ANKARA - Stating that Kurds are 'biological enemy' for Turkey since 1925's, Historian Prof. Dr. Hamit Bozarslan said, "Kobané was a development that showed Kurds was not going to be subordinated to Turks. That's why Turkey can not get over Kobané."

 

'No status' regions are still one of the main problems of the world. While cities like Kirkuk, Mosul Gaza and Rojava sometimes become the main agenda in the world, today it is Karabagh. Things never calmed down in regions like this where solution is always pushed away.  International, regional and local powers have a high share in this. In all these regions, Turkey is playing a dominant role. Turkey trying to turn tension into gain in both Caucasus and Middle East, uses only one bargaining chip and that is the 'Kurdish Chip'. No matter how much Turkey invests in this chip, it can not get what it wants. Not being able to get what it wants in Syria, Libya, East MEditerranean and Aegean, Turkey once again could not find what it hoped for in the Karabakg crisis.

 

While Turkey was pushed away from the table with Russia's delayed 'ceasefire' move, President Tayyip Erdoğan from AKP once again targeted the Kurdish lands. While signaling an intervention against North and East Syria, politicians with the HDP was arrested on grounds of the Kobané protests that took place 6 years ago.

 

We spoke the developments in the region and Turkey's predicament with the Kurdish with Historian and Political Scientist Dr. Hamit Bozarslan, Lecturer in the Social Sciences Advanced Research School (EHESS).

 

Stating that the opposition in Turkey has to acknowladge that the Kurdish issue in Turkey is not a secondary problem but a fundamental one, Bozarslan said: "At the same time, in order to be a democratic opposition, the relations between Turkishness and Kurdishness must be considered on the basis of equality. It is not just "we also persecuted the Kurds a little, usurped their rights". Things are way beyond that. In the 1990s, such a discourse might have been used but today the Kurdish movement is a movement that received not less than 10 percent of votes, at least at the legal level, despite all the pressures. You appoint trustees, arrest mayors, lynch them in the media, but the Kurdish movement still has around 15% potential. If the opposition really wants to be a democratic opposition, and if it really want to be a democratic power alternative, it must fully integrate this component. But it must integrate it this component with their own identity, as the Kurdish."

 

Drawing attention to the reason why the Kobané protests are still used by the government, Dr. Bozarslan said: "It is not possible to close the Kobanê book. It is not possible for it to be closed for both the government and the Kurds. Because Kobanê is a report, a historical milestone. A milestone in which Erdoganism is defeated in a moment when the Kurdish movement becomes fully autonomous and becomes autonomous based on its own resistance capacity. Kobané is the moment where the Kurds have become shields protecting everyone else from the jihadist movement of ISIS. It is not possible for the government to get over this. And the Kurds will not be able to forget about what happened. Kobané was a development that showed Kurds was not going to be subordinated by the Turks. That's why Turkey can not get over Kobané.

 

We know that a 'Destruction plan' was prepared at the National Security Council held on October 30, 2014 following the Kobané protests. In that meeting, the general opinion is that, the termination of the solution process was planned. Speaking about the relationship between the termination of the solution process and Kobané, Dr. Bozarslan said: "They were seriously related. We are not in 1915 in the genocide circumstances. But 2013- 2015 is seriously similar with 1914-1915. Back in 1914, Committee of Union and Progress told the Armenians that they acknowladge their existance but in return they have to be under the command of the 'Turkishness'. 'However, the policy of the Armenian movement of that period was the establishment of the Ottoman Empire on new foundations. On the basis of equality. This is what happened in 2013 and 2014. Erdogan was telling the Kurds "we recognize you", even using the word Kurdistan. Beyond that, he said, "There was a disaster in Dersim." But he meant "now that werecognize you now, you should be under the command of Turkishness ..." The Armenian genocide happened because the Armenians rejected to be under the command of the 'Turkishness'. And because the Kurds rejected to be under the command of Turkishness in Kobané in 2013-2015, and later in the elections in 2015, it paved the way for the Suruç Massacre and all other massacres. This is why Turkey will never get over Rojava."