Kurds in Turkey
Encyclopedia
Ethnic Kurds compose a significant portion of the population in Turkey
Turkey
Turkey , known officially as the Republic of Turkey , is a Eurasian country located in Western Asia and in East Thrace in Southeastern Europe...
(Turkish
Turkish language
Turkish is a language spoken as a native language by over 83 million people worldwide, making it the most commonly spoken of the Turkic languages. Its speakers are located predominantly in Turkey and Northern Cyprus with smaller groups in Iraq, Greece, Bulgaria, the Republic of Macedonia, Kosovo,...
: Türkiye'deki Kürtler, Kurdish
Kurdish language
Kurdish is a dialect continuum spoken by the Kurds in western Asia. It is part of the Iranian branch of the Indo-Iranian group of Indo-European languages....
: Kurdên li Tirkiye). Unlike the Turks
Turkish people
Turkish people, also known as the "Turks" , are an ethnic group primarily living in Turkey and in the former lands of the Ottoman Empire where Turkish minorities had been established in Bulgaria, Cyprus, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Georgia, Greece, Kosovo, Macedonia, and Romania...
, the Kurds speak an Indo-European language. There are Kurds living all over Turkey, but most live to the east and southeast of the country, from where they originate.
In the 1930s, Turkish government policy aimed to forcibly assimilate and Turkify
Turkification
Turkification is a term used to describe a process of cultural or political change in which something or someone who is not a Turk becomes one, voluntarily or involuntarily...
local Kurds. Today's presence of Kurds is a testimony that many have resisted these measures. Since 1984, Kurdish resistance movements included both peaceful political activities for basic civil rights for Kurds within Turkey, and violent armed rebellion for a separate Kurdish state. But, according to a Turkish opinion poll, 59% of self-identified Kurds in Turkey think that Kurds in Turkey do not seek a separate state (while 71.3% of self-identified Turks think they do).
Under the Ottoman Empire
According to Shaller and Zimmerer in the Journal of Genocide ResearchJournal of Genocide Research
The Journal of Genocide Research ' is a peer-reviewed academic journal that covers the field of genocide studies. Subject areas include: Peace and conflict studies, Human rights, international relations, security policies, conflict resolution, holocaust studies, history and international law.The...
, the leadership of Young Turks planned to eliminate Kurdish identity by deporting Kurds from their ancestral land and displacing them in small groups. In this era, the Kurds suffered from deportations and death marches and forced Turkification. The Young Turks
Young Turks
The Young Turks , from French: Les Jeunes Turcs) were a coalition of various groups favouring reformation of the administration of the Ottoman Empire. The movement was against the absolute monarchy of the Ottoman Sultan and favoured a re-installation of the short-lived Kanûn-ı Esâsî constitution...
partially implemented these plans in WWI and 700,000 Kurds were forcibly removed where approximately 350,000 of these displaces Kurds perished. These Kurds were forced by the Young Turks to go on death march resembling the Armenian marches which was part of a plan to eliminate Kurdish identity.
Under the Republic of Turkey
After the establishment of the Republic of TurkeyHistory of the Republic of Turkey
The Republic of Turkey was created after the overthrow of Sultan Mehmet VI Vahdettin by the new Republican Parliament in 1922. This new regime delivered the coup de grâce to the Ottoman state which had been practically wiped away from the world stage following the First World War.-Single-party...
, which ended the caliphates and sultanate in Turkey, there have been several Kurdish rebellions
Kurdish rebellions
According to Turkish military records, Kurdish rebellions have been taking place in Anatolia for over two centuries.-Koçkiri rebellion, 1920:...
since the 1920s: Koçkiri Rebellion
Koçkiri Rebellion
The Koçgiri Rebellion or Koçkiri Rebellion was a Alevi uprising in 1920 during the Turkish War of Independence, in the overwhelmingly militant Dersim region...
, Sheikh Said Rebellion
Sheikh Said rebellion
Sheikh Said Rebellion was a rebellion of a Kurdish clergy Sheikh Said and a group of former Kurdish Hamidieh soldiers in 1925.-Background:The Azadî was dominated by officers from the former Hamidiye, a Kurdish tribal militia established...
, Dersim Rebellion
Dersim Rebellion
The Dersim rebellion was an uprising against the Turkish government in the Dersim region of eastern Turkey, which includes Tunceli Province, Elazığ Province, and Bingöl Province...
, Ararat rebellion.
In 1937–1938, approximately 50,000–70,000 Alevi Kurds were killed and thousands were taken into exile. A key component of the turkification
Turkification
Turkification is a term used to describe a process of cultural or political change in which something or someone who is not a Turk becomes one, voluntarily or involuntarily...
process was the policy of massive population resettlement. Referring to the main policy document in this context, the 1934 law on resettlement, a policy targeting the region of Dersim as one of its first test cases, with disastrous consequences for the local population. The Dersim ethnocide
Dersim Massacre
The Dersim Massacre took place in 1937 and 1938 in Dersim, now called Tunceli Province, in Turkey. It was the outcome of a Turkish military campaign against the Dersim Rebellion by local ethnic minority groups against Turkey's Resettlement Law of 1934...
is often confused with the Dersim Rebellion
Dersim Rebellion
The Dersim rebellion was an uprising against the Turkish government in the Dersim region of eastern Turkey, which includes Tunceli Province, Elazığ Province, and Bingöl Province...
that took place during these events. Today, not much is left of Derim's distinctive culture and the majority of its people live in the diaspora.
After the 1960 coup, the State Planning Organization was established under the Prime Ministry to solve the problem of Kurdish separatism and underdevelopment. In 1961, the DPT prepared a report titled "The principles of the state's development plan for the east and southeast" , shortened to "Eastern Report". It proposed to defuse separatism by encouraging ethnic mixing through migration (to and from the Southeast). This was not unlike the policies pursued by the Committee of Union and Progress
Committee of Union and Progress
The Committee of Union and Progress began as a secret society established as the "Committee of Ottoman Union" in 1889 by the medical students İbrahim Temo, Abdullah Cevdet, İshak Sükuti and Ali Hüseyinzade...
under the Ottoman Empire
Ottoman Empire
The Ottoman EmpireIt was usually referred to as the "Ottoman Empire", the "Turkish Empire", the "Ottoman Caliphate" or more commonly "Turkey" by its contemporaries...
. The Minister of Labor of the time, a 35-year-old Bülent Ecevit
Bülent Ecevit
Mustafa Bülent Ecevit was a Turkish politician, poet, writer and journalist, who was the leader of Republican People's Party , later of the Democratic Left Party and four-time Prime Minister of Turkey.- Personal life :...
, was critical of the report.
During the 1970s, the separatist movement coalesced into the Marxist-Leninist Kurdistan Workers' Party
Kurdistan Workers' Party
The Kurdistan Workers' Party , commonly known as PKK, also known as KGK and formerly known as KADEK or KONGRA-GEL , is a Kurdish organization which has since 1984 been fighting an armed struggle against the Turkish state for an autonomous Kurdistan and greater cultural and political rights...
(PKK) which is listed as a terrorist
Terrorism
Terrorism is the systematic use of terror, especially as a means of coercion. In the international community, however, terrorism has no universally agreed, legally binding, criminal law definition...
organization internationally by a number of states and organizations, including the United States
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
, United Nations
United Nations
The United Nations is an international organization whose stated aims are facilitating cooperation in international law, international security, economic development, social progress, human rights, and achievement of world peace...
, NATO and the European Union
European Union
The European Union is an economic and political union of 27 independent member states which are located primarily in Europe. The EU traces its origins from the European Coal and Steel Community and the European Economic Community , formed by six countries in 1958...
. From 1984 to 1999, the Turkish military was embroiled in a conflict with the PKK. The village guard system
Village guard system
Village guards ) are paramilitaries. Originally they were set up and funded by the Turkish state in the mid-1980s under the direction of Turgut Özal. Their stated purpose was to act as a local militia in towns and villages, protecting against attacks and reprisals from the insurgents, terrorists...
was set up and armed by the Turkish state around 1984 to combat the PKK. The militia comprises local Kurds and it has around 58,000 members. Some of the village guards are fiercely loyal to the Turkish state, leading to infighting among Kurdish militants.
Much of the countryside in the southeast was depopulated, with Kurdish civilians moving to local defensible centers such as Diyarbakır
Diyarbakır
Diyarbakır is one of the largest cities in southeastern Turkey...
, Van
Van, Turkey
Van is a city in southeastern Turkey and the seat of the Kurdish-majority Van Province, and is located on the eastern shore of Lake Van. The city's official population in 2010 was 367,419, but many estimates put this as much higher with a 1996 estimate stating 500,000 and former Mayor Burhan...
, and Şırnak
Sirnak
Şırnak is a town in southeastern Turkey. It is the capital of Şırnak Province, a new province that split from the Hakkari province...
, as well as to the cities of western Turkey and even to western Europe. The causes of the depopulation included PKK atrocities against Kurdish clans they could not control, the poverty of the southeast, and the Turkish state's military operations. Human Rights Watch
Human Rights Watch
Human Rights Watch is an international non-governmental organization that conducts research and advocacy on human rights. Its headquarters are in New York City and it has offices in Berlin, Beirut, Brussels, Chicago, Geneva, Johannesburg, London, Los Angeles, Moscow, Paris, San Francisco, Tokyo,...
has documented many instances where the Turkish military forcibly evacuated villages, destroying houses and equipment to prevent the return of the inhabitants. An estimated 3,000 Kurdish villages in Turkey were virtually wiped from the map, representing the displacement of more than 378,000 people.
The epitome of this conflict was during the 1990s, when the National Security Council
National Security Council (Turkey)
The National Security Council comprises the Chief of Staff, select members of the Council of Ministers, and the President of the Republic...
sanctioned a covert war using the special forces, village guards, mafia, and contract killers. The conflict soon wheeled out of control, resulting in the Susurluk scandal
Susurluk scandal
The Susurluk scandal was a scandal involving the close relationship between the Turkish government, the armed forces, and organized crime. It took place during the peak of the Turkey–Kurdistan Workers' Party conflict, in the mid-1990s...
. The conflict tapered off after the capturing of the PKK's leader, Abdullah Öcalan
Abdullah Öcalan
Abdullah Öcalan , Kurdish founder of the terrorist organization called Kurdistan Workers' Party in 1978.Öcalan was captured in Nairobi and extradited to the Turkish security force, and sentenced to death under Article 125 of the Turkish Penal Code, which concerns the formation of armed gangs...
.
In 2010, after PKK rebels killed five Turkish soldiers in a series of incidents in eastern and southeastern Turkey, several locations in Northern Iraq were attacked by the Turkish Air Force
Turkish Air Force
The Turkish Air Force is the aerial warfare service branch of the Turkish Armed Forces. It ranks 3rd in NATO in terms of fleet size behind the USAF and Royal Air Force with a current inventory of 798 aircraft .-Initial stages:...
. The tense condition has continued on the border since 2007, by both sides responding to each others every offensive move, mostly initiated by attacks from the PKK to the Turkish military bases on the border, reported by witnesses in the border villages.
Following Turkey's electoral board decision to bar prominent Kurdish candidates from standing in upcoming elections, violent Kurdish protests
2011 Kurdish protests in Turkey
The 2011 Kurdish protests in Turkey are ongoing protests by members of Turkey's Kurdish minority to demonstrate against restrictions of their rights by the Turkish authorities...
erupted in April 19, 2011, resulting in at least one mortal casualty.
Culture
Music
Between 1982 and 1991 the performance or recording of songs in the Kurdish languageKurdish music
Kurdish music refers to music performed in Kurdish language.Traditionally, there are three types of Kurdish Classical performers - storytellers , minstrels and bards . There was no specific music related to the Kurdish princely courts, and instead, music performed in night gatherings is...
was banned in Turkey, affecting singers such as Şivan Perwer and İbrahim Tatlıses. However a black market has long existed in Turkey, and pirate radio stations and underground recordings have always been available. Although there is no ban on performing Kurdish language music, it is effectively prevented from being broadcast on radio or television through censorship.
Some of the foremost figures in Kurdish classical music of the past century from Anatolia include Mihemed 'Arif Cizrawî (1912–1986), Hesen Cizrawî, Şeroyê Biro, 'Evdalê Zeynikê, Si'îd Axayê Cizîrî and the female singers Miryem Xanê and Eyşe Şan
Ayse San
Ayşe Şan was a Kurdish singer born in Diyarbakır, Turkey. She is considered as one of the most influential voices in contemporary Kurdish music. Her father was a traditional Kurdish singer or dengbêj. Aysha began singing at local events in 1958...
.
Şivan Perwer
Sivan Perwer
Şivan Perwer is a Kurdish poet, writer, musical teacher, singer, and performer on the tembûr . Şivan currently lives in exile after fleeing Turkey in 1976 because of his music...
is a composer, vocalist and tembûr player. He concentrates mainly on political and nationalistic music - of which he is considered the founder in Kurdish music - as well as classical and folk music.
Another important Kurdish musician from Turkey is Nizamettin Arıç
Nizamettin Ariç
Nizamettin Ariç, Nîzamettîn Arîç, is a contemporary Kurdish singer, composer and director. He was born in Ağrı in eastern Turkey. He was exposed to traditional Kurdish bard music or Dengbêj at an early age. After the military coup in 1980, he was arrested for singing Kurdish songs in public and...
(Feqiyê Teyra). He began with singing in Turkish, and made his directorial debut and also stars in Klamek ji bo Beko
Klamek ji bo Beko
Klamek ji bo Beko is a 1992 film written and directed by Nizamettin Arıç. It is one of the first Kurdish films.-Plot:...
(A Song for Beko), one of the first films in Kurdish. Arıç rejected musical stardom at the cost of debasing his language and culture. As a result of singing in Kurdish, he was imprisoned, and then obliged to flee to Syria and eventually to Germany.
Literature
There is no existing evidence of Kurdish literature of pre-Islamic period. Some sources consider Ali HaririAli Hariri
Ali Hariri was among the first well-known Kurdish poets who wrote in Kurdish. He was from the Hakkari region of Turkey.- References :...
(1425–1495) as the first well-known poet who wrote in Kurdish. He was from the Hakkari
Hakkari
Hakkâri , is a city and the capital of the Hakkâri Province of Turkey. The name Hakkâri is derived from the Syriac word, Akkare, meaning farmers...
region.
Since the 1970s, there has been a massive effort on the part of Kurds in Turkey
Turkey
Turkey , known officially as the Republic of Turkey , is a Eurasian country located in Western Asia and in East Thrace in Southeastern Europe...
to write and to create literary works in Kurdish. The amount of printed material during the last three decades has increased enormously. Many of these activities were centered in Europe particularly Sweden and Germany which have large concentrations of Kurdish immigrants. There are several Kurdish publishers in Sweden, partly supported by the Swedish Government. More than two hundred Kurdish titles have appeared in the 1990s.
Well-known contemporary Kurdish writers from Turkey
Turkey
Turkey , known officially as the Republic of Turkey , is a Eurasian country located in Western Asia and in East Thrace in Southeastern Europe...
include Mehmed Uzun
Mehmed Uzun
Mehmed Uzun was a contemporary Kurdish writer and novelist. He was born in Siverek, Urfa, Turkey.Although the Kurdish language was outlawed in Turkey from 1920 to 1990, he started to write in his mother tongue. As a writer, he achieved a great deal towards shaping a modern Kurdish literary...
, Mehmed Emin Bozarslan
Mehmed Emin Bozarslan
Mehmed Emîn Bozarslan, , is a Kurdish writer. He was born in Diyarbakır in south-eastern Turkey. He moved to Sweden as political asylum seeker in 1978, and he has been living in Uppsala Sweden since then. The most famous of his early works was Alfabê which was the first ABC-Book for Kurdish...
, Mahmud Baksi
Mahmud Baksi
Mahmud Baksi , , was a Kurdish writer and journalist. He was born in the village of Suphî in Batman Province in Turkey. He began to publish a newspaper titled Batman Gazetesi in 1967. He became the head of the Batman branch of the Workers Party of Turkey. From 1968 to 1970, he became involved in...
, Hesenê Metê
Hesenê Metê
Hesenê Metê, , is a prominent Kurdish writer, novelist and translator. He was born in Erxanî near Diyarbakır in south-eastern Turkey. He has been living in Sweden since 1980's. He has translated works by Pushkin and Dostoyevski into Kurdish....
and Rojen Barnas
Rojen Barnas
Rojen Barnas is a contemporary Kurdish poet and writer. He was born in the Diyarbakır region in south-eastern Turkey. He became active in Kurdish politics in the 1970s. He has made his home in Sweden since 1981. He started publishing a Kurdish magazine called Tîrêj in the 70's. He has also...
.
Film
Yılmaz GüneyYilmaz Güney
Yılmaz Güney, was a Kurdish film director, scenarist, novelist and actor from Turkey. Many of his works are devoted to the plight of ordinary, working class people in Turkey.- Biography :...
was a famous film director, scenarist, novelist and actor. He directed and starred in the film Umut
Umut
Hope is a 1970 Turkish drama film, written and directed by Yılmaz Güney and Şerif Gören, featuring Güney as an illiterate horse cab driver, who, after losing one of his horses in an accident, sets out into the desert in a quest for a mythical lost treasure...
(1970) (Turkish
Turkish language
Turkish is a language spoken as a native language by over 83 million people worldwide, making it the most commonly spoken of the Turkic languages. Its speakers are located predominantly in Turkey and Northern Cyprus with smaller groups in Iraq, Greece, Bulgaria, the Republic of Macedonia, Kosovo,...
for "Hope"), and his most famous movie is 1982
1982 in film
-Events:* March 26 = I Ought to Be in Pictures, starring Walter Matthau, Ann-Margret and Dinah Manoff is released. Manoff would not appear in another movie until 1987's Backfire.* June = PG-rated film E.T...
film Yol
Yol
Yol is a 1982 Yılmaz Güney film. The screenplay was written by Yılmaz Güney, and it was directed by his assistant Şerif Gören, who strictly followed Güney's instructions, as Güney was in prison at the time. Later, when Güney escaped from prison, he took the negatives of the film and edited it in...
(Turkish
Turkish language
Turkish is a language spoken as a native language by over 83 million people worldwide, making it the most commonly spoken of the Turkic languages. Its speakers are located predominantly in Turkey and Northern Cyprus with smaller groups in Iraq, Greece, Bulgaria, the Republic of Macedonia, Kosovo,...
for "The Road" or "The Way"), which won Palme d'Or
Palme d'Or
The Palme d'Or is the highest prize awarded at the Cannes Film Festival and is presented to the director of the best feature film of the official competition. It was introduced in 1955 by the organising committee. From 1939 to 1954, the highest prize was the Grand Prix du Festival International du...
in Cannes Film Festival
Cannes Film Festival
The Cannes International Film Festival , is an annual film festival held in Cannes, France, which previews new films of all genres including documentaries from around the world. Founded in 1946, it is among the world's most prestigious and publicized film festivals...
in 1982.
Some other films by Kurdish people in Turkey are Hejar (aka Big Man, Little Love) by Handan İpekçi
Handan Ipekçi
Handan İpekçi is a Turkish screenwriter and film director.-Education:Handan İpekçi studied Radio and Television Studies at Gazi University, Faculty of Communication in Ankara...
and Klamek ji bo Beko
Klamek ji bo Beko
Klamek ji bo Beko is a 1992 film written and directed by Nizamettin Arıç. It is one of the first Kurdish films.-Plot:...
by Nizamettin Arıç.
Yılmaz Erdoğan
Yilmaz Erdogan
Yılmaz Erdoğan is a Turkish filmmaker, actor and poet, who is most famous for his box-office record-breaking debut comedy film Vizontele and the television series Bir Demet Tiyatro ....
is another famous film director
Film director
A film director is a person who directs the actors and film crew in filmmaking. They control a film's artistic and dramatic nathan roach, while guiding the technical crew and actors.-Responsibilities:...
, screenwriter
Screenwriter
Screenwriters or scriptwriters or scenario writers are people who write/create the short or feature-length screenplays from which mass media such as films, television programs, Comics or video games are based.-Profession:...
, poet and actor from Turkey
Turkey
Turkey , known officially as the Republic of Turkey , is a Eurasian country located in Western Asia and in East Thrace in Southeastern Europe...
of Kurdish
Kurdish people
The Kurdish people, or Kurds , are an Iranian people native to the Middle East, mostly inhabiting a region known as Kurdistan, which includes adjacent parts of Iran, Iraq, Syria, and Turkey...
ethnicity.
Demographics
Most Kurds live in TurkeyTurkey
Turkey , known officially as the Republic of Turkey , is a Eurasian country located in Western Asia and in East Thrace in Southeastern Europe...
, where their numbers are estimated somewhere between 11,400,000 The Konda Poll gives a figure of about 11.4 million (in Turkish)
Describes methodology and results of Konda poll and 14,000,000 people. Both figures include Zaza people
Zaza people
The Zazas, Kird, Kirmanc or Dimilis are an ethnic Iranic people whose native language is Zazaki spoken in eastern Anatolia. They primarily live in the eastern Anatolian provinces, such as Adıyaman, Aksaray, Batman, Bingöl, Diyarbakır, Elazığ, Erzurum, Erzincan , Gumushane, Kars, Malatya, Mus,...
as Kurds. However Kurdish nationalists claim there are as many as 20 million Kurds in Turkey. These figures are for the number of persons who identify as Kurds, not the number who speak a Kurdish language. Estimates based on native languages place the Kurdish population at 6% to 23%; Ibrahim Sirkeci
Ibrahim Sirkeci
İbrahim Sirkeci is a Turkish management scientist who lives in London. He is a Professor in Marketing, Strategy and Law Department at the European Business School London, Regent's College where he teaches international marketing,...
claims the closest figure should be above 17.8%, taking into account political context and so the potential bias in responses recorded in surveys and censuses. Also the population growth rate of Kurds in 1970s was given as 3.27%.
Today, Kurdish populations remain highest in the traditionally Kurdish-majority regions of southeastern Turkey, corresponding with Turkish Kurdistan
Turkish Kurdistan
Turkish Kurdistan is an unofficial name for the southeastern part of Turkey, which is inhabited predominantly by ethnic Kurds. The area covers between 190,000 to 230,000 km² , or nearly a third of Turkey...
, as well as the more developed and industrialised northwestern provinces due to significant migration in the late 1980s. There are also Kurds in the Central Anatolia Region, concentrated to the west of Lake Tuz
Lake Tuz
Lake Tuz is the second largest lake in Turkey with its surface area and one of the largest hypersaline lakes in the world. It is located in the Central Anatolia Region, northeast of Konya, south-southeast of Ankara and northwest of Aksaray.-Geography:...
(Haymana
Haymana
Haymana is a town and district of Ankara Province in the Central Anatolia region of Turkey, 72 km south of the capital, Ankara. According to 2010 census, population of the district is 33,886 of which 9,091 live in the town of Haymana....
, Cihanbeyli
Cihanbeyli
Cihanbeyli is a town and district of Konya Province in the Central Anatolia region of Turkey. According to 2000 census, population of the district is 75,871 of which 18,306 live in the town of Cihanbeyli.-External links:* *...
, Kulu
Kulu, Konya
Kulu is a town and district of Konya Province in the Central Anatolia region of Turkey. According to 2000 census, population of the district is 72,279 of which 28,024 live in the town of Kulu. Many former residents live abroad and work in western European countries like Germany, Denmark and...
, Yunak
Yunak
Yunak is a town and district of Konya Province in the Central Anatolia region of Turkey. According to 2000 census, population of the district is 41,506 of which 12,734 live in the town of Yunak.-External links:* *...
) and also scattered in districts like Alaca
Alaca
Alaca is one of the largest districts of Çorum Province in the Black Sea region of Turkey. It is located from the city of Çorum, on a road from the Black Sea coast to central Anatolia. Population is 22,092 as of 2010....
, Çiçekdağı
Çiçekdagi
Çiçekdağı is a town and district of Kırşehir Province in the Central Anatolia region of Turkey. According to 2000 census, population of the district is 21,059 of which 6,683 live in the town of Çiçekdağı.-External links:* *...
, Yerköy
Yerköy
Yerköy is a town and district of Yozgat Province in the Central Anatolia region of Turkey. According to 2000 census, population of the district is 48,889 of which 32,228 live in the town of Yerköy.- 2009 Great Union Party's rally :...
, Emirdağ
Emirdag
Emirdağ is a town and district of Afyonkarahisar Province in Turkey, between the city of Afyon and Eskişehir. It covers an area of 2,009 km², and the population is 42,111 of which 19,991 live in the town of Emirdağ itself. The mayor is Cengiz Pala .The Emirdağ Mountains rise steeply behind...
, and Zile
Zile
', also known as Zela, is a city and a district of Tokat Province, Turkey. Zile lies to the south of Amasya and the west of Tokat in north-central Turkey...
, as well as in significant to high numbers of the northeast, most importantly the large presence in Kars
Kars
Kars is a city in northeast Turkey and the capital of Kars Province. The population of the city is 73,826 as of 2010.-Etymology:As Chorzene, the town appears in Roman historiography as part of ancient Armenia...
and surrounding provinces of the South Caucasus wherein many Kurdish villages scatter across the borders into Armenia and Georgia. According to a March 2007 survey, Kurds and Zazas
Zaza people
The Zazas, Kird, Kirmanc or Dimilis are an ethnic Iranic people whose native language is Zazaki spoken in eastern Anatolia. They primarily live in the eastern Anatolian provinces, such as Adıyaman, Aksaray, Batman, Bingöl, Diyarbakır, Elazığ, Erzurum, Erzincan , Gumushane, Kars, Malatya, Mus,...
together comprise an estimated 13.4% of the adult population, and 15.68% of the whole population.
Racism and Intolerance
The European Commission Against Racism and Intolerance (ECRI) reports that (as of April 2010): "The public use by officials of the Kurdish language lays them open to prosecution, and public defence by individuals of Kurdish or minority interests also frequently leads to prosecutions under the Criminal Code."External links
- Human Rights Abuses Against the Kurdish Minority a report by Amnesty International
- Turkey's "Kurdish Problem": Is the End in Sight?
- US Journalist Deported from Turkey After Reporting on Plight of Kurds - video report by Democracy Now!Democracy Now!Democracy Now! and its staff have received several journalism awards, including the Gracie Award from American Women in Radio & Television; the George Polk Award for its 1998 radio documentary Drilling and Killing: Chevron and Nigeria's Oil Dictatorship, on the Chevron Corporation and the deaths of...