The Kurdish Culture and Art Movement (TEV-ÇAND) Europe released a statement about the increasingly ongoing Turkish attacks in Kurdistan and the betrayal of the KDP, the ruling part in the Kurdistan Region of Iraq, which cooperates with the Turkish state in its war against the Kurdish freedom movement.

The statement titled “Let’ embrace and unite against the genocidal system, a sworn enemy of the Kurds”, pointed out that the policies of physical and cultural genocide that were first implemented against the Kurdish people with the Treaty of Lausanne concluded on 24 July 1923 continue today with inhumane methods of special war.

“United around Leader Apo (Abdullah Öcalan), the 50-year legendary struggle of the Kurdish freedom movement against these genocidal practices has frustrated the policies initiated by England, France and Turkey in Lausanne a hundred years ago,” said the statement released on Sunday, which further includes the following:

“All organizations, institutions and personalities from Kurdistan, except for the KDP that persists on the course of cooperation and betrayal, came together at the Lausanne Conference on the hundredth year of the pro-genocide treaty. With the Kurdish conference in Lausanne, Kurds showed that they are united against genocidal attacks, and voiced their democratic political status. These righteous demands of the Kurdish people have received strong support from intellectuals, artists, politicians, scientists, non-governmental organizations, unions and many other caring circles of democratic society all over the world.

On the hundredth year of the Republic of Turkey, the AKP-MHP fascism asks for support from the world to complete the Kurdish genocide. To this end, it does not abstain from plundering all the moral and material richness, nature and society of the country. Employing chemical weapons and all kinds of unlawful and immoral methods, it attacks the Kurdish people’s values of freedom. For this purpose, it struggles to make use of the Kurdish collaborative- treacherous circles and to make the KDP play this sinister role today. The KDP officials welcome these sworn enemies of the Kurds with red carpets, embrace them and do not refrain from providing them with any support for their own interests. Going a step further, the KDP became a partner in the Turkish state’s attacks on Zap, Avashin, Metina, the whole of Medya Defense Zones (guerrilla areas in northern Iraq) and Rojava, and got to the phase of participating in war in deed. It is obvious that such a conflict environment will yield no results other than harming the warring parties of the Kurds.

Despite all the provocative endeavors of the KDP, the Kurdish freedom movement has acted sensitively to avoid such a conflict, made statements to the public and issued calls seeking for the Kurdish people to unite around national interests. These statements were also supported by all sensitive, democratic circles. The KDP, however, turned a blind eye to these appeals and maintains its dirty relations with the Turkish state. A most recent example in this regard is the martyrdom of (guerrilla fighter) İsmail Por (Çiya Agirî) from Maku, as a result of an attack orchestrated by MIT (Turkish intelligence service) and Parastin (KDP intelligence service). The provocative and conspiratory attacks of the Massoud Barzani family and KDP in four parts of Kurdistan have resulted in the martyrdom of many freedom fighters and the injury of several others. To make matters worse, an KDP official named Ali Avni made remarks expressing support for the genocidal AKP-MHP fascism and openly appealing to the Turkish state through the media to carry out airstrikes against the fighters and executive members of the guerrilla.

With this attitude, KDP officials and the Massoud Barzani family rely on the Turkish state for their rule and narrow family interests and pursue a policy against the people of Kurdistan. The KDP has opened all the mountains, plains and almost every inch of South Kurdistan to Turkish military occupation. It is obvious that no party or individual involved in such actions and discourses can have anything to do with the right cause of the Kurdish people. For this very reason, it is now indispensable for all the intellectuals and artists in Kurdistan to uphold their historical and social duties in line with the Kurdish people’s demand for freedom, and to take a stand and action against the KDP’s hostile policies.

It is not possible for the policies of genocide implemented against the Kurdish people to come to an end without taking an active stand against the Turkish state’s genocidal attacks ongoing for a hundred years and against the bloody conspiracies implemented in care of the KDP. Speaking and demanding the right thing against these genocidal policies is not enough to end them. In order to achieve the right demands, we must act in a planned and organized manner everywhere we are. Everything that has been lost can only be won back through struggle and action and this fight can only succeed by being based on the Kurdistan freedom struggle. Well aware of this truth, the fascist-genocidal enemy welcomes and embraces the Barzani family at their home and carries out the heaviest and most savage genocidal aggression against the organized fighting forces, Leader Öcalan, the freedom guerrillas and the people of Kurdistan by denying all legal and moral norms.

We state hereby that TEV-ÇAND, together with all the free-thinking intellectuals and artists of the Kurdistan society, will take sides with the resilient and honorable Kurdish people and assume an active role in the democratic struggle against the genocidal, fascist Turkish state and all forces of cooperation and betrayal. On this basis, we call on all pro-freedom intellectuals and artists to stand with Leader Öcalan, the freedom movement and the guerrilla, the sole hope of the Kurds, to unite around national values against the collaborative- treacherous line and to take part in an active struggle to call those responsible for any unjustness to account.”