Intensified persecution against Kurdish movement
The Kurdish activist Kenan Ayaz has been sentenced to four years and three months in prison in Hamburg. Cansu Özdemir (Die Linke) speaks of a fatal signal for the rule of law and the opposition in Kurdistan and Turkey.
The Higher Regional Court (OLG) of Hamburg today sentenced the Kurdish politician and activist Kenan Ayaz to four years and three months in prison on charges of ‘membership of a terrorist organisation’ pursuant to Section 129b of the German Criminal Code (StGB). The 50-year-old was accused of acting as a ‘regional leader’ of the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK). He is only alleged to have been involved in the organisation of ‘propaganda events and gatherings’ such as demonstrations and festivals and in collecting donations. The judgement is not final.
Kenan Ayaz has already spent twelve years in prison in Turkey due to his commitment against the oppression of the Kurdish population. He had been living in Cyprus as a recognised refugee since 2013. In March last year, he was arrested in Cyprus on the basis of a European arrest warrant issued by the German judiciary and transferred to Germany. He has been held in the Holstenglacis remand prison in Hamburg since June. The proceedings against Ayaz began in November last year. The federal prosecutor’s office had demanded a prison sentence of four and a half years, while the defence called for an acquittal.
‘Against the criminalisation of the Kurdish movement! Freedom for Kenan Ayaz!’ was written on a banner in front of the OLG © ANF
Kenan Ayaz’s last word
The court day began with a rally in front of the OLG organised by supporters of the #FreeKenan alliance. The participants demanded the acquittal of Kenan Ayaz and an end to the persecution of Kurds.
In the courtroom, Kenan Ayaz began to read out the last section of his statement. On 3 August 2014, when the so-called ‘Islamic State’ (IS) attacked Şengal, both the Iraqi army and the Peşmerga fled. ‘It was the Kurdish freedom guerrillas who reached Şengal and prevented a major genocide,’ explained Ayaz.
‘The patrons of IS, first and foremost Erdoğan, want to prevent the Kurds from becoming an essential and powerful player in the new system that is to replace the collapsed despotic regimes in Iraq and Syria. They do not want the Kurdish people to have a status with their own identity, language, culture and freedom in the newly organised Middle East. They do not want a free Kurdish administration in Rojava, just as they do not want a free administration in South Kurdistan,’ said Ayaz.
Erdoğan had effectively declared war on the Kurds with the attacks on Şengal and Kobanê. After the capture of Mosul and the genocide in Şengal, Erdoğan persuaded IS to focus its attack on Kobanê instead of Damascus. ‘Women led the resistance in Kobanê. The world was afraid of IS and IS was afraid of women. IS, one of the most feared organisations in the world, was defeated by the struggle of women.’
Erdoğan plans the annihilation of the Kurds
The simultaneous negotiations between Öcalan and the Turkish state, the so-called ‘Dolmabahçe Consensus’, an agreement with a ten-point plan for a solution to the Kurdish question, were unilaterally terminated by Erdoğan on 22 March 2015. ‘Many people in Turkey and Kurdistan had high hopes for this agreement and hoped that the war would end. And so began the apocalypse we are now living in,’ Ayaz continued. ‘Erdoğan took the place of the defeated IS against the Kurds. He bombed election rallies in Kurdistan and Turkey and allowed IS to carry out bloody attacks on peace demonstrations. And Erdoğan began to implement the genocide plan, the extermination plan that he had decided on 30 October 2014,’ Ayaz said, describing the comprehensive war against the Kurds that followed.
Solingen is a consequence of the AKP regime’s support for IS
At this point, Kenan Ayaz interrupted his prepared speech and commented on the events in Solingen. He expressed his condolences to the victims of Solingen and wished the injured a speedy recovery. He referred to the threats that Erdoğan had made against Europe and the subsequent attacks in Paris and Brussels by IS. The latter had not only supplied weapons to IS, but had also created a new base for IS with the occupation of parts of northern Syria, which in turn posed a threat to the entire world.
The terrorism lie
Ayaz then went on to discuss the close relationship between Erdoğan and the German state. The basis of the historical relationship is Turkey’s geostrategic position. Turkey has always marketed this. Germany had persuaded NATO to actively side with Turkey in relation to the genocide against the Kurds.
According to Ayaz, the isolation of the Kurds began with the attempt to blame the PKK for the assassination of Swedish Prime Minister Olof Palme on 28 February 1986. The PKK was only acquitted of this accusation 34 years later. However, no reparations were made for the Kurds, who had been subjected to persecution, oppression and discrimination for 34 years. The ‘terrorism’ lie with which the PKK had been labelled as a result of this murder had not been removed.
Turkey may carry out massacres, but Kurds are not allowed to protest
Ayaz commented on the so-called PKK ban in Germany in 1993. For the first time in the history of Kurdistan, the demands of a people defending their basic rights to freedom and recognition of their identity have met with such broad interest and the support of society as a whole. However, 1993 was also the year in which Turkish fascism, with the support of NATO and Israel, reached the peak of the genocide, which lasted until 1996 Massacres and the destruction of 4,000 villages and the displacement of millions of people drove people onto the streets.
‘On 4 November, the Kurds protested in many places. This is one of the protests that Germany cites as justification for the PKK ban. In other words: The Turkish Republic is allowed to carry out massacres, but the Kurds are not allowed to protest!
The Kurdish potential in Europe, which informed the world about the events in Kurdistan, was suppressed by Germany. Democratic and peaceful protest actions in Germany against this serious attack and the brutality of the Turkish state against the Kurds as well as the sensitisation of the public were prevented. Considering that the majority of Kurds living in Europe live in Germany, it is clear that this attack aims to neutralise Kurds across Europe,’ Ayaz said.
The ‘terror list’ of Germany and the EU is the indirect legitimisation and approval of the barbarism, massacres and genocidal policies of the Turkish state, said Ayaz. The Turkish state justifies its barbaric actions with this ban and this list.
Cover for the genocide
Ayaz recalled Turkey’s invasion of Efrîn (Afrin) in northern Syria, the joint occupation of the region by Turkey and the Salafists, the destruction of factories, hospitals, schools, dams, water, electricity and petrol stations, refineries, buildings and infrastructure. The ‘fight against terrorism’ is a big deception, said Ayaz. It is a cover for genocide. The Erdoğan regime is the monster of the Middle East today. Instead of fighting this genocidal mentality, Germany is banning and arresting the innocent Kurdish people, who are in the stranglehold of genocide. In doing so, Germany is at least indirectly supporting fascism, colonialism and genocide.
Germany is also indirectly promoting the emergence of right-wing fascist parties. ‘You may find this exaggerated, but if Germany had focussed on solving the Kurdish question and not on the ban, it would have been easy to solve. Erdoğan couldn’t have opened and closed the gate for refugees on a whim. Erdoğan could not have negotiated about refugees. Fascist parties could not have exploited the refugee issue,’ says Ayaz.
They legitimise the genocide
Ayaz explained that human rights obviously do not apply to Kurds. ‘Because then I would not be on trial today and our people would not be subjected to genocide […] A community of more than forty million people is ignored in national and international law.
‘Instead of prosecuting those responsible for the genocide – and this is especially true for Germany – they indirectly legitimise the genocidal acts by persecuting those who resist the genocide. Under the guise of terrorism, the genocide is basically being covered up,’ says Ayaz.
The core of the accusation against the Kurdish movement is ‘that Turkey is allowed to commit genocide, that one is not even allowed to protest against it, that one is not even allowed to organise a legal democratic demonstration. It criminalises the democratic right to demonstrate, which is a constitutional right, as a terrorist activity when it comes to Kurds, and accuses legitimate defensive resistance of terrorism.
The federal prosecutor’s office defines the PKK as a terrorist organisation that has come together to commit crimes and murders. They know that this is not true. […] When all legal and political solutions are barred to a people in the face of massacres and genocidal attacks, in the face of injustices against their language and culture, they can resort to short or long-term resistance if necessary. This is neither rebellion nor terrorism, but a legitimate and lawful right. Not to do so would be a violation of law and order.
Ayaz explained that self-defence is a constitutional right as well as a duty to the people. ‘I have been standing up with my pen and with my words for decades. This is a constitutional right. But in my case, the constitution is being ignored in order to satisfy Erdoğan. This is also a violation of European law,’ Ayaz said.
He recalled the appeal of 69 Nobel laureates who had sent an appeal for the release of Abdullah Öcalan and for a peaceful solution to the conflict with the Kurds to the Committee of Ministers of the Council of Europe, the European Court of Human Rights, the European Committee for the Prevention of Torture and the United Nations Human Rights Committee and quoted Elfriede Jelinek, who had said:
‘It is unbearable for me, in connection with Kurdistan and the Kurds, to only ever hear the buzzwords terrorism, insurgency, fighting militias, destroying PKK positions, operation to displace, etc. As if this Kurdish people, who only strive for autonomy and freedom, were the super-terrorist of Europe, indeed, of the world. […] Abdullah Öcalan, who is seen as a legitimate political representative by the majority of the Kurdish population, must finally be released after almost a quarter of a century of total isolation, during which he was not even allowed to speak out. He will be able to make a decisive contribution to the solution plan for Kurdistan. He is the great liberation figure for the Kurds. His release will be the basic condition for a peaceful future, ultimately also for Turkey.’
In other words: ‘The Federal Republic of Germany could play an essential role both in the enforcement of universal law and in the development of Turkey into a secular constitutional state by taking up the appeal of these Nobel Prize-winning intellectuals, writers and scientists as the conscience of humanity and using its close relations with Turkey for a political dialogue on the Kurdish question. The Federal Republic of Germany can make an important contribution to the peaceful resolution of the Kurdish question by assuming responsibility and taking the initiative. In doing so, it can make a contribution to overcoming Turkey’s historical problem. Germany has the power to do this if it wants to,’ Ayaz concluded his last word.
He thanked his defenders and supporters. He had received a lot of mail from Germans, who were the conscience of the German people.
Defence lawyer Kuhn: Intensified persecution against the Kurdish movement
The large audience stood up and applauded. After a break of two and a half hours, Judge Wende-Spohrs read out her judgement. As expected, she sentenced Kenan Ayaz to four years and three months, claiming that the Kurdish liberation struggle was not legitimate and that Kenan Ayaz was a terrorist, even though he had only used democratic means.
Kenan Ayaz’s lawyer Stephan Kuhn commented on the judgement as follows:
‘Unfortunately, today’s judgement fits seamlessly into the intensified persecution practice of the German state against the Kurdish freedom movement. It is becoming increasingly clear that supposed geopolitical interests are being placed above fundamental and human rights, and people are being punished more and more excessively for their non-violent political commitment.
It is bitter to see that the Turkish regime is also being rewarded by the German state for its policies that are contemptuous of international and human rights, while the belief in the rule of law and democracy is being further frustrated.
From the outset, the court left no doubt that it would convict despite unclear evidence and on the basis of dubious intelligence claims. Nevertheless, today’s judgement has once again impressively demonstrated the internal contradiction of German repression practice, on the one hand being unable to avoid recognising decades of oppression of the Kurds by the Turkish state in violation of human rights and expressing understanding for the defendant’s political activity, which is motivated by this and is in itself legal, and on the other hand imposing such a high sentence.
It is all the more remarkable that Kenan Ayaz fought to the end against all attempts to denigrate and criminalise the Kurdish freedom struggle with extensive political and historical analyses and relentlessly pointed out and named the historical and contemporary injustices of those in power in Turkey and Europe.
Cansu Özdemir: Fatal signal
The judgement against Ayaz also caused outrage among Cansu Özdemir. The justice policy spokesperson for the Left Party parliamentary group in the Hamburg City Parliament described the conviction of the Kurd as a ‘fatal signal for the rule of law and the opposition movement in Turkey and Kurdistan’. Özdemir added: ‘It’s absurd: Ayaz is being accused of completely legal acts that are only punishable because the German government is supporting the Erdogan regime by banning the PKK. However, if the German constitutional state waves through such politically motivated charges at Erdogan’s behest, this has nothing to do with justice. The ban on the PKK must finally be lifted.’