts in 
Malatya, Tunceli and Diyarbakir also expressed frustration with 
the government's slow start in processing of the new 
compensation law (law 5233), criticizing new requirements for 
documentation of past losses which set such a high documentation 
threshold as to cause contacts to question the sincerity of the 
government's offer to compensate regional residents for their 
losses in the past almost twenty years of regional civil strife. 
 They also noted that the values put on loss restitution by the 
new law were only fractions of those used in parallel European 
Court of Human Rights claims.  They nevertheless welcomed the 
government offer, in principle, along with the recent 
regulations softening the sentences of already convicted PKK and 
other terrorist-linked prisoners as "contributing somewhat" to 
early momentum toward potential future regional reconciliation. 
End Summary. 
 
2. (SBU)  In October 24-28 meetings with PO, southeastern 
Turkish Alevi community contacts repeatedly cited their 
pre-Seljuk era penetration of eastern Anatolia over a thousand 
years ago and claim to almost one-third of Turkey's estimated 72 
million population as proof that "Alevi's are no minority." 
(Comment: Judging the exact scope of Turkey's Alevi population 
is difficult, but estimates generally range from 15-20 percent 
of Turkey's population.  End Comment.)  Grating at both how the 
EU October 6 report and a recent Turkish government report 
labeled them as "minorities," Alevi community leaders either 
called for the outright dissolution of the Sunni-dominated 
Government Religious Affairs Ministry or its reform to include 
considerable funding for non-Sunni Moslem and other faiths, 
expressly including Jewish and Christian faith support among 
their demands, too. 
 
3. (SBU)  Most Alevi lay leaders and several prominent regional 
dedes, an Alevi religious and community leader, specifically 
called for: 1) government funding of cemevi's, or religious 
worship sites; 2) government funding of, or free provision of, 
utilities, as their Sunni counterparts now enjoy; 3) training 
seminaries for dedes; and 4) government transportation 
assistance to help transport their congregations to cemevi's, 
which by Alevi tradition and practice are more widely scattered 
than Sunni mosques, which are found in most neighborhoods.  A 
minority of Alevi contacts and dedes also called for re-writing 
of the official Islamic history textbook used in all Turkish 
middle schools and elimination of the religion declaration on 
Turkish national identity cards.  One Alevi leader, who is also 
a dede, said that the ideal situation would be for the Religious 
Affairs Ministry to "be abolished entirely, getting government 
out of religion entirely in Turkey, but that is not reality now. 
 Without the Religious Affairs ministry among the radical 
Sunni's out there today, we would have ten times more (Turkish) 
Hizbullahs than we worry about now already.  It just won't work 
not to have a Religious Affairs ministry now.  We just want our 
fair share." 
 
4. (SBU)  While repeatedly criticizing Prime Minister Reccep 
Tayyip Erdogan's public characterization of Alevi practices as 
"cultural, and not (those) of a religion," some Alevi's balanced 
their strong criticism of the AK party's perceived Sunni 
discrimination toward them with observations of how local 
government ministry representatives were more sympathetic to 
their situation, even citing one pair of successive governors in 
one southeast province who had funneled almost 2 billion Turkish 
lira worth of construction materials over several years for 
construction of the only modern cemevi in the almost exclusively 
Alevi province of Tunceli. 
 
Malatya media warning seemingly not about Kurdish tongue, but 
religion 
 
5. (SBU) An early October warning to Malatya's media by the 
provincial security director turned out not to concern use of 
Kurdish in local television and radio, but rather to reflect 
perceived government concerns about Sunni religious radicalism. 
Several contacts mentioned that government security officials 
largely had ignored recent occasional usage of Kurdish by local 
radio broadcasters, but explained that the recent Security 
Director's warning to media not to use non-Turkish language in 
broadcast media seemed to follow directly on the use of a small 
Malatya radio station by a "Kurdish radical Sunni group which 
advocated introduction of sharia (Islamic law) in Turkey, 
forcibly if necessary."  "The timing seems like it was the 
Kurdish Islamic's Party's broadcast which was the problem, not 
the Kurdish itself which was the problem," one prominent media 
contact offered. 
 
Kurdish contacts express disdain at minority label 
 
6. (SBU)  "There are twenty-five million of us. How can we be a 
minority?" questioned a Kurdish contact in Diyarbakir. "We want 
to be treated with the respect we deserve, by the government and 
the EU."  Pressed about the specific form in which such respect 
would need to materialize to be satisfactory, the contact 
replied." The freedom to use our language in broadcast, not a 
few token government broadcasts a week about subjects of their 
choosing.  We want something like Roja and (comment: largely 
pro-PKK. End Comment.) Medya TV (Note: two popular Kurdish 
language broadcasts followed in Turkey which broadcast via 
satellite from outside the region. End Note.) in Turkey.  We 
want our children to learn about Kurdish history in school, at 
least as an (elective) and to learn Kurdish language the same 
way.   Turkish children should also be able to learn about these 
things if they want, too, in an environment free of fear and 
repression."  These comments were echoed by many Kurdish 
contacts, some of whom are sending their children to the new 
Kurdish language schools in Diyarbakir or elsewhere to learn how 
to read Kurdish.  However, our contacts also noted that many 
were not sending their children due to fear, lack of funding for 
private schooling or concern that government minders would note 
their childrens' attendance and exact later (comment: 
unspecified, but widely believed and cited. End Comment.) 
retribution for the perceived act of defiance. 
 
7. (SBU)  Some Kurdish print media, however, is not awaiting the 
outcome of the give and take on radio and television broadcast 
issues.  PO visited a small Zaza (the Kurdish dialect common 
among Anatolian Alevis) publishing house in Tunceli, which 
started a partial Zaza weekly newspaper, Munzur Haber, with 
accompanying website (), several 
months ago. It covers Tunceli provincial news in Turkish, Zaza 
and Kurdish (Kermanji - the dominant Kurdish dialect in Turkey 
and northwestern Iraq).  While it has little or no advertising 
base, private sources are supporting its circulation of about 
2-3,000 readers for now.  In Diyarbakir, there is no Kurdish 
language paper, but a national pro-Kurdish paper printed in 
Istanbul is widely sold and circulated there. 
 
Government contacts see another side of the coin 
 
8. (SBU)  Government contacts, including several prominent 
governors in the region, noted that they heard regional concerns 
about how the "minority" label was playing poorly in the region 
and recognized that the GOT and the EU were going to have to 
"come to a meeting of the minds about what that word may mean 
now, something different from in the Lausanne treaty.  The 
future will be different in how these groups are approached, but 
what that is we do not know yet." Nonetheless none of the 
regional governors knew how or when such a new understanding 
would be reached, frequently citing a continuing "lack of trust 
in each other and confidence about a shared sense of where we 
want to go" among EU and Turkish interlocutors on Turkey' 
soon-anticipated EU accession process. 
 
9. (SBU) On language issues, one governor pointed out the 
multiple new (private) Kurdish language institutes in the 
region, but observed that their attendance is low.  He 
attributed this phenomenon to a greater Kurdish youth desire to 
learn English or an EU-language than Kurdish.  "One generation 
clings to this desire to learn Kurdish and some of their 
children do, too, without really knowing what they would do with 
it," he contended, "but in our schools, Turkish and Kurdish 
children demand to learn English, not Kurdish or something else. 
 The new generation does not always seem to want what their 
fathers say they want."  Another governor followed this line in 
explaining that private media broadcasting using Kurdish " is 
not blossoming because there is not an advertising base to 
support it. The government is not the problem now.  There is a 
law saying that (the Kurdish community in Turkey) can do this, 
but they cannot because there is not enough advertising money 
for it.  That is why the government official channel stepped in 
SUBJECT: MINORITY LABEL GRATES ON SOUTHEAST TURKE 
with official broadcasters to provide some Krdish broadcasting. 
 Without it, there would be one to show the law was real now," 
he explained. 
 
Important common denominatrs favring ialogu and stability 
 
10. (SU)  Wth theexcepton of one prominent Kurdish contact 
who conceded his views reflect a minority of current Kurdish 
thinking, both Alevi and Kurdish contacts stated that their 
desires for broader respect and cultural recognition were being 
expressed within the broader framework of acceptance of a 
Turkish "super-identity," a further acceptance of Turkish as the 
official language in Turkey and no desire to challenge Turkey's 
territorial integrity.  The single notable exception called for 
Kurds in Turkey to receive "millet" status, harking back to an 
Ottoman administrative structure which, if translated into 
modern terms, likely would allow Kurds a right of 
self-determination and a co-equal claim to foundation of the 
Turkish republic.  He said it would mean Kurdish and Turkish 
would be Turkey's official language as well, and that Kurds in 
southeast Turkey  "largely would rule themselves like our 
brothers in Kurdistan in Iraq do now." 
 
Compensation law off to a slow and contentious start 
 
11. (SBU) Contacts in Malatya, Tunceli and Diyarbakir, 
especially among the bar associations and attorney groups, also 
expressed frustration with the government's slow start in 
processing of the new compensation law (law 5233), criticizing 
new requirements for documentation of past losses which set such 
a high documentation threshold as to cause contacts to question 
the sincerity of the government's offer to compensate regional 
residents for their losses in the past almost twenty years of 
regional civil strife. They also noted that the values put on 
loss restitution by the new law were only fractions of those 
used in parallel European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) claims. 
Citing a recent similar ECHR case, a Tunceli bar association 
representative said comparable compensation cases in Strasbourg 
would yield six to eight times the value of the GOT offers, but 
conceded that ECHR were taking three to five years to conclude. 
The GOT cases should finish sooner, he predicted, "so many of 
those seeking claims may opt to take that route.  They have no 
funds now and the government offer is probably just what they 
will have to settle for." 
 
12. (SBU)  One set of contacts in Tunceli illustrated their 
concerns by explaining how rare documentation of civil strife 
was in the 1980 and 1990's era civil strife.  "Much of the time, 
the whole government effort was to deny it was happening at all. 
 Who would have given some villager a document about the army or 
village guard destruction of his home like they now want for 
these claim?" one car association president rhetorically asked. 
In another case shown to PO which was rare to date because some 
documentation from the earlier era existed, an attorney produced 
a recently-filed claim wherein a villager whose property was 
burned and allegedly looted in 1994 received government village 
affairs documentation of his loss at a somewhat later time, 
which he said his client estimated to be twice or more the 
government stated value, but which had been refuted by the 
current Jandarma when recently filed.  He showed PO a recent 
letter, under a governor's office forwarding letter, to the 
claims commission in which the current Jandarma claimed there 
had been no such alleged destruction and advocated outright 
dismissal of the entire claim.  "This commission is just 
starting, so we will see," the bar association vice president 
offered," but if this is what the compensation commission is 
going to be about it will not achieve any reconciliation or help 
the region get past the problems it now sees." 
 
13. (SBU)  Contacts nevertheless welcomed the government offer, 
in principle, along with the recent regulations softening the 
sentences of already convicted PKK and other terrorist-linked 
prisoners as "contributing somewhat" to early momentum toward 
regional reconciliation.  Still, they said that GOT deeds would 
have to speak to convince skeptical regional audiences. "People 
see these documentation requirements (in the compensation law) 
as just a way to water down something that the government did 
just because the foreigners were leaning on them.  It is up to 
the government now to prove it really wants to see 
reconciliation," another bar association president concluded. 
 
Law not seen as boon to village return, village guard issue an 
obstacle 
 
14.  (SBU)  Neither government nor Kurdish community contacts 
saw implementation of the compensation law spurring significant 
village return.  Government officials in Tunceli and Diyarbakir 
noted that their provinces have developed electrical, road and 
water infrastructure to about half a dozen larger villages each, 
but did not anticipate large scale villager return despite the 
expected influx of capital stemming from compensation law 
claims.  They explained that internally displaced persons 
already had created lives and ties elsewhere.  Community 
contacts echoed this reasoning, but noted that the additional 
impediment, about which the government was perceived to be doing 
almost nothing, was the continuing existence of large local 
guard forces in most southeast rural areas.   "Even with a 
little new money, who would want to uproot themselves and their 
children to go back to face armed, probably hostile local 
villagers who would feel threatened by your return ?" one bar 
association contact asked rhetorically. 
 
15. (SBU)  Several governors commented on the village guard 
program, when asked, noted that it had its problems and was not 
seen as a lasting element in southeast Turkish society, but 
repeatedly offered that little could be done in practice about 
the institution of arming pro-government villagers until "the 
terrorists come done from the mountains and finish terrorizing 
our villagers."  One governor projected that, should Turkish 
accession to the EU occur and develop an irreversible momentum, 
a fairly rapid disarming of local guards in tandem with a 
five-year gradual phase out of local guard salaries might be "a 
risk that the government could afford in a broader regional 
stabilization initiative."  He cautioned that this was 
unofficial thinking, but a reasonable possible future option. 
One government contact also touched on the related issue of the 
considerable role that meager village guard salaries play in 
southeast Turkey's almost subsistence level non-urban economy, 
but had few concrete ideas about what alternative revenues might 
replace that regional income component should the village guards 
be dissolved.   He only made a passing reference to perhaps 
"something coming from EU regional development funds," but 
cautioned that those funds usually are devoted to infrastructure 
projects and that unclear change in EU common agricultural 
policy (CAP) funding made its applicability toward the village 
guard issue unclear. 
 
16. (SBU)  Comment:  Discussions with contacts in the region 
clearly yielded deep psychological scars and sensitivities 
stemming from their collective perceptions of  how their ethnic 
and religious communities have been marginalized by decades of 
government policy.  The use of the term "minority" by the EU and 
the recent government-sponsored human rights board brought to 
the surface deeply felt and frequently bitter emotions.  This 
may point the way toward an eventual reconciliation process both 
in southeast Turkey and elsewhere in the nation, but, for now, 
the path ahead for that progress in developing a more durable 
civil society seems long and likely full of many fits and 
starts.  End Comment. 
 
17. Baghdad minimize considered. 
 
REID