ethnic conflict and convergence: the kurdish case

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Comparative Politics, Year I

ETHNIC CONFLICT AND CONVERGENCE:

THE KURDISH CASE

When approaching convergence in relation to ethnic conflict, there is a

presumption from which one has to depart within the inquiry- that in ethnic conflict there is a

final end that is common and that there are common variables to all ethnic conflicts that can

be objectively approached.

However, how can ethnic conflict, defined as a war context between two

ethnicities, be common everywhere it is encountered, and what determines this commonness?

What are the common variables playing to this convergence? Why would it be important to

establish the common traits and examine ethnic conflict from this perspective and to what

end?

In this respect, upon just a glance at the subject, it can be determined that, in

general, ethnic conflict may be approached relating to the following variables: the reaction of

the majoritarian population to the other, nationalism and its implications in the respective

country, the means of implementation of the abuses and the final purpose- be it total

destruction or assimilation.

The purpose of this present paper is to introduce the above stated variables as

to determine the convergence of the ethnic conflict approach in the Kurdish Case.

The Kurdish case is appropriate for this type of analysis, since the matter has

been approached in more than one country where the minority can be found: Turkey, Iran,

Iraq and Syria and the situation of the Kurdish minority has in all cases led to ethnic conflict.

However, on approaching the matter and stating its importance and introducing

these variables into play, it is also compulsory to state the historical context, since this context

is most illustrative for the case and helps to establish the framework necessary for the

approach of the subject.

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An ethnic group, according to the definition, is a collectivity whose bonds of

unity come from subjectively felt concepts, sentiments, and actions stemming from common

traditions in contradistinction to other groups within a polity.1

The Kurdish population is spread more or less homogeneously on a territory

that is part of four states: Iran, Turkey, Iraq and Syria, that is called by them, even if not

internationally recognized, Kurdistan, state that emerged as the result of the Kurdish self-

determination and nation-building process.

In order to identify the Kurds as a nation, it is compulsory, according to the

definition of a nation, to track their common history, geographical continuity and common

language of the population since a nation is not a fixity but rather a daily plebiscite (Ernest

Renan).

The Kurds can be traced back in history to the Arab conquest in the seventh

century, the name Kurd being applied to the Western Iranians and the other Iranicised

peoples established astride the mountain systems of the Zagros and the Taurus.

Until the extinction of the Arab Caliphate of Baghdad in the 1258, the Kurds

are traced by history as having some importance, some dynasties being present, while during

the wars between the Ottoman Empire and the Persian-Safavid ones, they have distinguished

themselves in the context of independent principalities2. Despite the attempts of centralization

of the two governments during the nineteenth century, some principalities managed to remain

independent, mainly those of Mukriyan and Ardalan in Persia, Botan, Hakari, Badinan, Soran

and Baban in Turkey.

Relating to language, the Kurdish language belongs to a north-western division

of Iranian tongues as distinct from the ones in the South-West, and nowadays it is divided in

two dialects- northern and southern, rather distinct because of the geographical setting and of

the lack of political unity, but still maintaing common traits.

In what regards the advent of the modern Kurdish nationalist movement, as the

other peoples in Europe, the Kurds, together with the Arabs and the Armenians as minorities

in the Ottoman Empire, have raised to the discourse of President Wilson that announced that

nationalities should be assured an absolute, unmolested opportunity of autonomous

development.

1 MUTLU Servet, Ethnic Kurds in Turkey, a Demographic Study, International Journal of

Middle East Studies, vol. 28, No.4, November 19962 EDMONDS C.J., Kurdish Nationalism, Journal of Contemporary History, vol.6, No.1,Nationalism and Separatism, 1971

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In fact, the Treaty of Sevres, never to be ratified, contained the recognition of

the Arab states of Hijaz, Syria and Iraq, but also of Armenia, and of Kurdistan that would

have included the eastern vilayets of Turkey, together with the Mosul vilayet that at the time

was under British occupation.

However, Mustafa Kemal Ataturk refused to ratify the treaty of Sevres, which

was replaced with the Treaty of Lausanne in 1923, recognizing the Arab states but which

made no mention of Armenia and Kurdistan.

The Treaties of Lausanne and Ankarra, together with an Anglo-French

Convention and the Franco-Turkish agreement of March 1921 decided the split of the

Ottoman Kurdistan between Turkey, Iraq and Syria.

On short, the paradox of the situation with which Kurdistan was faced was the

turnaround from the Wilson Programme of the encouragement of national self-determination,

to the split of a rather homogeneous population between three states, drawing a kin apart.

This historical context being exposed, it is evident why it is interesting to

analyze convergence relating to the Kurdish Ethnic conflict, since three statal orders have

been imposed to a population that once experienced unification, situation that triggered the

advent of ethnic conflict as response to, one hand the claims of self-determination and

unification and on the other hand, the reaction to the possible loss of territory of the sovereign

state in which the minority inhabited.

It is, therefore, to be approached the situation, through the following variables:

reaction to the other, nationalist speech, means of implementation and its final purpose, to

the states that had to deal with the matter and in which ethnic conflict is or was present, as to

determine the extent to which we may argue for convergence among the Kurdish Ethnic

Conflict.

The structure of the inquiry will in turn concentrate, relating to the above stated

variables, on each countrys approach, starting with Turkey, Iraq, Iran and Syria.

1. The Nationalist Variable

The matter of nationalism, given the idea of once a united and heterogeneous

population within the borders of the Ottoman Empire, whose split determined in fact its

division between Syria, Turkey, Iran and Iraq, the nationalist variable cannot be studied

independently for each country, since we are talking of the same population that makes the

claims of self-determination and strives for unification.

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The Kurdish nationalism emerged afterWorld War I with the dissolution of the

Ottoman Empire which had historically successfully integrated, but not assimilated, the

Kurds, through use of forced repression of Kurdish movements to gain independence.

On short, the historical basis of Kurdish nationalist thinking may be summed

as follows: the Kurds constitute a single nation which has occupied its present habitat for at

least three thousand years, having outlived the rise and fall of many imperial races: Assyrians,

Persians, Greeks, Romans, Arabs, Mongols and Turks. They have their own history,

language, and culture. Their country has been unjustly partitioned, but they are the original

owners, not strangers to be tolerated as minorities with limited concessions granted at the

whim of usurpers3

In what regards the advent of the modern nationalist movement, as the other

peoples in Europe, the Kurds, together with the Arabs and the Armenians as minorities in the

Ottoman Empire, have raised to the discourse of President Wilson that announced that

nationalities should be assured an absolute, unmolested opportunity of autonomous

development.

2. The reaction toward the other

Depending on the final end that is envisaged in an argumentation and what it

aims to prove, in ethnic policy the states promote differ, as to tolerate or to exclude the

other, by the other understanding the minority, the population presenting different traits

form those of the majority.

Turkey.The emphasis on Kurds as a distinct ethnicity was encouraged by turn

of the century Russiananthropologists who suggested that the Kurds were a European race

based on physical characteristics and their language which is part of the Indo-European

language group. While these researchers had ulterior political motives their findings were

embraced and still accepted today by many.

Following the reaction of some Kurdish tribal leaders in regards to the

abolition of the caliphate and the reformist policies, that divide the Kurds in two camps,

Turkey started the implementation of a policy encouraging the Kurds to identify as Turks.

3 EDMONDS C.J., Kurdish Nationalism, Journal of Contemporary History, vol.6, No.1,Nationalism and Separatism, 1971, pg. 88

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Ataturk, himself, promoted a reasonable discourse in relation to the Kurdish

population, speaking often of Turkey as the homeland of Turks and Kurds to the intention

of the inclusion of the whole territory inhabited by the Kurds in Turkey.

Moreover, in the effort to celebrate the pre-islamic cultural heritage of the

Turks as the basis of the new nationalism, the Ankara authorities promoted the view that the

Kurds were Turanians who had somehow forgotten their linguistic origins4, policy that

started in fact denying the mere existence of the Kurds as a nation or a separate people.

On the other hand, the capturing of the PKK leader Ocalan, in 1999 and the

growing in importance of the European Union has determined changes in the Turkish conflict

evolution, reason for which nowadays we hear in Turkey a new type of speech, basically

focusing upon the. essentialization of the Kurdish identity, providing a new definition for both

the Kurdish and Turkish identities and the competition between them.

This, according to Murat Somer serves the goals of hardliners, and it is

frequently employed by social-political actors to undermine competitors, whether deliberately

or as a political reflex. Hardline Kurdish nationalists essentialize Kurdishness in order to

strengthen their bid for nationhood and statehood. An ancient, historically continuous and

monolithic image of Kurdishness facilitates the justification of these causes in the

international arena. Further, the depiction of the Kurdish category in opposition to

Turkishness vilifies and helps to weaken moderate Kurds who, in a more liberal environment,

might prefer to cultivate both identities.5

The new conception of the Turkish identity is that of a civic nation, definition

which attempts to integrate Turkey among modern liberal nations that conceive the state not

as an ethnic one, but rather as a civic one.

However, to this it may be argued that the replacement of the supposedly

ethnic Turkish national identity with a civic-territorial or civic-religious identity is neither

necessary nor sufficient for resolving the Kurdish conflict. In order for any identity strategy to

be effectively unifying, socio-economic policies that actually create compatible interests for

ethnic Turks and Kurds would have to accompany it6.

Iraq, where the Kurds are present in a high number, appears as an ethnic

museum where groups that differ in language, religion and sociopolitical organization have

4 HARRIS S. George, Ethnic Conflict and the Kurds, Annals of the American Academy ofPolitical and Social5 SOMER Murat, Turkey's Kurdish Conflict: Changing Context, and Domestic and Regional

Implications, Middle East Journal, Vol. 58, No. 2 (Spring, 2004), pp. 235-2536 SOMER Murat, Turkey's Kurdish Conflict: Changing Context, and Domestic and RegionalImplications, Middle East Journal, Vol. 58, No. 2 (Spring, 2004), pp. 235-253

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coexisted for centuries. Moreover, the tribally organized populations served as a resource of

manpower for the struggles between the caliphate in Iraq, the Persians and the Ottomans.

In fact, in Iraq the nationalist movement was the most persistent and

successful because it is here that the Kurds were officially and legally recognized as an ethnic

minority and rejoiced rights.

However, there are still some issues of discontent relating to instances of

small-scale insurgency in the north, said to be fueled by Kurdish nationalists originating from

Syria.

In Iran the official attitude of the state was that the Kurds are a branch of the

Iranian race and therefore part of Iran and since Iran is a multinational empire based on

history, tradition and common loyalty to the Shah, for the Iranians there was no Kurdish

problem. Also, the Kurdish language was recognized as different from the dialects of Farsi,

and permitted to be used as well as all the other languages of the empire, such as Arabic,

Baluchi or Azarbayjani Turkish.

In the Syrian context, the situation of the Kurds differed fundamentally from

the one of the Kurds in the other three countries since their number is more limited and as

such they did not challenge at all the rule of the French mandatory authorities.

However, after the French withdrawal the Kurdish minority came to be more

and more regarded as an offence and a threat that needed to be suppressed. In this regards,

Syria presents itself as grounds for Kurdish discrimination in every branch and domain of the

administration and in every activity of the administration. The possession of books and

newspapers in the Kurdish language is prohibited situation which determined the underground

distribution of such materials.

3. Means of implementation of the measures and their final purpose

This variable relates more to the issue of how the conflict was managed by the

different states just as the means of the Kurds to make their claims for national unity and self-

determination.

Turkey. The independence claims of the Kurds in Turkey were never well

received and were suppressed. It was Ataturk that encouraged his followers as to proceed in

such a manner as to destroy the possibility of a separatist movement of the Kurds.

In Turkey several uprisings marked the passing of the years, each time the

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Kurds being of no match for the Turks, who deposed also a constant effort to disarm the tribes

and armed forces, were stationed in the areas of unrest. The measures even reached the point

when tribes were moved from a region to another so as to manage to settle it. Also railways

were built in order to make it possible for the troops to be moved fast to the region.

On the other hand, during the relatively open government of the 1950s, Kurds

gained political office and started working within the framework of the Turkish Republic to

further their interests but this move towards integration was halted with the 1960 Turkish

coup d'tat.

The 1970s saw an evolution in Kurdish nationalism as Marxist political

thought influenced a new generation of Kurdish nationalists opposed to the local feudal

authorities who had been a traditional source of opposition to authority, eventually they would

form the militant separatist Partiya Karkeren Kurdistan (PKK), orKurdistan Workers Party in

English.7

Going Further, the 1990s mark the revival of the Kurdish identity, since on

this occasion Turkey witnessed the rising consciousness and politicization of the Kurdish

identity, the surging visibility of the Kurdish category within the main-stream public-political

discourse, and the ascent of Turkish nationalism that viewed the Kurdish rebel movement, the

Kurdistan Workers Party, and Kurdish nationalism in general, as the major antagonists8.

Upon inquiring the final end of the measures approached by the two

populations, it is evident that the struggle led here is that, on one hand, for the Turks, to

maintain the status quo as it is, while the Kurds strive for nationalism and self determination

on the grounds of a unity that once existed within the Ottoman Empire and that was drawn

apart as a result of the concessions of the international society.

Be the measures implemented radical, reaching extreme violence and

terrorism, they are the result of the clash between these interests, and the consequence of the

fact that, as a minority, for the Kurdish the sole argument that remains is that of violence,

since they are of no match for the Turks nor in the international discourse or the internal one.

In Iraq we are talking about a different approach to the matter. Rather than

resorting to violence and assimilation, the Kurdish population was granted rights and allowed

self-determination.

7 LACINER, Bal; Bal, Ihsan. "The Ideological And Historical Roots Of Kurdist Movements InTurkey: Ethnicity Demography, Politics". Nationalism and Ethnic Politics pages: 473504.

8 SOMER Murat, Turkey's Kurdish Conflict: Changing Context, and Domestic and RegionalImplications, Middle East Journal, Vol. 58, No. 2 (Spring, 2004), pp. 235-253

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In this respect, the Kurdish population, even if at times it revolted, was granted

rights and this was due to a number of reasons such as their number, making up about one

fifth of the total population; the British rule in 1918 which permitted the formation of more

semi-autonomous Kurdish provinces; between 1920-1923 there was an obligation to keep the

possibility open for the Kurds in Mosul vilayet to adhere to a Kurdish state that might be

formed; in 1925 the League of Nations made it a condition of its Mosul award that officials of

Kurdish race should be appointed for the administration of their country and that Kurdish

should be the official language in the public services.

Going further, in April 1991, following the March uprising of Kurds in the

north and Shia Arabs in the south against the central government, Iraqi Kurdistan was

divided into two parts. Relying on UN Security Council Resolution 688, military forces from

eleven countries, including the United States and Turkey, implemented Operation Provide

Comfort to give security and humanitarian assistance to refugees in camps along the Iraq-

Turkey border. The so-called Kurdish safe haven and northern no-fly zone were established in

this context. Under considerable constraint and against strong external and internal

opposition, the Kurdish safe haven has been successfully governed for a decade by the Kurds

themselves. This part of Iraqi Kurdistan is roughly 40,000 square kilometers, or about half of

Iraqi Kurdistan. The rest continues to be directly governed by Baghdad.

In October 1991, the Government of Iraq voluntarily withdrew its civil

administration and the citizens of the Kurdish safe haven were left to govern themselves.

Elections were held in May 1992 and the Kurdistan National Assembly and the Kurdistan

Regional Government were created. The Kurdistan Democratic Party and the Patriotic Union

of Kurdistan entered into an equal power-sharing arrangement, with 5 of the 105 KNA seats

allocated to members of the Assyrian-Chaldean Christian community. Turkomans boycotted

the election, although efforts were made to include representatives from all ethnic and

religious communities9.

Since in Iran religion played an important role in the marginalization of the

Kurdish population because the majority of Kurds are Sunnis while the Official State Religion

and as such that of the majority of population, is Shia, religion was the one that triggered

uprisings of the Kurds that also resulted in the claim of border territory, situation which did

not last, and the land was lost due to foreign intervention.

9

Carole A. OLeary,THE KURDS OF IRAQ: RECENT HISTORY, FUTURE PROSPECTS, MiddleEast Journal Review of International Affairs, Vol. 6, No. 4, December 2002,http://meria.idc.ac.il/journal/2002/issue4/jv6n4a5.html

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Basically periodical struggles and uprisings systematically settled either by the

foreign powers or the Iranian state represent the manifestation of the ethnic conflict, conflict

that determined the acquirement of a statute for the Kurdish population at the limit between

the Turkish denial policy and the Iraqian permissive one. It is therefore observed the gradual

permission of books and broadcasting of programs in the Kurdish language even if it is not

allowed to be used as an official language.

Another aspect of the conflict implies also the manipulation of the Soviets,

who saw in the encouragement of Kurdish separatism a way of consolidating their power in

northwestern Iran.

Similarly to the situation in Turkey, Syria appears as skeptic towards the

Kurds who gradually come to be considered as a possible threat and are, therefore, persecuted

and denied cultural rights.

Furthermore, leaders and members of the Syrian branch of the Democratic

Party of Kurdistan are arrested and charged with treason, while in the 1960s some thousands

Kurds are deprived of their Syrian nationality on the grounds that they or their parents had

come over as refugees from Turkey during the French Mandate, and by a plan to establish an

Arab belt along the Turkish frontier by evicting the Kurdish villagers10.

Generally, even though we are not talking of an important minority, the

Kurdish population that exists has, overtime stood the victim of abuses and saw its rights

denied.

Conclusions

Upon having exposed the important variables of the analysis of ethnic conflict,

mainly that of nationalism, the reaction towards the other and the means of implementation

and final purpose of the matter, there are a series of conclusions to be drawn relating to

convergence, just as some new variables come into play as to change the odds of it.

We are speaking mainly of variables that have only marginally been touched in

this present paper, such as the number of Kurdish population, the distribution of the territory

it inhabits, the demands of culture, the claims of independence, the exterior intervention as

determinant to the rise of the conflict, the religious element.

These variables stated above serve to the consolidation of the ones that stood

inquiry, since, even if more general, they most clearly create the image upon the

10 C.J. EDMONDS, Kurdish Nationalism, Journal of Contemporary History, Vol. 6, No. 1,Nationalism and Separatism, 1971, pp. 81-107, Sage Publications

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synchronization/ convergence of the approach of the Kurdish minority and thus the

imminence of ethnic conflict in the states inhabited by Kurds.

As such, the treated variables suggest that:

1. Firstly, and most important, ethnic conflict appears present in all the approached

territories, being imminent and approached as the sole solution.

2. Due to the split between four states of the rather homogeneous territory inhabited by

Kurds, ethnic conflict raised on the grounds of the need for unity and self

determination.

3. Marginally, religion also played a role in the countries where it was different (Iran) in

triggering ethnic conflict.

4. Foreign intervention played an important role in all the situations, either if the

influence was exercised from inside, such in the case for Syria or Iraq, or from the

outside, such in the case of Turkey, in which case was also indirect, and Iran.

5. The need for the recognition of the Kurdish culture is also marginal, since the political

organization of the Kurds is rather separated between the tribes, this lack of unity,

even of language, determining the impossibility of the need of culture to be

determinant in the matter. It is included rather in the struggle for self-determination

and unity.

To conclude, convergence seen as limiting behavior to some variables as to

touch a final envisaged goal is attained in the case of the Kurdish ethnic conflict, since the

variables described above when applied to the different countries where the Kurdish conflict

is present suggest basically the same reaction to the Kurds: ethnic conflict. Ethnic conflict is

envisaged as the sole solution. Self determination and unity stand as final end and purpose to

ethnic conflict.

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References

EDMONDS C.J., Kurdish Nationalism, Journal of Contemporary History, Vol. 6, No.

1, Nationalism and Separatism, 1971, pp. 81-107, Sage Publications

HARRIS S. George, Ethnic Conflict and the Kurds, Annals of the American Academy

of Political and Social

LACINER, Bal; Bal, Ihsan. "The Ideological And Historical Roots Of Kurdist

Movements In Turkey: Ethnicity Demography, Politics".Nationalism and Ethnic

Politicspages: 473504.

MUTLU Servet, Ethnic Kurds in Turkey, a Demographic Study, International Journal

of Middle East Studies, vol. 28, No.4, November 1996

OLEARY Carole A. , THE KURDS OF IRAQ: RECENT HISTORY, FUTURE

PROSPECTS, Middle East Journal Review of International Affairs, Vol. 6, No. 4,

December 2002, http://meria.idc.ac.il/journal/2002/issue4/jv6n4a5.html

SOMER Murat, Turkey's Kurdish Conflict: Changing Context, and Domestic and

Regional Implications, Middle East Journal, Vol. 58, No. 2 (Spring, 2004), pp. 235-

253

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ethnic conflict and convergence: the kurdish case

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