Erdogan declares war on Kurds

TURKEY - In Brief 05 Nov 2024 by Atilla Yesilada
Barely had the Turkish body-politic recovered from the sacking of CHP Esenyurt (Istanbul) mayor, Prof Ahmet Ozturk, Erdogan dealt a second blow to tranquility by ordering the ouster of three Kurdish (DEM Party) mayors in the provinces of Mardin, Batman as well as the Halfeti town in the province of Sanliurfa. Parenthetically, Mardin mayor Mr Ahmet Turk became the first ever elected politician to be sacked three times. Like Ozturk, the new victims are removed from office after probes about their suspected terror links. AKP’s “embedded” journalist Mr Abdulkadir Selvi, who is currently in the retinue of Erdogan visiting Kyrgyzstan heralded in his Tuesday column (link here) that all DEM mayors with suspected links to PKK will be sacked, which means literally all of them, because there are very few, if any Kurdish politician of note, who is not somewhat in conversation with PKK. According to some sources, two CHP township mayors from the province of Mersin may also join the list of “criminals”. But why, when Bahceli only today reiterated his call to incarcerated PKK leader Ocalan to report to the parliament to renounce terror? To be honest, I’ve no single explanation that fits all the observed shocks in Turkish politics since 31st of March. Consider: CHP wins an unexpected victory in local elections.CHP leader Ozel launches a detente with Erdogan and Bahceli dubbed normalization, reciprocated by the latter, albeit somewhat less eagerly.Ozel calls for early elections on or before November 2025. Bahceli extends an olive branch to MHP’s nemesis Kurdish equality movement. Four Kurdish mayors are suddenly removed from their posts on frivolous charges, with more to come. Perhaps ...

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