Kenan’s statement on the first day of the trial
Kenan Ayaz, the Kurdish man on trial in Hamburg, sees a pattern in the trial against him and the proceedings against other activists: ‘They obviously serve Germany’s foreign policy interests, as Turkey is demanding these terrorist criminal proceedings.’
The trial against Kenan Ayaz, a Kurd extradited to Germany from Cyprus, opened on Friday at Hamburg Higher Regional Court. Ayaz is a recognised refugee in Cyprus due to political persecution in Turkey and is accused in Germany of organising legal demonstrations and rallies and taking part in fundraising activities. Because he is alleged to have carried out these acts as a member of the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK), he is charged as a member of a terrorist organisation abroad under Section 129b of the German Criminal Code (StGB). On the first day of the trial, his defence lawyers Antonia von der Behrens, Stephan Kuhn and Efstathios C. Efstathiou made an opening statement and requested that the proceedings be discontinued. Kenan Ayaz supplemented his defence team’s motion for discontinuation with his own statement, which we document as follows:
‘Inviolability of human dignity in the Basic Law”
I would like to give additional reasons for my defence’s application: Since the Kurdish language was forbidden in my home country, I have not been able to receive an education in my mother tongue. I therefore cannot write Kurdish and am forced to read my text in Turkish.
The first article of the German Basic Law deals with the inviolability of human dignity. This article is very special and places great responsibility on the German state and society. It is significant that the Turkish constitution does not protect human dignity. On the contrary, the dignity of the Kurdish people and of individual Kurdish people has been systematically violated by the Turkish state for a century. Until recently, even the existence of the Kurds was questioned. In order to prove their existence, the Kurds had to endure oppression, denial and annihilation on a very large scale. They were subjected to cultural and physical genocide. All kinds of coercion and ideological means were used to dismember their homeland and negate their culture. It can be said that there is virtually no mechanism of oppression and plunder that the hegemonic powers have not used against the Kurdish people.
‘More than the struggle for freedom: the Kurdish struggle for existence”
The history of mankind is full of examples of this. The only means that peoples can resort to when they are confronted with the question of their existence, their freedom and their dignity is to fight. This is the only way they can protect their existence, their freedom and their dignity. For a century, the Kurds have been living in a situation in which they have to prove their existence, and they have fought a great battle for this. In a way, it is a struggle over whether Kurds exist or not. Many peoples have experienced violent massacres and genocides. But did they have to discuss whether they exist as a people? The Kurds’ struggle is more than a struggle for freedom, it is a struggle for existence. They had to fight for their survival. There was no way for them to prove their existence or to live freely. Their existence, their homeland, their nation and their social identity were not recognised.
In Turkey, the mentality of ‘one language, one religion, one homeland, one society, one flag’ is maintained. The Kurdish language has no constitutional and legal status, and even demanding it is considered a crime. The right to education in one’s mother tongue, the right to economic existence, the right to health, the right to identify with one’s national and social identity in one’s own language are criminalised at the level of expression. They are a reason to be tortured, arrested and killed. There can be no question of political rights for the Kurds.
‘Anti-terrorism campaign as a cover for crimes”
The Turkish state is not only maintaining this strict disenfranchisement, but is also waging a genocidal war against the Kurds 100 years after the genocides of the Armenians, Assyrians and Greeks. With its military, political, economic, cultural, psychological and diplomatic armies, which reach millions of people, and with the radical jihadist gangs it has organised in recent years, it is keeping the existence, dignity and will of the Kurds to live freely under siege. The Turkish state has made it its main task to liquidate the Kurds. To this end, it is using all its resources and mobilising funds from allied states. By doing this in the name of the ‘fight against terrorism’, it legitimises and disguises the genocidal crime it is committing and receives great support at home and abroad. At the international level, the concept of terrorism has become a cover for crime. In other words, the Kurds’ struggle for their dignity is regarded as terrorism by many states, especially Germany. A people is being ruthlessly sacrificed for current economic and political interests.
‘The most beautiful women in the world have defeated the ugliest men in the world”
The people being sacrificed, however, have spent the last ten years, led by women, fighting against fascism and the barbarism of the Islamic State in the Middle East. It has waged a war for human dignity. They have made human dignity sacrosanct. The Islamic State has violated human dignity the most. It has beheaded and raped people. It has enslaved women and sold them on the slave market. It has attacked historical values and holy sites. In the 21st century, he has committed this fascist barbarism before the eyes of humanity and put human dignity at great risk.
Kurdish women have won the struggle for a dignified life under the slogan ‘Jin Jiyan Azadî’ [Woman Life Freedom]. The Kurds have given more than 20,000 martyrs and tens of thousands of wounded to save humanity from the plague of the Islamic State. The world has formed a grand coalition [against IS], which more than 30 states have joined. This coalition saw the Kurds as a force for freedom. A force that defends human dignity. The Kurds caused quite a stir in the world and humanity was very grateful to them. Above all, humanity has admired the resistance led by women. They defeated the barbarism of the Islamic State and defended human dignity. At the time, the world press ran the headline: ‘The most beautiful women in the world have defeated the ugliest men in the world.’ The women’s victory was celebrated worldwide.
‘Erdoğan has Ottoman expansionist dreams”
Fascism and Erdoğan’s dictatorship wanted to conquer the Middle East with the Islamic State. He gave every support for this. He provided the Islamic State with his weapons so that the Kurds could be defeated. He sent all the gangs he could organise to Syria. Erdoğan has Ottoman expansionist dreams. The Ottoman Empire opened the door to the Middle East by conquering Syria at the beginning of the 16th century and dominating the entire Middle East through Syria. Erdoğan threatened Europe and the USA with the Islamic State in order to persuade them to support his policies. He carried out massacres in many parts of Europe, particularly in France, Belgium and England. He organised numerous gangs in Europe and unleashed them on civilians in the streets.
It is thanks to the Kurds, whom they labelled as terrorists, that people in Europe can now move around and go about their daily lives in a relaxed manner. If the Kurds had not opposed IS fascism and liquidated its caliphate, the Islamic State would be conquering the Middle East today under the leadership of Erdoğan, making the world uninhabitable and turning it into a bloodbath.
‘Kurdish living space is being destroyed”
However, the danger has not yet been averted. After the Islamic State was defeated, Erdoğan fascism appeared on the scene. It committed genocide against the Kurds who were fighting against the Islamic State. It occupied many regions of Syria, especially the Kurdish areas. He massacred thousands of people and established radical jihadist gangs in the occupied areas. Millions of people were driven from their homes. The jihadist groups loyal to Erdoğan practise all forms of sadism. Massacres, rape and torture are the order of the day.
Every day it rains bombs on the Kurds who are defending humanity against the Islamic State. Their living space is being destroyed. Kurdish factories, hospitals, dams, schools, prayer houses, electricity and petrol stations are being bombed. Millions of people are cut off from water and electricity. More than five million people are victims of the latest attacks. Yesterday, the Kurds were considered a force for freedom when they defended humanity against IS fascism. They were a force for dignity. The forces of the coalition fought together. Today, as Erdoğan’s fascism invades and carries out genocidal attacks, have the Kurds become terrorists?
‘I can prove Erdoğan’s support for IS with documents”
Erdoğan is waging a war of massacre and genocide before the eyes of all humanity. The world watches in silence. It even supports him. It says it is on his side in the fight against terrorism. It says that the Turkish state has the right to self-defence. Everyone must oppose Erdoğan’s fascism and the fascist genocide he has instigated. Those who do not resist today will be afflicted by this fascism tomorrow. IS is continuing its attacks in Europe. Who is supporting the Islamic State? It is Erdoğan who supports IS! All states, especially Germany, know this. If Germany claims not to know, I am happy to prove it with documents.
‘Why does Germany accept the Turkish occupation of Cyprus?”
But who knows it very well is the Cypriot population. Cyprus was last occupied by the Turkish state in 1974 in a very bloody manner and this occupation was shamelessly labelled as a peace operation. The people of Cyprus were subjected to a massacre and genocide before the eyes of the world. Women were raped in front of their children. Many people were deported to Turkey and disappeared there. The Cypriot people are still mourning the remains of their children. It is a people that has endured many invasions in its history and has put up great resistance. They have entered the 50th year of the occupation of their country by the Turkish state. For 50 years they have been forced to experience this great tragedy.
When the Turkish state occupied the land of the Kurds and waged a genocidal war, it did so under the guise of terrorism. And what is the justification for the expulsion in Cyprus? Why do the European states, especially Germany, accept the occupation of Cyprus by the Turkish state, which has been going on for 50 years?
‘Because Turkey is demanding these terrorist criminal proceedings”
And why am I writing all this? Erdoğan fascism violates human dignity the most. It tramples on human dignity. It commits genocide and war crimes. So, according to the constitution, it is committing a great crime. Erdoğan should be on trial here today, not me. But I have to realise with regret that I am on trial here, as Erdoğan has demanded. The criminal proceedings against me and the proceedings against many other Kurdish activists follow a pattern: they obviously serve Germany’s foreign policy interests, as Turkey is demanding these terrorist criminal proceedings.
But the Kurds in Syria, Iraq, Iran and Turkey are defending themselves against attacks by the fascist regimes in these states, they are fighting for their survival, they are fighting for their dignity and the dignity of every single person, regardless of gender, religion and ethnicity. And that is not terrorism.