Handan Tufan-Medya Cebe/JINHA

WAN - Figen Yüksekdağ, co-chair of Turkey's left Peoples' Democratic Party (HDP), has traveled to the Kurdistan region of the country speaking to residents of towns under police and military assault. Figen described what she had seen as "a war against the people" by the ruling government.

Over recent weeks, the ruling AKP government in Turkey has been ordering unceasing military and police attacks in the Kurdistan region of the country. Figen Yüksekdağ, chair of the left party HDP, commented on the violence. She noted that the state began launching such attacks in the wake of a massive electoral victory for her party in Kurdistan, where the AKP lost a significant amount of votes.

"This is a war being waged against the people," said Figen. She reported on what she has seen over a week as part of a delegation visiting the towns of Şemdinli, Yüksekova and Hakkari.

"The things we saw, these were attacks that are forbidden even by the laws of war," said Figen. "They're using all kinds of heavy weaponry against the people--howitzers, rocket launchers, bombs, weapons that we haven't yet even been able to identify. We witnessed the kind of destruction that comes from using those weapons in inhabited areas," said Figen. Figen said that the scale of the destruction pointed to a deliberate policy of targeting civilians.

"Yes, we know that this is an area where guerrillas have certain amounts of activity, but the attacks we've seen, the deaths and assassinations, and the way these attacks have happened, show that civilians are being targeted," she said. She described the scene as the delegation arrived at the town of Şemdinli, where dozens of burned-out vehicles nearly blocked the road. "People who do this can't be aiming to 'protect the country,'" said Figen.

Figen noted that the local people have made a conscious decision not to abandon their homes, as an act of resistance against the war. "People are really being forced to migrate," said Figen, but the people have organized to stand their ground. Figen evaluated this as a democratic impulse, as Kurdish people said that they wanted the right to local governance. Figen noted that the conscious stance that the Kurdish people have taken to defend their democratic rights shows the way to Turkey.

But, she said, "if the war in this land isn't stopped, all of Turkey will drown."

(fk/cm)