The Democratic Kurdish Society Center (DKTM) in Bielefeld, Germany was raided by the police at 06:00 this morning.

Doors of the offices were broken in the raid that dozens of police officers participated in and that cited the reason as “banned” flags and photographs.

The raid and searches took 4 hours and the police confiscated large numbers of books, photographs, flags and paintings.

The Bielefeld DKTM issued a statement and condemned the raid, saying: “This is an utterly anti-democratic and illegal raid. We condemn this police practice.” The NAV-DEM association and the Civaka Azad offices had also been raided on June 13 in Germany, which is in close cooperation with the Erdoğan regime. For the reason of the raid, the police had cited a demonstration for Afrin that was planned for December 3, 2017 but never actually took place.

SOLIDARITY WITH KURDS CONSIDERED A CRIME

German police have been targeting Kurdish institutions and political and cultural activities for decades. Those who show solidarity with Kurds are also targeted by criminalization policies. An investigation was launched against Die Linke State MP Marjana Schott for holding a YPG/YPJ flag during a celebration of Karl Marx’s 200th birthday in Kassel this May.

On March 2, 2017, the Interior Ministry issued a notice to all states with the title “Update on the PKK ban” and announced that displaying various Kurdish symbols including YPG, YPJ and PYD flags had been banned.

BANS REACH SOCIAL NETWORKS

Collusion with the Turkish state, intolerance and oppressive practices have reached even internet users. In April, Bavaria state police started targeting people sharing YPG/YPJ flags on their social media accounts. In the state’s capital Munich, the police force listed German persons who shared YPG/YPJ flags on their social media accounts under the chapter “Crimes with political motives/foreigners” of the annual crime report. The “29-year-old German citizen” listed in the police report was Kerem Schamberger, who is a university lecturer in Munich. In November, Schamberger’s home was raided on suspicion of “solidarity with the YPG”.

BOOKS AND MUSIC ALSO TARGETED

The ban isn’t limited to flags, social media posts and peaceful protests. Books and music are also targeted now. In March, offices of Mesopotamia Publishing and Mir Multimedia were raided and the searches continued for 3 days. Thousands of books, CDs and an archive of songs were confiscated. There were Kurdish-German dictionaries and pedagogical books among the confiscated lot.