Salam Zandi

PKK:s terrorstämpel en eftergift till Nato-landet Turkiet

#1 Arne Dear Arne, thank you for writing your standpoint in this issue. Your three accusations and your figures are exactly the same accusations and the same figures one can see in Turkish mainstream newspapers on a daily basis. I think your accusations can be explained in two ways; either your sources are derived only from prejudice, or you do not have access to other sources to understand the issue more impartially. This makes your reasoning very selective, and consequently your view on the issue very poor. This is regrettable because it pales the hope to understand the roots of the conflict and to find a solution for the ethnic killings in Turkey. If we take our prejudicial filters off for some minutes it might be visible that I am not trying to take part in the conflict. Using the case of PKK as a context, I am trying to establish that in our contemporary international relation system, nation states accuse non-state actors of being terrorists while their own terrorist actions are simply described as “coercive power to restore security”. This is applicable to Turkish state and to all other nation states. I am reflecting on a logic in International Relations that sticks the “Terrorist” label on a person when the person is not fit into some criteria set up by the nation-state system and praises the same person “for his efforts to create peace” when the person complies with these criteria. I am trying to explain why Yasser Arafat was awarded the Noble Peace Prize here in Scandinavia; same Arafat who, along with his organization (PLO), was labeled “terrorist” for a many long time. Arne, we can discuss the three accusations you mentioned in your comment above. I hope you are able to realize the fact that all these three acts are carried out by many organizations all over the world and even by some institutions within some states. These organizations are internationally called Mafia not terrorist organizations. There is, however, no specific name for those states that accommodate, organize and carry out these three awful operations. If you believe PKK is doing these acts you can call PKK a Mafia organization. What is behind the terrorist label on PKK then? Is it because we are borrowing it from Turkish state-media without reflections? If you and (as your affirm) Swedish Government accuse PKK of being terrorist because it killed two persons in Uppsala, or 138 teachers in Turkey, what you and Swedish government call the Turkish state who has been killing Armenian, Greeks, Kurds and Christian Groups in millions? What you and Swedish government name American and British army’s killings of thousands in Iraq and Afghanistan. Were these killings not terrorist actions because they were carried out by army of nation states? In my writing I was trying to illustrate this inconsistency which is inherent in the contemporary definition of terrorism. I would have preferred not to end the discussion up at this level. Thank you again for your comment and thank you for tolerating my way of thinking.