The Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) has declared a unilateral ceasefire in Turkey over the earthquakes recorded on Monday in the south of the country, near the Syrian border, which have so far left more than 21,000 people dead in both countries.
The co-chairman of the Executive Council of the Kurdistan Peoples Confederation (KCK) Cemil Bayik, who is also one of the co-founders of the PKK and a senior member of the group, has called on «all forces carrying out military actions» to «stop military actions in Turkey».
«We have decided not to act unless the Turkish state attacks us. Our decision will be valid until the pain of our people is relieved and their wounds are healed,» he said, without specifying a specific date, as reported by the Kurdish news agency ANF, linked to the armed group. «The attitude of the Turkish state will be key in our decision,» he said.
The Turkish army has intensified in recent months its operations against the PKK – which it considers a terrorist group – both in the southeast of the country and in northern Iraq, both Kurdish-majority, since the ceasefire between the government and the armed group was broken in July 2015.
Bayik has stressed that the earthquakes have caused «a great disaster» and said that the population «is in very difficult circumstances» in the affected areas.» «In particular, people are suffering much more because of the policies carried out by the invading and murderous Turkish state,» he has denounced.
Thus, he has conveyed his condolences to the families of the victims and regretted that «thousands of people are still under the rubble.» «We are in winter. There is rain and it is cold. If they are not rescued as soon as possible, they could freeze to death. Everyone should mobilize all their resources. Everyone should mobilize to save our people. Everyone, especially the democratic institutions, must mobilize,» he said.
«Unfortunately, earthquakes happen everywhere, all over the world. The important thing is that many countries are taking precautions against earthquakes in order to suffer less damage and losses,» explained the senior PKK official, who criticized that «in Turkey these disasters happen because no measures are taken.»
In this sense, he recalled that the governmental Justice and Development Party (AKP) of the Turkish president, Recep Tayyp Erdogan, «has been in power for 20 years, managing the state». «Precautions should have been taken, but the AKP did not take action. It did not act in favor of the population. Fees have been collected for years for earthquakes, but no one knows what happened to them,» he has argued.
«The Turkish state has used all its means to massacre the Kurdish people in Kurdistan. They have spent millions of dollars on this,» he has denounced, while criticizing that «during its rule, (the AKP) has developed theft, corruption and looting and has made the rich richer and the people poorer every day.»
Bayik has emphasized that «there are earthquakes in many parts of the world» and gave as an example the case of Japan. «There, not so many buildings collapse and there are not so many deaths because they approach it seriously and take precautions. That is why there is not so much pain when an earthquake takes place,» he said, before stressing that if Ankara had taken «precautions,» there would not be «thousands of buildings destroyed and cities and villages collapsed.»
On the other hand, he criticized the decision of the Parliament to approve the state of emergency for ten months in the ten provinces affected by the earthquakes, many of which are home to a large Kurdish population, and pointed out that the objective is to «cover up the earthquake». «The government wants to suppress the pain and tears of the people so that the pain and cries do not reach any further,» he has argued.
«It has mobilized the press so that no one hears what is happening. They are developing propaganda to deceive the people of the world. They hide a lot of people. They make it look like they are helping people everywhere, but it is a lie. The independent media will reveal their lies. They want to prevent aid being sent by people to the affected areas and they want to prevent people-to-people cooperation,» he said.
«They want to put at their service the aid sent by the people and from other parts of the world, so the Kurds and the Turks must continue to cooperate in every possible way and not allow the government to get in the way,» Bayik said, according to information reported by ANF news agency.
The Turkish authorities have raised this Friday to more than 18,300 the dead because of the earthquakes, while in Syria about 3,300 people have died, according to the last balances provided by the Syrian Government and the Syrian Civil Defense, known as ‘white helmets’, which operates in the areas of the northwest controlled by the rebels.
Source: (EUROPA PRESS)
