Joost Lagendijk, study the court decision!

Joost Lagendijk, MEP and Chairman of Delegation to the EU-Turkey Joint Parliamentary Committee. Photo: Kristiina Koivunen

The decision of the Court of Justice of the European Communities on 3 April 2008 is a crisis for European Union.

The court decision states that the 2002 decision of the European Council to put the PKK on its terrorism list because of an “error of procedure.” The court said that when the European Council created the list and applied sanctions to the organisation and its members, it did not announce its justification in time.

In Turkey courts are the places where the legacy of political decisions are being surveyed. It is a well known fact that Turkish politicians are not able to follow even the Turkish law. What this tells about the level of decision making?

Is the same happening now in the EU? Cooperation between EU and Turkey and Turkey’s EU membership negotiations should increase Turkey’s democratic development, not the opposite. Also move EU towards Turkish type of political life. But PKK’s inclusion to EU list of terrorist organisations proves that this has happened already.

The inevitable conclusion to be drawn from the court decision on 3 April 2008 is that how many other EU’s decisions are illegal?

EUTCC Conference in Brussels: Turkey must put its promises into action!

The European Parliament in Brussels.

Leyla Zana.

Some days ago, the 3.-4. December, there was an important conference about the future of the Kurds. It was arranged by a NGO, EU Turkey Civic Commission. The conference was held in the European Parliament in Brussels.

This conference was a forum for discussion. It reflected the atmosphere in Kurdistan and feelings of the Kurds. And how is the Kurdish atmosphere now? Courageous and optimistic. Recent news from Turkey show that common awareness is increasing about the Kurdish question. More and more Turkish people understand that this problem is endemic source for instability in Turkey and a solution must be found.

This conference was arranged for the fourth time, but for me it was the first time I attended it. The people who had been there earlier said this was the best of the four EUTCC conferences.
Turkish Kurds run now a campaign called "Edi bes e" - It is enough! These words describe well the atmosphere of the conference. One of the speakers, Dutch green MEP Joost Lagendijk, put it this way: "Now the situation is that EU criticises and Turkey promises to make changes but in practise nothing happens." This must change! This demand was repeated by speaker after each other, for example by Leyla Zana, Ahmet Türk, Akin Birdal and Nurettin Demirtas.

It depends on the political development during the next five months whether there will be war or peace. British lawyer Mark Muller talked about the need for a new way of thinking. "In peace negotiations it is question about what helps, not about what is right or wrong", he explained. Muller did not believe that there would be any purely political or military solution to the problem. A twin approach is needed because there are many military and geopolitical aspects.

Mr Muller spoke about the historical responsibility of his country Britain. He said also that Britain has lots of knowledge in peace processes due its experience of creating peace in North Ireland.

Like many other speakers, Mark Muller wanted EU to be more active in demanding change in Turkey. Some other speakers demanded EU to make time table for Turkey in the democracy process.

Next year will be the fifth anniversary of EU Turkey Civic Commission and it already plans a big new conference. There are many ideas for it, for example that there should be participants also from South Kurdistan, despite the topic will be the Turkish part of Kurdistan. There were some Iranian Kurds already in the conference of 2007. One of them was psychiatrist Kamal H. Artin, who come to Brussels from California, American west coast. He was critical on Nurettin Demirtas who demanded democratic autonomy. Artin wants the Kurdish target to be an independent state.

Kamal H. Artin had sat twenty hours in aeroplane travelling to Brussels. The next day after the conference he returned to California. "It was boring to travel so long time but it was worth of it to get the opportunity to say my opinion", he told.

Mark Muller and Joost Lagendijk.

Ahmet Türk and Nurettin Demirtas.

Rewbar Fatah and Kamal H. Artin.

Akin Birdal.

Akin Birdal, Dogu Ergil and Ahmet Türk.

Pictures: Kristiina Koivunen.

Fourth International Conference on EU, Turkey and the Kurds

Ahmet Türk, I and Nurettin Demirtas.

Greetings from Brussel where the fourth International Conference on EU, Turkey and the Kurds is just over. It was held in the European Parliament.

This is my favourite picture from it, despite the light is not enough.

I write more about the conference when I get back to Finland. Now I write with a computer that has French system and it is very slowly to write.

The second division of Kurdistan?

The European Commission made its 2007 progress report public through a press release on 6th November. The first Kurdish comments are very critical. It is not a surprise that the European Commission neglects the problems of the Kurds. Its attitude has been all the time during Turkey's EU membership negotiations to close the eyes from the Kurdish question.

This attitude is just a continuation of the Lausanne Treaty where many European countries participated. In this Treaty Kurdistan was divided by four countries. Turkey, Iran, Iraq and Syria (or the colonies which are nowadays independent countries) took each a piece of Kurdistan. England and France accepted this. Now they want to sharpen the division of Kurdistan by putting the boarder of EU in the middle of Kurdistan.

Kurds have been controlled by the principle of "divide and rule" for centuries. If the northern part of Kurdistan would be inside EU and other parts outside it, this would be one more method of foreign rule in Kurdistan. One new strategy to hinder the cooperation between the Kurds.

But this strategy does not work any more. At the end of last century Kurds in Turkey had great hopes for EU but in vain. After understanding the disappointment they looked for cooperation to the south instead of the west. Also cooperation with Kurds and South Kurdistan instead of EU. This has already benefited Kurds in both parts of Kurdistan.

If EU would pay attention to the Kurdish question and the Kurdish upraising EU would benefit also itself. European Union needs Turkey as its member. The population in EU countries is getting older and there is need for new labour. Turkey is an answer for Europe's needs, a reservoir of labour. EU will miss this possibility if Turkey's membership negotiations fail. And this will happen if Turkey becomes more unstable country.

The Kurdish question is the biggest problem in Turkey but EU refuses to see it. If there will be no peaceful solution to the Kurdish question, it is not only a question whether Turkey will be member in EU or not. But EU will have in its neighbourhood an unstable and dangerous country.

European mass media has started to write more and better articles about the Kurds. Still there is no understanding how complicated the situation is and how dangerous it would be even for EU countries if there will be a war between Turkey and South Kurdistan or a full scale civil war in Turkey.

European people seem to believe still that if Turkey's membership negotiations do not lead to a good direction the situation will remain as it is now. Let's hope they understand the situation before it is too late. The refusal of EU to see the Kurdish question is based on a false imagine that there would be time for ever to wait that Turkey voluntarily starts solving its problems.