Kurdistan Worker’s Party (PKK) Central Executive Committee member, Duran Kalkan, commented on the Council of Europe’s anti-torture Committee’s (CPT’s) report examining the prison isolation conditions of Kurdish leader, Abdullah Öcalan. He stated that the significant struggles that have been carried out by Kurdish people have helped to bring attention to Ocalan’s situation.
CPT announced that there was isolation and torture in the prison where Öcalan was imprisoned in Turkey.
Kalkan pointed out that isolation has not only been imposed on Öcalan but the whole country and its peoples, as a consequence of that act.
Kalkan called on the CPT to eliminate the obstacles that prevent Öcalan from sharing his ideas freely. He added that the CPT has not found a solution to this, despite confirming that isolation and torture has taken place.
Another issue that Kalkan focused on related to the attacks of the Turkish state against Northern Iraq (Başure Kurdistan) and the attitude of the Democratic Party of Kurdistan (KDP) to all of this.
Kalkan stated that the KDP tries to take over those areas where PKK guerrillas are located. He defined this stance as a “serious danger”. He added that Turkey’s aim is to take over all of Kurdistan and he called upon the KDP to stand with the guerrillas against Turkish attacks.
Kalkan also made statements regarding the soaring tension in the eastern Mediterranean and stated that there is an ongoing war which he has referred to as a “Third World War”.
Capitalist modernity has been in this war constantly due to its own contradictions, to gain the highest economic profits, he added.
Kalkan stated that the causes of tension in the eastern Mediterranean are based on the issue of controlling and sharing energy transmission lines. Turkey has been drawn into these tensions by other countries due to the Kurdish issue.
During this process and under the ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) and Nationalist Movement Party (MHP) alliance, Turkey has altered its international policies, he observed.
Turkey attempts to take over several regions outside its borders and this fact has led to the collapse of the political map that was constituted at the end of the First World War. Today, the status quo, formed as a result of the First World War, has collapsed. Kalkan added that Turkey could face a new kind of Treaty of Sevres at the end of this period.
The policies of the AKP-MHP alliance cause division in Turkey. Democratic forces, he suggested, should struggle against this alliance.
