NEWS
- British revolutionaries in Syria say they will defy Home Office’s new terrorism laws
- KCK’s Hozat: Afrin won’t be abandoned
- PYD Co-chair Hesen: We will resist any attack
- Öcalan’s ideas discussed in Tolpuddle Martyrs’ Festival
- A brief history of the path to a revolution
- Turkish jets bomb Maxmur Camp
- KON-MED condemns Turkish air strike on Maxmur Camp
- What does Turkey’s military build-up on Rojava border mean?
- Appeal to local and global media and public opinion
- Trade union general secretary uses the platform of Durham Miners Gala 2019 to call for Ocalan’s release
- Successful “Big Jump” actions for Hasankeyf and Tigris River!
OPINION, COMMENTARY, ANALYSIS
- David Morgan – Encountering the Kurds
- UN ISIS investigator calls for Nuremberg-style international tribunal
- Syrian Kurd Who Lost Hand in IS Battle Finds Passion for the Drums
- Genocides begin in the wilderness, far from prying eyes – in Ottoman Turkey as well as Nazi Germany
- It’s time to kick Turkey out of NATO – former Reagan adviser
- Time to Kick the Islamizing Turkey Out of NATO
- Kurds gain support, perhaps invitation to Syrian talks
- ‘The Era of People Like You Is Over’: How Turkey Purged Its Intellectual
- Why Boris Johnson is Even More Dangerous Than Trump
- Noam Chomsky on co-signing Turkey’s ‘Academics for Peace’ appeal
- Turkey’s Ilisu Dam is a war nature with catastrophic consequences
- Is pacifism appropriate in today’s world?
- Stop and search is discriminatory so why is it on the rise?
- INTERNATIONAL FORUM ON ISIS in Rojava
- Final Declaration of the International Forum on ISIS
ACTIONS, CAMPAIGNS
- Safe Hasankeyf! Stop the filling of the Ilisu Dam!
- Filling of Ilisu Dam has started! Join the resistance with the “Hasankeyf Watch”!
- Trade unionists’ letter to the Home Secretary: Don’t Criminalise International Solidarity
- Early Day Motion: TREATMENT OF KURDISH PEOPLE
CULUTRE, ARTS/EVENTS
- Your Freedom and Mine
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NEWS
- British revolutionaries in Syria say they will defy Home Office’s new terrorism laws
27 July 2019|The Telegraph
A group of self-styled British revolutionaries who travelled to Syria to help build a democratic society in the Kurdish north say they will defy new Government legislation which would see them prosecuted on terrorism charges. The Home Office revealed in May that it planned to designate northern Syria a “no-go area” and that British citizens would have 28 days to leave or face a 10-year prison sentence if they attempt to return to the UK.
- KCK’s Hozat: Afrin won’t be abandoned
26 July 2019|ANF English
KCK (Kurdistan Communities Union) Executive Council Co-chair Bese Hozat said the Rojava Revolution’s ideology is one of democracy, freedom, equality and peace that rejects nationalism, fundamentalism, sexism and a crude positivism, which is the reason why the racist Turkish nation-state attacks it. Hozat said: “All who want democracy, freedom, equality, justice and peace should defend the Rojava Revolution and put forth a strong stance against the invading Turkish state.”
https://anfenglishmobile.com/features/kck-s-hozat-afrin-won-t-be-abandoned-36513
- PYD Co-chair Hesen: We will resist any attack
26 July 2019|ANF English
Speaking to ANHA, Democratic Union Party (PYD) co-chair Shahoz Hesen drew attention to the Turkish state’s threats of invasion of Northern and Eastern Syria and the recent military deployment along the border. Hesen stressed that they are always opting for a solution to be reached through dialogue, but added that they will show great resistance against a possible invasion attack. Referring to the defeat of ISIS achieved by the SDF (Syrian Democratic Forces), Hesen said that the Turkish state is trying in every possible way to destroy the peace and security of the region.
https://anfenglishmobile.com/features/pyd-hesen-we-will-resist-any-attack-36508
- Öcalan’s ideas discussed in Tolpuddle Martyrs’ Festival
22 July 2019|ANF English
One of the long-standing traditions of the British labour movement, the annual Tolpuddle Martyrs’ Festival, had a theme of Kurdish People’s Leader Abdullah Öcalan this year. The festival started in the Tolpuddle town in Dorset, UK on Friday and concluded with a mass march and rally on Sunday. Opposition leader Jeremy Corbyn was among the thousands of participants of the festival, who came from all around the UK to stay in tents they put up in the area.
https://anfenglishmobile.com/news/Oecalan-s-ideas-discussed-in-tolpuddle-martyrs-festival-36434
- A brief history of the path to a revolution
19 July 2019|ANF English
The Rojava Revolution is celebrating its 8th year, with the “third way” strategy proposed by Ocalan, and has become a great hope for the peoples of the region. Every minute of the path of the revolution is filled with labor and a heavy price paid. Rojava was divided, robbed of its identity, had its children imprisoned for years, burned to death and murdered. Despite everything, the revolution on July 19, 2012 created a ray of hope for Kurds and all oppressed peoples and faiths.
https://anfenglishmobile.com/features/a-brief-history-of-the-path-to-a-revolution-36344
- Turkish jets bomb Maxmur Camp
19 July 2019|ANF English
The invading Turkish army’s jets have bombed the vicinity of the Martyr Rustem Cudi Camp, injuring two civilians. Sources in Maxmur say the invading Turkish army jets bombed the Maxmur camp, located in Southern Kurdistan. Sources say the vicinity of the camp was bombed and two civilians were injured. The two civilians were buried under falling earth due to the explosions. The wounded were removed and taken to the hospital by camp residents and are doing well.
https://anfenglishmobile.com/features/turkish-jets-bomb-maxmur-camp-36350
- KON-MED condemns Turkish air strike on Maxmur Camp
19 July 2019|ANF English
Condemning the air strikes carried out by the occupying Turkish state on Martyr Rüstem Cudi Refugee Camp (Maxmur), the German Confederation of Kurdistan Communities (KON-MED) reminded that Turkish warplanes bombed civilian settlements that are under the United Nations (UN) protection. Both the Iraqi government and the Hewlêr government continued to remain silent against the attacks of the Turkish state, said KOM-DEM, urging people to protest before the UN representation.
https://anfenglishmobile.com/news/kon-med-condemned-air-strike-on-maxmur-camp-36353
- What does Turkey’s military build-up on Rojava border mean?
17 July 2019|ANF English
Turkey has received the S-400 parts, and simultaneously started a military build-up at Rojava border. Turkey blackmailed the US to change course and gave Russia a message that they could disrupt US plans for the region to look for approval for buffer zone. The US government and NATO have protested, but Turkey received delivery of the first parts of the S-400 missile defense system. The same day, they started a military build-up along the Rojava border.
- Appeal to local and global media and public opinion
17 July 2019|Kurdistan National Congress
Under the pretence of targeting the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK), the Turkish military is attacking and invading the Kurdistan Region of Iraq. While this is not the first time that the Turkish state’s forces have struck the Kurdistan Region, this time the campaign of military aggression is larger in scale – this invasion demonstrates a more vicious intention, and its goals are terrifying and disastrous for the peoples of the region.
http://www.kongrakurdistan.net/en/appeal-to-local-and-global-media-and-public-opinion/
- Trade union general secretary uses the platform of Durham Miners Gala 2019 to call for Ocalan’s release
17 July 2019|Freedom for Ocalan
Doug Nicholls, General Secretary of the General Federation of Trade Unions, has renewed calls for the release of imprisoned Kurdish leader Abdullah Ocalan at the Durham Miners Gala 2019 an event attended by 200,000 trade unionists, socialists and activists. “We should appreciate first today, those sisters and brothers who since we last met have been prepared to lay down their lives for our cause”, Nicholls said.
https://freedomforocalan.org/durham-miners-gala-2019-release-ocalan/
- Successful “Big Jump” actions for Hasankeyf and Tigris River!
15 July 2019|ANF English
Eology activists in Hasankeyf, Turkey and the world protested the controversial Ilisu Dam on Sunday, responding to the call by the Initiative to Keep Hasankeyf Alive and the Mesopotamia Ecology Movement. This day of action was the continuation of the growing activities of the last months against the Ilisu Dam which is almost ready for the filling of its reservoir. With these latest actions in more than 25 places the participants requested the immediate stop of the mega dam which would also devastate the Tigris region along the Tigris also in Iraq.
OPINION, COMMENTARY, ANALYSIS
- David Morgan – Encountering the Kurds
8 August 2019|Live Encounters
David describes a personal encounter with the history, culture and struggle of the Kurds. The story begins back in the mid-1980s, when, having just left university, I moved from Manchester to London. Long before the Internet, the terrorism acts, the bans and the listings of proscribed organisations and all the restrictions on our civil rights and freedoms that we have been compelled to endure in recent years.
- UN ISIS investigator calls for Nuremberg-style international tribunal
29 July 2019|The Defense Post
The head of the United Nations special probe into Islamic State crimes has called for trials like those at Nuremberg of Nazi leaders to ensure the jihadists’ victims are heard and their ideology “debunked.” For a year, British lawyer Karim Khan has traveled around Iraq with a team of almost 80 people to gather evidence and witness testimony for the U.N. body known as UNITAD. “It’s a mountain to climb”, the human rights specialist told AFP, as the investigative team works to analyze up to 12,000 bodies from more than 200 mass graves, 600,000 videos of ISIS crimes and 15,000 pages from the group’s bureaucracy.
https://thedefensepost.com/2019/07/29/un-isis-nuremberg-trial/
- Syrian Kurd Who Lost Hand in IS Battle Finds Passion for the Drums
26 July 2019|Voice of America
When Ciwan Husen lost his left hand and eye at age 21 in the Kurdish fight against the Islamic State (IS) in northwest Syria, he knew his life would never be the same. In the months leading to his recovery, his efforts to overcome his physical disability and the psychological trauma of war led him to develop a talent he never knew he had: playing drums and cymbals.
https://www.voanews.com/extremism-watch/syrian-kurd-who-lost-hand-battle-finds-passion-drums
- Genocides begin in the wilderness, far from prying eyes – in Ottoman Turkey as well as Nazi Germany
25 July 2019|The Independent
New evidence tells a story of Armenian killings carried out in the provinces long before the ‘Medz Yeghern’ was thought to have begun. The Armenian Medz Yeghern (Great Crime) destroyed a million and a half souls. The Turks – and, alas, the Kurds – committed these crimes against humanity of the First World War. The Turks have never, to this day, accepted their responsibility. The Germans have. We still respectfully record how the Turks “hotly dispute” their genocide of the Armenians.
- It’s time to kick Turkey out of NATO – former Reagan adviser
25 July 2019|Ahval News
Bringing Turkey and its nascent democracy into NATO was always a bit of a stretch, but today it makes even less sense and Turkey should be expelled from the alliance, said an analysis for The American Conservative. Turkey has proven over the years to be politically unstable, with occasional military interference in governance, Doug Bandow, a senior fellow at the Cato Institute and former special assistant to President Ronald Reagan, wrote on Wednesday.
https://ahvalnews.com/s-400/its-time-kick-turkey-out-nato-former-reagan-adviser
- Time to Kick the Islamizing Turkey Out of NATO
25 July 2019|The American Conservative
Foreign and military policy needs to change along with circumstances. During the Cold War, it made sense for Washington to forge the North Atlantic Treaty Organization and make Turkey a member. Today, an American-dominated NATO makes little sense, and Ankara’s membership even less so. Bringing in Turkey, which no one ever mistook for a liberal Western-style democracy, was always a bit of a stretch. That nation has proven over the years to be politically unstable, with occasional military interference in governing affairs.
https://www.theamericanconservative.com/articles/time-to-kick-the-islamizing-turkey-out-of-nato/
- Kurds gain support, perhaps invitation to Syrian talks
25 July 2019|Al-Monitor
Since the battles against the Islamic State (IS) in Baghouz ended in March, several factors have indicated the Kurdish-led autonomous administration in northeast Syria is garnering international political support. Previously, support to that region — known as Syrian Kurdistan or Rojava — from the international coalition against IS had been limited to military and security aspects. Now, diplomatic visits have increased in frequency, actually coming weekly in the past two months, Abdul Karim Omar, head of the region’s Foreign Relations Department, told Al-Monitor.
- ‘The Era of People Like You Is Over’: How Turkey Purged Its Intellectual
24 July 2019|The New York Times
For more than a century, one school of political science dominated the education of Turkey’s governing class — until the Erdogan regime set about destroying it. Ilhan Uzgel learned he had been fired while driving his Honda Civic from the village of Ayas to Ankara, after a visit to his ailing, elderly father. A little after midnight, one of his former research assistants called his cellphone. “Ilhan hocam,” the student said, using a Turkish honorific (“my teacher”) bestowed on educators. “Your name was on the list”.
- Why Boris Johnson is Even More Dangerous Than Trump
23 July 2019|Counterpunch
Is the rise of Boris Johnson to be the next prime minister the product of a soft coup? Does Donald Trump’s racist demonisation of four non-white congress members prove him to be a “fascist” leader like Mussolini and Hitler? The two questions should be answered together because political developments in Britain tend to emulate those in the US, and vice versa, though the latter is less frequent.
https://www.counterpunch.org/2019/07/23/why-boris-johnson-is-even-more-dangerous-than-trump/
- Noam Chomsky on co-signing Turkey’s ‘Academics for Peace’ appeal
15 July 2019|Open Democracy
In support of ‘Academics for Peace,’ more than a hundred academics, including Seyla Benhabib, Noam Chomsky, Nancy Fraser, Fredric Jameson, Steven Pinker, Michael Löwy, Wendy Brown, Bertell Ollman, Warren Montag and Saskia Sassen, have reported themselves to the Attorney General’s Office in Ankara. This action started with the court’s decision to sentence Noemi-Levy Aksu to 30 month of prison and the beginning of the trial of several notable artists and journalists, including Hrant Dink’s son, Arat Dink, for the same ‘offence’ of declaring their support for ‘Academics for Peace.’
- Turkey’s Ilisu Dam is a war nature with catastrophic consequences
14 July 2019|The National
Cultural and natural heritage are frequent casualties of war – often deliberately so. Sometimes, as in the predominantly Kurdish areas of south-east Turkey, the “war” may not be officially recognised as such, but that can make the cultural war even more intense.
https://www.thenational.scot/news/17769108.turkey-s-ilisu-dam-war-nature-catastrophic-consequences/
- Is pacifism appropriate in today’s world?
12 July 2019|New International
Thou shalt not kill. It seems simple enough. But can pacifism work as a strategy against violence and injustice? Tim Gee and Rahila Gupta go head to head.
https://newint.org/features/2019/07/01/debate
- Stop and search is discriminatory so why is it on the rise?
12 July 2019|The Guardian
This week the Guardian revealed that police attempts to tackle violent crime had brought about a sharp rise in the use of stop-and-search powers by some of England’s major forces. Boris Johnson, most likely to be Britain’s next prime minister, has said he wants to increase the powers further. Critics say stop-and-search powers disproportionately target black people and undermine community relations.
- INTERNATIONAL FORUM ON ISIS in Rojava
11 July 2019|Peace in Kurdistan
The Rojava Centre for Strategic Studies (NRLS) hosted the three-day International Forum on ISIS (Da’esh) which focused on security, social, economic, and legal issues currently facing the region as a result of the five-year war. International intellectuals, academics, and political experts from 15 different nations travelled to the Autonomous Administration of North and East Syria (AANES) to participate and hear from local military, civil society, and administration officials.
- Final Declaration of the International Forum on ISIS
9 July 2019/ANF English
The International Forum On ISIS: Dimensions, challenges, and confrontation strategies, closed in Amude on Monday night. Three days of debates, discussions, testimonies and proposals, which brought together hundreds of people from all over the world. The Rojava Center for Strategic Studies (NRLS) invited more than 200 people, including politicians, researchers and representatives of civil society institutions from multiple countries.
ACTIONS, CAMPAIGNS
- Safe Hasankeyf! Stop the filling of the Ilisu Dam!
29 July 2019|Julie Ward MP
Letter to the UK Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab MP by Julie Ward MEP, Prof Felix Padel and Henry Brooks, Kurdish Solidarity Cymru
- Filling of Ilisu Dam has started! Join the resistance with the “Hasankeyf Watch”!
26 July 2019|Hasankeyf’i Yaşatma Girişimi
Hasankeyf’i kurtaralım, Dicle Vadisini yaşatalım! – Save Hasankeyf and Tigris Valley
The Turkish government has started filling the controversial Ilisu Dam Reservoir on the Tigris River in the Kurdish Southeast of Turkey. We call on all people and organizations to stand against this act of destruction. Join or visit the Hasankeyf Watch in the 12,000 year old town Hasankeyf.
http://www.hasankeyfgirisimi.net/?p=1134
- Trade unionists’ letter to the Home Secretary: Don’t Criminalise International Solidarity
26 July 2019|Freedom for Ocalan
In a joint letter to the Home Secretary, Priti Patel MP, senior trade union officials oppose any Home Office decision to make Kurdish-run North-East Syria a “designated area” under the Counter-Terrorism and Border Security Act 2019. Under such a designation, anyone visiting the region could face up to 10 years imprisonment, a fine or both. They urge the Homes Secretary “Don’t criminalise international solidarity.”
https://freedomforocalan.org/border-security-act-2019/
- Early Day Motion: TREATMENT OF KURDISH PEOPLE
EDM #2582| 26 UK MPs
That this House expresses its grave concern at the Turkish state’s intensified aggression against the people and territory of northern Iraq/southern Kurdistan and military occupation of that region; condemns the use of Turkish warplanes to bomb and kill civilians in northern Iraq in violation of international law, human rights and the basic principles of sovereignty; and notes that the Turkish state does this with the aim of occupying Kurdish people’s lands, changing the demographics of those territories and the suppression of Kurdish identity and the Kurdish people’s aspiration for democratic representation.
https://edm.parliament.uk/early-day-motion/53130/treatment-of-kurdish-people
CULUTRE, ARTS/EVENTS
- Your Freedom and Mine
An evening of poetry, music and film celebrating the resistance struggle of the Kurdish Freedom Movement on the occasion of the publication of “Freedom Poems for Ocalan” marking Abdullah Ocalan’s 70th birthday.
https://vimeo.com/showcase/6155720
Peace in Kurdistan
Campaign for a political solution of the Kurdish Question
Email: estella24@tiscali.co.uk
www.peaceinkurdistancampaign.com
Contacts Estella Schmid 020 7586 5892 & Melanie Gingell – Tel: 020 7272 7890
Fax: 020 7263 0596
Patrons: John Austin, Christine Blower, NUT International Secretary, Prof Bill Bowring, Julie Christie, Noam Chomsky, Jeremy Corbyn MP, Prof Mary Davis, Lord Dholakia, Simon Dubbins, UNITE International Director, Jill Evans MEP, Lindsey German, Convenor STWC, Melanie Gingell, Rahila Gupta, Nick Hildyard, Dafydd Iwan, Former President Plaid Cymru, James Kelman, Bruce Kent, Jean Lambert MEP, Elfyn Llwyd, Aonghas MacNeacail, Scottish Gaelic poet, Mike Mansfield QC, Doug Nicholls, General Secretary, GFTU, Dr. Jessica Ayesha Northey, International Coordinator, Green Party of England and Wales; Sinn Fein MLA Conor Murphy, Dr Thomas Jeffrey Miley, Kate Osamor MP, Margaret Owen OBE, Gareth Peirce, Maxine Peake, Lord Rea, Joe Ryan, Stephen Smellie, Steve Sweeney, Dr Tove Skutnabb-Kangas, Dr Tom Wakeford, Dr Derek Wall, Julie Ward MEP, Hywel Williams MP.