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July 14, 2008
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Letter to: Mr. Nicolas Sarkozy, President of France
Ladies and Gentlemen attending the meeting of the Union for the Mediterranean
Paris 12.07.2008
Regarding the situation for Kurdish people in Syria who are subjected to racist and chauvinistic policies and procedures:
Ladies and Gentlemen,
We send our greetings to your meeting to launch a European initiative for the Mediterranean and wish you success in your work. We are hoping that you will consider the issue of our Kurdish people in Syria, and impress upon the Syrian delegation the need to resolve the Kurdish issue in Syria according to international laws, charters and by peaceful means.
We raise this letter to draw your attention to the situation of our people, the Kurds in Syria, who are suffering chauvinistic policies of racial discrimination that are practised by the Syrian authorities. We ask that any agreement with the Syrian delegation ensures its commitment to securing the national and democratic rights of Kurdish people in Syria, because without this, you will be breaching human rights and legitimising the racist attitude applied against our people.
As you know the Kurdish population of 50 million people today, has been separated in its homeland Kurdistan which spreads over an area of more than 500,000 square kilometres, when it was divided between Turkey, Iran, Iraq, and Syria as a result of the 1916 Sykes-Picot Treaty. Barbed wire and minefields separate our sons in the four countries until now, even at this stage of our civilisation.
Since the founding of Syria in 1920 under the French mandate, part of Kurdistan has been taken within the emerging Syrian state, and the community of more than three million Kurdish people who live there is a core component of the country. Our people have participated in, and contributed to the construction, development and progress of the political, social, economic and cultural life of Syria, and contributed to the country's independence.
Ladies and Gentlemen,
Successive Syrian governments in power since independence, and especially the Ba'ath Party which came to power in 1963, ignored the existence of Kurds who live on their own land in Syria. They have moved other people to live on Kurdish land and denied the legitimate and democratic rights of this nation. The Syrian authorities that approved the racist laws are still practising persecution and discrimination against our people.
Among these measures are:-
- Law No. 93 issued on 23 August 1962 provides for a special census in the province of al-Hasakah. This unjust and exclusive census was taken on one day only and led to 120,000 Kurds, citizens of Syrian nationality, being stripped of their Syrian citizenship. This has now increased to affect more than 400,000 people. These people were deprived of ownership, employment, work, education and mobility.
- The Arab belt is the result of the Government policy of confiscating and extracting large areas of fertile agricultural land from the Kurds and distributing it to Arab families, between 1973 to 1974.
- The historically Kurdish names of regions, towns and villages have been replaced with Arabic names..
- Kurdish people were starved of food, and the economic structure was demolished; the cultural and historic consciousness was eroded; Kurds were deprived of education causing them to become ignorant, and forcing their sons to emigrate. Kurdish people were prevented from using their own Kurdish language, in all situations.
Ladies and Gentlemen, these procedures were clearly racist.
This Government seeks to introduce illegal security systems designed to uproot our Kurdish people from their land and change the demographic regions.
The ruling Ba'athist Party showed its way of thinking when, on 12 March 2004 they plotted to encourage a confrontation between Arabs and Kurds at a football match in Qamishlo. The security forces intervened against the Kurds, and as a result there were deaths and injuries amongst the Kurds, thousands of Kurds were arrested, and dozens of our people remain in arbitrary detention. This led to the timely start of the uprising of the Kurdish community in all Kurdish regions within the country, to which the system reacted with more violence, and kidnapped Sheikh Maschuk al-Khaznawi on 10th May 2005. On 1st June 2005 his death was announced and there is still silence by the Syrian authorities in relation to this heinous crime.
On 20th March this year, the forces of the regime fired on a crowd of Kurds celebrating Newroz in the town of Qamishlo causing the death of three martyrs and the wounding of several others.
Ladies and Gentlemen,
We appeal to you to intervene and apply pressure to the regime in Syria to take steps to achieve democracy through:
- Finding a just and democratic solution to the Kurdish issue in Syria, in recognition of the fact that Kurdish people are constitutionally the second largest nation in Syria, and they live on their historic land;
- Lifting the State of Emergency and martial law that has been applied in our country since 1963;
- Giving an amnesty to those in the country's prisons, allowing the release of all detainees who have been imprisoned for their opinion, and conducting an impartial investigation into the crimes that are still being committed against the Kurds and Arabs in Sednaya prison, that have become known to the whole world. This would pave the way for genuine democratic reform guaranteeing freedom of expression to citizens;
- Separate the three authorities, thereby restoring the independence of the judiciary and freedom of the media;
- Remove the discriminatory and racist special laws against our Kurdish people;
- Restoring Syrian nationality to those people, their children and their grandchildren who have been stripped of their rights, and pay compensation to them;
- Cancellation of the Arab belt project, and returning land to its original Kurdish owners, and paying compensation to them;
- Ending the policy of Arabization, and removing its effects to date;
- Recognising the Kurdish language as the official language in Kurdish areas;
- Allowing the Kurdish people to exercise their Kurdish national legitimate rights
In conclusion, we give you our thanks, and we are hoping to receive a response to our letter of concern from you.
'The Committee of Joint Action of Kurds in Syria' includes the following Parties and Organizations from Germany:
Kurdish Left Party in Syria
Yekiti Kurdish Party in Syria
Kurdish Democratic Unity Party in Syria
Kurdish Democratic Party in Syria al-Party
Democratic Progressive Party in Syria
Syrian Kurdish Democratic Party
Kurdish Azadi Party
Kurdish Democratic Party in Syria al-Party
Kurdish Patriotic Centre / Syria NAVEND
Association of Syrian Kurds in Berlin and Brandenburg
Association of Yasa Kurdish Lawyers - Bonn
Individual Independent Patriotic Kurds
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A Kurdish man now living in New Zealand searches for the family he lost in Iraq. Despite the sectarian violence that rages around him, watch as he struggles to find the family he had to leave behind.
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