CWEH Activists Blog: 17 January 2020
Carol Yong

The title of a book[1], “No friends but the mountains”, figuratively described the life of “the largest nation without a state” – the Kurds. Yet, today, even the mountains are no longer safe for civilians who traditionally have inhabited the countryside surrounded by mountain ranges for centuries (see CWEH Activists blog post: Atrocities against women and girls as tool for "devil-worshippers" cleansing)

For decades, the Kurds have struggled for an independent Kurdistan, and no less for recognition of their origins, existence and identity as a distinct people, rich traditions, cultures and historical sites.

It is not possible to give a full blown account on the history of the Kurds in a short article such as this. As such, I will only mention that the creation of an autonomous Kurdistan dates back to the aftermath of World War I. A treaty known as the Treaty of Sèvres was signed on 10^th August 1920 that granted the Kurds the right to form a sovereign state. However, the Kurds were betrayed by the Allied Powers, who gave up on any intention of implementing the Treaty of Sèvres, following an armed nationalist rebellion and a further treaty, the Treaty of Lausanne (published on 24^th July 1923). At the core, the Treaty of Lausanne “duly recognized a new Turkish state incorporating most of the Kurdish territories. The treaty did not mention the Kurds and spoke only of the rights of non-Muslim minorities, a category which excluded most Kurds” (Bulloch and Morries, p.91), and they remain so today. Indeed, present day Kurds are the largest ethnic minority that live mainly in Turkey, Iran, Iraq, Syria and the former Soviet Union.

Above all, “Kurdistan” has long been eyed by different political, economic and religious competing world powers and forces. The primary greed, then as now, has been to tap and exploit the territories’ rich resources including oil reserves, and control the headwaters of the Tigris and Euphrates, vital rivers to Syria, Turkey and Iraq. One example is the Turkish government’s South East Anatolia Project (GAP) encompassing the building of 22 dams and 19 hydroelectric power plants on the Euphrates and Tigris rivers and their tributaries, mostly in Kurdish regions, for electric power, flood control, irrigation and other public purposes. That is what the Turkish authorities wanted the world to believe: to transform the remote and troubled south east Turkey. But what many Kurds think, is that, the dams were motivated primarily by the Turkish state’s desire to destroy the Kurds as an ethnic group by destroying their homes, villages, agricultural lands and, most importantly, cultural and historic sites.

And so it happened: I watched with deep sadness as a European television programme today showed bulldozers tearing down archaeological remains and artefacts of Hasankeyf, an historic Kurdish city. The demolition of Hasankeyf made no media headlines, although in my eyes it is akin to the crimes of the Taliban to the Buddhist heritage in Afghanistan; indeed it was by chance I kept the TV on after the evening news.

Over the last 20 years or so, local and international campaigns were launched to stop the Ilisu Dam and the flooding of Hasankeyr as well as 52 villages and 15 hamlets, requiring the forced relocation of an estimated 15,000-20,000 people, mainly Kurds. Although the campaigns managed to bring the plight of the Kurds to the world’s attention that did not stop the Turkish authorities from building the Ilísu Dam and relocating the affected peoples. The Ilisu Dam was completed in 2019.

Ironically, Hasankeyf was designated as a site of historic importance in 1984 under the Turkish Protection of Cultural and Historic Sites Law (No. 2863). If the demolition of Hasankeyf by the Turkish government today is not evidence of a political agenda for the eradication of Kurdish culture, as many Kurds claimed, then what? The loss of Hasankeyf and the city’s unique history, surrounding caves, archaeological sites and artefacts of religious and cultural significance both to the local Kurds and humankind is forever.

In connection with my academic work on dams in Malaysia, I went to Diyarbakir and Hasankeyf in 2000. At that time, I was attending a feminist conference in Istanbul and after it ended, I self-funded a trip to the south east part of Turkey. I wanted to see at first hand Hasankeyf and Diyarbakir with its ancient walls encircling the city. I wanted to talk to local people and groups in the region to know their concerns about the GAP project, and, in particular, the Ilisu Dam. I learned a lot from my experience, both personally and politically. After the demolition work of the bulldozers, all that remains to me are my personal recollections of photographs and stories on places I saw and people I met when I travelled to Diyarbakir and Hasankeyf in 2000 (see article: Hasankeyf Hard Rock VOX Nov5 2000 [PDF 926.74KB]).