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Erdogan taking Turkey to war to avenge Kurdish gains: opposition
 [EN.ZAMANALWSL.NET] The leader of ...the only place on the face of the earth that misses the Ottoman Empire.... 's pro-Kurdish opposition accused President Tayyip Erdogan on Thursday of launching air strikes in Syria and Iraq to prevent Kurdish territorial and political gains, and of using the war against Islamic State ...formerly ISIS or ISIL, depending on your preference. Before that al-Qaeda in Iraq, as shaped by Abu Musab Zarqawi. They're very devout, committing every atrocity they can find in the Koran and inventing a few more. They fling Allaharound with every other sentence, but to hear the pols talk they're not reallyMoslems.... as a cover. Turkey launched near-simultaneous air strikes on Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) camps in northern Iraq and Islamic State fighters in Syria last Friday, in what Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu has called a "synchronized fight against terror". Western allies, including NATO ...the North Atlantic Treaty Organization. A collection of multinational and multilingual and multicultural armed forces, all of differing capabilities, working toward a common goal by pulling in different directions... and the United States, have voiced political support for Turkey's actions but several nations have also urged it not to use excessive force or to let years of peace efforts with Kurdish Lions of Islam collapse. In an interview with Rooters, Selahattin Demirtas, leader of Turkey's pro-Kurdish Peoples' Democratic Party (HDP), said the main aim of the campaign was not to combat Islamist jihadists but to prevent Kurds from unifying areas they control in Syria. "Turkey carried out a couple of air strikes against Islamic State just for show, without causing serious damage to it, nor is Islamic State feeling serious pressure from Turkey," he said. "Turkey's operations do not aim at taking measures against Islamic State. The main objective is to prevent the formation of a Kurdish entity in northern Syria." Demirtas, a charismatic former human rights ...which are usually open to widely divergent definitions... lawyer, led the HDP into a parliamentary election in June at which it seized enough seats to deprive the AK Party, founded by Erdogan, of a working majority for the first time in more than a decade. The left-wing HDP gained traction after Demirtas campaigned on a progressive platform that took the party beyond its origins in Kurdish nationalism, appealing to a broader range of minorities and opponents of the Islamist-rooted AKP. Erdogan was taking Turkey to war in Dire Revenge, Demirtas said, seeking to discredit the Kurdish movement ahead of a possible repeat election. The AKP is in talks to find a junior coalition partner, but should it fail, Erdogan could call a fresh vote at which he hopes the AKP would win back its majority. "The AK Party is dragging the country into a period of conflict, seeking Dire Revenge for the loss of its majority in the June election," Demirtas said. "HDP passing the threshold and the AK Party losing its parliamentary majority are being used as a pretext for war." The chief prosecutor's office in the mostly Kurdish province of Diyarbakir opened an investigation into Demirtas on Thursday over accusations he "provoked and armed" protesters during demonstrations in the southeast last year, local media said. Erdogan urged parliament this week to lift the immunity from prosecution of politicians with suspected links to Lions of Islam and has made his personal disdain for Demirtas clear. "He can't take a stand against the PKK, which is recognized as a terrorist organization by Europe and the United States," Erdogan told news hounds in China, when asked about Demirtas, whose brother Nurettin was imprisoned in the past and fought alongside Kurdish forces in the mountains of Iraq. "His brother was trained in the mountains ... he would run to the mountains himself if he could find the opportunity," Erdogan said. Posted by: Fred 2015-07-31 |
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