organization:kurdistan workers' party

Ynetnews News - PM refutes fmr. dep. IDF chief’s PKK comments
▻https://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-5015867,00.html

Mere hours after former deputy IDF chief of staff Yair Golan said he does not consider the Kurdish resistance movement PKK (Kurdistan Workers’ Party) a “terrorist organization”, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu stepped in to refute his claim in an attempt to head off a diplomatic crisis.

 
“#Israel objects to the #PKK and considers it a terrorist organization, unlike Turkey, which support a different terrorist organization: Hamas,” Netanyahu said.

Broken Trust : How a Failed Coup Weakens Turkey

The coup attempt that saw the Turkish state plunged into crisis has come at precisely the wrong time for Ankara. Just over the border in Iraq and Syria, critical challenges are mounting, as Turkey is drawn deeper into the fight to contain the Islamic State. Internally, Turkey is combating its own domestic Kurdish militant movement, the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK). Because the coup emerged from within certain divisions of the military, the government of President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and his Justice and Development Party (AKP) must now engage in heavy purges of the armed forces. This will make it difficult for Ankara to use the military as an instrument of policy and national strategy. The coup has been put down, but the aftershocks could hamstring Turkey for a long time to come.

https://www.stratfor.com/sites/default/files/styles/stratfor_large__s_/public/main/images/use-Turkey-Coup-Important-Sites-Map-Wide-View.jpg?itok=IYiI8yvx

Origins of the Syrian Democratic Forces: A Primer | Syria Deeply, Covering the Crisis
▻http://www.syriadeeply.org/articles/2016/01/9346/origins-syrian-democratic-forces-primer

The Syrian Democratic Forces, or SDF, is a coalition of Kurdish, Sunni Arab and Syriac Christian fighters, but is completely dominated by its Kurdish element, which is a powerful and well organized militia known as the Popular Defense Units, YPG, with an all-female branch called the Women’s Defense Units, or YPJ. These organizations, in turn, are Syrian front groups for the Kurdistan Workers’ Party or PKK. The other militias involved in the Syrian Democratic Forces are either long-standing PKK allies or proxies, such as the armed wing of the Syriac Union Party, or more recent allies drawn from the Sunni Arab tribal landscape in this part of Syria and from the remains of small Sunni Arab rebel groups crushed by the so-called Islamic State.

The coalition as a whole receives American air support for operations against Islamic State, as did the YPG/J before it. That started in the Battle of Kobane that began in autumn 2014, which was enormously successful—really the first major battlefield defeat inflicted on Islamic State. It has provided the template for US-PKK cooperation. In addition, the Pentagon has picked out a number of these little Arab groups that work under the SDF umbrella as favored recipients of arms and support. It terms them, collectively, the Syrian Arab Coalition, though no one else seems to use that name.

Erdoğan plays politics with illegal electricity usage
▻http://www.todayszaman.com/business_erdogan-plays-politics-with-illegal-electricity-usage_396347.h

President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan appears to have been manipulating the much-debated problem of illegal electricity usage in the eastern part of Turkey, a controversial issue frequently on the public agenda after video recordings revealed clandestine ties between distribution companies and the government in 2014.

In a regular meeting with muhtars (headmen) at the presidential palace on Wednesday, Erdoğan said the government has been expending diligent efforts to overcome security problems in the eastern provinces; however, it suffers financial losses from illegal electricity usage, a common headache for distribution companies in the region.

There are nearly 37 million subscribers registered with energy companies in Turkey paying approximately TL 70 billion in electricity bills ?????, of which an amount of between TL 5 million and TL 6 million each year is surcharged from those who pay their bills regularly. Yet the illegal usage rate in some areas is much higher than in others.

Abdullah Tivnikli, a businessman known for his close ties to Erdoğan, said early in January that he wants to exit his partnership with Dicle Electricity Distribution (DEDAŞ) — which serves 1.5 million subscribers in the Southeast — in order to avoid further losses due to widespread illegal use of electricity in the area in which the company operates. After the revelation of massive corruption investigations late in 2013, Tivnikli was allegedly heard asking then-Deputy Undersecretary in the Prime Ministry İbrahim Kalın for reimbursement from the government for subscribers’ unpaid electricity bills in a voice recording leaked on YouTube in April 2014.

Erdoğan seems to have aimed at relieving Tivnikli’s concerns as he addressed unpaid electricity bills immediately after his talk about security woes.

“They [Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK)] dig up the streets, lay mines along the roads and threaten people, set fire to their automobiles and bar highway and dam construction [in the eastern provinces]. Can you imagine? What will these reservoirs be for? Collecting water to irrigate dry areas… They generate electricity, if they are hydroelectric power plants. [When the PKK prevents dam construction] the burden will be on the government, and they will say ‘the state does not provide electricity for us.’ They are the ones who cut the electricity supply. The price of the electricity, unfortunately, is not paid as you may probably know,” Erdoğan said.

According to another voice recording leaked on Twitter, also in April of last year, Kalın told Tivnikli that the prime minister [Erdoğan at the time] was in favor of the idea of the state paying the company for illegally consumed electricity, given that the rate of unpaid electricity bills in the Southeast was as high as 60-70 percent

#Electricité #privatisation #PKK

232 Turkish Scholars Call for International Help Facilitating Kurdish Peace Process
▻http://globalvoicesonline.org/2015/08/10/232-turkish-scholars-call-for-international-help-facilitating-pe

Over 230 Turkish scholars from several universities have released a statement calling on the international community to press for the resumption of peace talks between the Turkish government and the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK). Source: Global Voices

Fear and anxiety sweep nation as Turkey wages unprecedented war on two terror fronts
▻http://www.todayszaman.com/national_fear-and-anxiety-sweep-nation-as-turkey-wages-unprecedented-wa

As Turkey enters a war against terror groups Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) and the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) in both Syria and Iraq, the country has entered a new and yet familiar period of chaos and distress. Still without a coalition government since the June 7 general election, the nation is evidently falling into a dark abyss of insecurity and citizens are finding themselves susceptible to fear, anxiety and anger, according to experts. Beyond personal emotional changes, trouble performing simple day-to-day tasks such as a morning commute or a trip to the mall has already begun.

#Turquie #Opinion_publique #Manipulation #Peur

PKK sets construction vehicles on fire, briefly kidnaps 15 workers in southeast Turkey
▻http://www.todayszaman.com/latest-news_pkk-sets-construction-vehicles-on-fire-briefly-kidnaps-15-w

Terrorists from the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) kidnapped 15 workers after they stormed a thermal power plant construction site and set six construction vehicles on fire in the southeastern province of Şırnak on Saturday.

The incident took place at the thermal power plant belonging to the silopi A.Ş. in the Silopi district early on Saturday. The terrorists left the power plant with 15 workers they had kidnapped. The workers were later released by the group.

Meanwhile, the PKK also released three paramedics they abducted in Erzurum late on Friday. The three were released near the Tekman village early on Saturday.

Jailed PKK Leader Calls on Movement to Drop Arms
▻http://english.al-akhbar.com/content/jailed-pkk-leader-calls-movement-drop-arms

The jailed leader of the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) on Saturday urged the separatists to take a “historic” decision to lay down their arms, a key step in efforts to end Turkey’s long-running Kurdish insurgency.

[…]

Reading a statement live on television, Sirri Sureyya Onder, a lawmaker from the pro-Kurdish Peoples’ Democratic Party (HDP), relayed a message from Abdullah Ocalan calling on the Kurdish rebels to hold a congress on disarmament in the spring.

“We are in the process of ending the 30-year of conflict in the form of a perpetual peace, and our primary goal is to reach a democratic solution,” Onder quoted Ocalan as saying in a joint press conference with Deputy Prime Minister Yalcin Akdogan.

“I’m calling on the PKK to hold an extraordinary congress in the spring months to take the strategic and historic decision on disarmament,” Ocalan’s message said. “This is a historic call to replace armed struggle with democratic politics.”

Minister targets PKK over illegal electricity use
▻http://www.todayszaman.com/news-352421-minister-targets-pkk-over-illegal-electricity-use.html

Energy Minister Taner Yıldız singled out the terrorist Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) while addressing recent protests about electricity cuts in southeast Turkey on Tuesday.

“We know that the PKK has said it would be great if you do not pay your bills,” said Yıldız, referring to the illicit use of electricity that has been a problem in the Southeast for years.

“It must be known that the number of people who pay their electricity bills in this region is around 10 percent. [The Ministry of Energy] serves 77 million people. We need to stress to the public that there is a difference between those who pay their bills and those who do not. It is not right for those who do not pay to take from those who do,” continued Yıldız.

“Those who have not paid their bills — intentionally or unintentionally — must do so immediately," said Yıldız.

Illegal electricity usage reportedly cost every Turkish household registered with an energy company TL 140 last year. A total of TL 4.9 billion was lost through unpaid electricity because of illicit usage in 2013.

The formerly state-owned Dicle Electricity Distribution Company (DEDAŞ) was privatized last year. One of the DEDAŞ partners, pro-government businessman Abdullah Tivnikli, came under scrutiny when it was revealed that he had received loans from Kuveyt Türk — a bank where Tivnikli is the deputy board manager — to help finance the privatization venture.

An extended period of drought, which began at the end of last year, has severely reduced the volume of water in Turkey’s reservoirs and raised concerns that electricity production will decline.

#Electricité
#Piratage
#Privatisation
#PKK

Kurdish groups committing rights abuses says #HRW
▻http://english.al-akhbar.com/content/kurdish-groups-committing-rights-abuses-says-hrw

Kurds in parts of northern #syria have carried out arbitrary arrests and failed to investigate the killings and disappearance of political opponents, Human Rights Watch said on Thursday in a report documenting rights abuses. The Democratic Union Party (PYD), an offshoot of the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) in neighbouring Turkey, has run three Kurdish enclaves in northern Syria since 2012, when Syrian government forces withdrew from the areas. read more

#ISIS #Kurds

#Kurdish group abducts two Turkish soldiers
▻http://english.al-akhbar.com/content/kurdish-group-abducts-two-turkish-soldiers

An armed Kurdish group has abducted two Turkish soldiers in the southeast of the country, the state-run Anatolia news agency reported Sunday. The abduction took place late Saturday, after the jailed leader of the outlawed #Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) issued a statement warning of a possible return to violence. However it was not clear whether the kidnappers were linked to the #PKK, which declared a landmark truce with the Turkish state last March. read more

#Top_News #turkey

BDP says 2nd stage of settlement begun as PKK fires on commanders

▻http://www.todayszaman.com/news-318872-bdp-says-2nd-stage-of-settlement-begun-as-pkk-fires-on-comm

According to the BDP leader, the first stage of the settlement process, launched with the terrorist Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) by the Turkish government in October 2012 to end the decades-old terrorism problem in the country, is a cease-fire and the withdrawal of PKK forces, the second stage consists of constitutional and legal amendments that would bring democratic reforms for Kurds and the third is the laying down of arms. A formal agreement on the stages has not been announced.

Demirtaş said his party has held the first official negotiations on the second stage of the settlement process with the ruling Justice and Development Party (AK Party) government, adding: “The government says they are preparing to start the second stage of the process. They could share their plans with the people next week.”

#Turkey
#PKK #Kurdistan

Öcalan says PKK might withdraw from Turkey in August

▻http://www.todayszaman.com/news-308246-.html

Abdullah Öcalan, the imprisoned leader of the terrorist Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK), envisions the withdrawal of his fighters from Turkey by August under a draft peace plan sent to his group’s leadership and Kurdish politicians, media reports said on Wednesday.
Held in an island prison since his capture in 1999, Öcalan has been negotiating with the government since October over the outlines of a deal to end a conflict which has killed at least 40,000 people since his fighters took up arms in 1984.

#PKK #Kurds #Kurdistan #Turquie #Turkey

Gov’t vows end to eastern electricity woes despite antiquated grid

▻http://www.todayszaman.com/news-304726-govt-vows-end-to-eastern-electricity-woes-despite-antiquate

A new government campaign in the country’s easternmost provinces will clamp down on illicit electricity use — a practice Ankara says is encouraged by the terrorist Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) — although the largest obstacle to better electricity service remains the antiquated grid itself, experts say.