The following statement was released by the Australian Kurdish Association on December 22.
Let's Stand Against the Massacre in Kurdistan, Support the Kurdish People's Struggle for Freedom!
As a result of the attacks of the Turkish state forces, a comprehensive war is ongoing in Kurdistan since July of this year. The people of Kurdistan, just like all the peoples of the world, want to live freely and govern themselves in their own country. The Turkish state is rejecting all demands for rights by the Kurdish people and is deploying violent suppression. This is the essence and cause of the problem.
In accordance with its own interests, the AKP government put the ongoing dialogue and negotiation process with the Kurdistan Freedom Movement on hold and initialised the war against the Kurds.
As a result, the Kurdistan Freedom Forces took up a position of self-defence. In many towns and cities, the people of Kurdistan have attempted to establish autonomous local administrations in order to govern themselves without rejecting the state. This action in the towns and cities was a completely civil and democratic affair.
However, in an atmosphere in which even the slightest opposition is not tolerated, the AKP government disregarded the rightful demands of the Kurdish people and opted to violently repress this democratic advance. They declared indefinite curfews, targeted civilians and residential areas, killed hundreds of civilians and destructed towns and cities.
According to statistics from the Human Rights Association and the Human Rights Foundation until the December 5 (after which attacks have continued killing and injuring many more civilians) 173 people have been killed and 226 wounded by the police or military for disobeying a stop warning or from random fire. All of these people were civilians. As a result of suicide attacks (jointly organised by Daesh [ISIS] and the AKP), a total of 138 people were killed, of which 5 died in Diyarbakır, 33 died in Suruç and 100 died in the October 10 attacks in Ankara. A total of 929 people were injured in the three attacks. All the targets were either HDP meetings or opposition rallies.
In the clashes between the guerrillas and the military there have been hundreds of deaths from both sides. Also in these clashes a total of 157 civilians have been killed as a result of aerial bombardments of civilian residential areas. Today, the curfews in the Sur Ici district of Central Diyarbakır, in the Nusaybin and Kerboran districts of Mardin, and in the Cizre and Silopi districts of Şırnak the curfews and attacks are still ongoing as they have been in the past weeks.
Kurdish neighbourhoods are being bombed by tanks, heavy artillery and helicopters. Kurdish towns are being besieged, entrances are not allowed and water and power supplies have been cut-off. Updates of new deaths are frequent and the people are facing the threat of massacre. There is a humanitarian tragedy in Kurdistan.
The Turkish state is undertaking a massacre in front of the eyes of the world. Everyone who calls themselves a human, a democrat or a human rights supporter must raise their voice and stand against this massacre. Our call is to the UN, the EU, the OSCE, the EC, the EU, all international institutions and human rights organisations and everyone that calls themselves a human.
No to Turkey's Kurdish Genocide!
No to the AKP's and its Collaborator's Massacres in Kurdistan!
Let's Support the Struggle of the People of Kurdistan for a Free and Honourable Life in their Homeland!
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