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By Yara Kamaran:
A week ago, the Cizire Kurdish town was besieged by the Turkish army, allowing no one to go out on the streets, blocking connections between the various neighborhoods, with people being shot to death on sight by Turkish snipers positioned on the roofs of the houses, “They kicked the door of our house, and several soldiers came in, they took the roof as a base for them, we couldn’t say anything, they left after several hours,” said one of the inhabitants of a neighborhood in Cizire. This resulted in the deaths of 30+ persons, mostly civilians. “Those who venture out into the streets are killed by snipers. A violation that normally costs just 100 lira has become the price of death for the Kurds,” Selahattin Demirtaş explained.
The Turkish Government blamed these terrorizing actions on the people of the town, stating that they had affiliations with the PKK, which is baseless, since the rebels inside the city who were seeking protection of their people against the Turks were only youth moved to take actions defending basic human rights. The town was running low on supplies of food and water, phone lines were cut, media and internet were blocked, there was no electricity, not even washing water, which were signals that it may have turned into a huge humanitarian crisis, if the Turkish Government had not decided to lift curfew on the city at 7 am on Saturday.
Hundreds of Kurds on their way to Cizire
Amidst the silence of the free world, some faithful Kurds ventured to raise awareness of what was happening in the city. Selahattin Demirtaş said: “I will carry Cizire’s voice to the world.” he stated when he went on a 55-mile trip to Cizire with his colleagues where, at the end, he was not allowed to enter the besieged city, and violently stopped by Turkish Police alleging that they were fearing for the delegation’s safety from the town’s people. During this time more than one thousand Kurdish truck drivers were not permitted to re-enter Turkey and kept at the border with southern Kurdistan (Zakho) for one week, which resulted in them marching, and smuggling themesleves back to their homes, to Cizire town, “They are killing our children, we need to stand by our people’s side” conveyed one of these men. The Turkish Police opened up fire on them, causing one death and six other injuries. Meanwhile, there are claims that Turkish Government is “punishing” the people of the town for voting for the pro-Kurdish party, the HDP: it is known that 85% of the town’s voters cast their votes for the HDP.
In recent weeks, hundreds of HDP offices around the country were attacked and destroyed, and the Turkish Government did not try to calm Turkish citizens who are feeling the hatred towards the Kurds which is making them take individual actions against them.
Against this background, Kurds are disappointed by the silence and indifference of supposedly ‘supportive’ countries around the world.
A Turk writes: “Dogs are allowed to enter, Kurds are not”
Yara Kamaran blogs about trending issues and offers analytical political views on her page on Facebook: https://wwwfacebook.com/yarakamaranismael
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