No let up in Turkey’s crackdown, amid evacuations and deaths in Kurdish southeast

 

ERBIL, Kurdistan Region – Turkish security forces evacuated some 500 residents in several towns in the country’s Kurdish southeast, as clashes continued on Tuesday and the military said it had killed two more rebels of the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) and lost one soldier.

The official Anadolu Agency reported that residents of Silopi in Sirnak province were sheltered at a sports hall before being transferred to the homes of relatives in calmer districts.

It said a Turkish soldier was killed along with two PKK fighters in an operation in the village of Olek in Bitlis province on Tuesday.

Local media reports said that some homes in Silopi sustained heavy damage from clashes, which have continued across Turkey since the military launched a crackdown on the PKK in late July, shattering a fragile peace deal with the Kurds that had been two years in the making.

The military has reported killing more than 100 PKK rebels since mid-December alone, without any international outcry.

On Tuesday, New York-based Human Rights Watch (HRW) urged Ankara to curb its crackdown and investigate deaths caused by it.

“The Turkish government should rein in its security forces, immediately stop abusive and disproportionate use of force, and investigate the deaths and injuries caused by its operations," HRW said in a statement.

"To ignore or cover up what's happening to the region's Kurdish population would only confirm the widely held belief in the southeast that when it comes to police and military operations against Kurdish armed groups, there are no limits -- there is no law," it said.

Meanwhile, the co-leader of Turkey’s main pro-Kurdish party attacked Ankara for justifying curfews, crackdowns and civilian deaths by pointing to “ditches” and “barricades” that people in Kurdish neighborhoods have reportedly constructed to deter military incursions.

“Should people act like lambs to the slaughter in the face of all pressures?” asked Selahattin Demirtas, who leads the Peoples Democratic Party, or HDP.

“They (authorities) made a coup after June 7,” Demirtaş said, referring to parliamentary elections in the summer which were followed by a snap election on Nov. 1, after the vote failed to produce a single-party government and coalition talks were fruitless.