The Deconstruction of Diyarbakır's Old Centre
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The Deconstruction of Diyarbakır’s old centre: Violating international law and disregarding the interests of local populations ………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………….... By Zekeriyya Yahya Karapinar and Gunnar M. Ekelove-Slydal1 Turkey has been fighting an off-and-on war with the Kurdish Worker’s Party (PKK) since the 1980s over Kurdish independence or self-rule in South East Turkey.2 A peace process started in March 2013, supported by Abdullah Öcalan, the imprisoned leader of PKK, who called for its disarmament.3 In 2015, the peace process collapsed, and Turkish security forces conducted extensive operations against PKK and PKK-affiliated organisations mostly in the urban centres of the region. The ensuing brutal conflict caused the killing of hundreds of civilians, displacement of more than 350,000 people, and the destruction of old urban centres.4 In this policy paper, we discuss the consequences of the security operations with a focus on Sur, an ancient district in the city of Diyarbakır. Sur had about 120 000 inhabitants before fighting started in early December 2015, which led to more than 40 000 leaving the area.5 1 The Policy Paper was drafted by Zekeriyya Yahya Karapinar, consultant with the Norwegian Helsinki Committee (NHC). It was edited by Gunnar M. Ekelove-Slydal, NHC Head of policies. Parts of it is based on a mission to South East Turkey that included the Director of the NHC supported Freedom of Belief Initiative in Turkey, Mine Yıldırım. 2 The Partiya Karkerên Kurdistanê or the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) is a rebel group with roots in Marxist-Leninist ideology which was founded in 1978. It declared a full-scale insurgency against the Turkish state in 1984 with the aim of creating an independent Kurdish state. The ensuing conflicts claimed more than 40.000 lives and led to the displacement of more than 1 million people. (PKK) is listed as a terrorist organisation by many states and international organisations, including the United States of America, the European Union, the United Kingdom, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, and several other countries. 3 Hürriyet Daily News, Öcalan calls on Kurdish militants to bid farewell to arms for a ‘new’ Turkey, March 2013, http://bit.ly/3cIliN4. 4 OHCHR, Report on the human rights situation in South-East Turkey, para. 2, 14, 19, 29, 32-40, February 2017, http://bit.ly/37nJLnV. 5 This is the official number as stated by Murat Kurum, Minister of Environment and Urbanisation, November 2019, http://bit.ly/30Q3nyp. 1 Sur’s history goes back millennia, with traces of dozens of civilisations, including Jewish, Muslim, Christian, Persian, Arab, Armenian and Turkish. More than 1,500 buildings have been labelled historic and are protected by law. In June 2015, UNESCO enlisted the 12-meter-high stone fortifications that encircle Sur, built around 350AD, as a World Heritage Site. It also included the 8,000-year-old Hevsel Gardens, which lie between the walls and the Tigris river, on the list.6 More than four years after the end of the security operations, construction in the Sur district is still ongoing. Several neighbourhoods are closed to Sur residents, and interwoven political, legal, economic, and cultural issues remain to be solved. The paper argues that authorities should involve local actors and cultural heritage experts much more than is currently the case, in the process of planning and conducting the restoration of the district. UNESCO has been largely silent about the destruction in Sur. It should step up its involvement and ensure that cultural heritage concerns are taken into consideration in the reconstruction and further development of the district. The paper argues that the government should start an independent investigation regarding crimes that reportedly took place during the security operations. It should also halt the practice of removing elected Kurdish politicians in the region and assigning government appointees in their stead. More inclusive policies are needed to increase local ownership of the rebuilding and further development of the region. The government must interact with elected Kurdish politicians with popular support. Collapse of the peace process The reasons for the collapse of the 2013-2015 peace process between the Turkish state and PKK are contested. They may include the Syrian civil war and its spill over effects on Turkish soil. Especially after the Suruç bombing, the PKK accused the Turkish state of overlooking, and even encouraging, ISIS members attacking Kurdish people in Turkey.7 The resumption of hostilities may also have been related with the Justice and Development Party (AKP), the governing party, losing a significant number of votes in the June 2015 general elections while the pro-Kurdish People’s Democratic Party (HDP) had successful outcome. For the first time a Kurdish-oriented party surpassed the nationwide 10 per cent threshold to enter the Turkish parliament.8 On the other hand, the practice of digging trenches and building barricades in Kurdish-populated urban areas by PKK youth militias started well before the collapse of the peace process, as early as 2014.9 It seems that the youth militias were preparing for the resumption of conflict early on. There were efforts by elder influential Kurds, to convince the youth to abandon the militarising of city centres.10 6 David Lepaska, The destruction of Sur: is this historic district a target for gentrification?, The Guardian, February 2016, http://bit.ly/2NSCepA. See also: UNESCO and World Heritage Convention, Diyarbakir Fortress and Hevsel Gardens Cultural Landscape, https://whc.unesco.org/en/list/1488/ and UNESCO and World Heritage Convention, Sites in Denmark, France and Turkey inscribed on UNESCO’s World Heritage List, July 2015, https://whc.unesco.org/en/news/1315/. 7 See France 24, PKK claims Turkish police killing in revenge for Syria border attack, July 2015, http://bit.ly/2un4iKU. The 20 July 2015 Suruç bombing targeted a meeting at the Amara Culture Centre in Suruç, a town in the Şanlıurfa Province. Youth groups were gathered at the centre to prepare support for Kurdish militias in Kobani; a region in Syria where fighting was ongoing against the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL/ISIS). The suicide bombing claimed 33 lives, and wounded more than 100. The day after, ISIL claimed resonsibility for the attack but HDP and PKK-afilliated groups also blamed the Turkish government. See Constanze Letsch, Turkey releases bombing suspect details as Twitter temporarily shut down, The Guardian, July 2015, http://bit.ly/2RSiWSj. 8 Tim Arango and Ceylan Yeginsu, Turkey’s push into war is seen as Erdogan’s political strategy, The New York Times, August 2015, https://nyti.ms/2NJD9s4. 9 International Crisis Group (ICG), The Human cost of the PKK conflict in Turkey: The Case of Sur, p. 6, March 2016, http://bit.ly/36mKnJ2. 10 Prominent Diyarbakır businessman Shahismail Bedirhanoglu met with young PKK members and urged them not to militarise Sur. I told them it’s as if you’re mad at someone, yet you burn down your own house, … It’s like giving the state an invitation for these operations. We told the people there will be death and destruction. Lepaska, Op. Cit., see footnote 6. 2 After the Ceylanpınar incident, where two Turkish police officers were assassinated by unknown people, a large-scale police operation was launched, and Turkey conducted air-strikes against both ISIS and PKK targets in Iraq on 24 July 2015. As a result, the PKK announced the resumption of hostilities. On 12 August 2015, self-rule was declared in many Kurdish-populated towns in South-East Turkey by the Democratic Regions Party (DBP), a local affiliate of the HDP. These developments triggered operations by Turkish security forces to remove barricades, booby traps and explosives. The Turkish army imposed round-the-clock curfews, which obstructed all normal activities in the affected areas. It engaged in fights with PKK or pro-PKK insurgents, using tanks, heavy weapons, and artillery in the barricaded urban areas. The Turkish operations were widely criticised for the use of extended curfews and their adverse effects on the civilian population, as well as for excessive use of force in urban areas which caused civilian casualties and destroyed whole neighbourhoods. According to the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR), around 2000 people lost their lives during security operations between July 2015 and December 2016. Close to 800 of them were security personnel and approximately 1200 of them were people residing in the region. It is unknown how many of them were involved in violent actions.11 Other actors also contributed documentation of human losses as a result of the conflict. The Human Rights Foundation of Turkey (HRFT), a Turkish non-governmental (NGO) group, reported that at least 321 civilians had lost their lives in the context of the curfews that took place between 16 August 2015 and 16 August 2016.12 According to the International Crisis Group, at least 254 civilians were killed between July 2015 and March 2016.13 The death toll of conflict and terrorism between 20 July 2015 and 9 January 2019 was 4783, according to its database of fatalities.14 After July 2016, the conflict shifted away from the cities to rural areas of South East Turkey. The PKK suffered extensive losses during the fighting, although was far from being defeated. The current hard-line policies of the Turkish Government are also fuelling Kurdish grievances and anger and may lead to increase of combat