Sir, - The hypocrisy of the West in relation to the rights of the Kurds stinks to high heaven. While President Clinton reacts fiercely to Saddam Hussein's attacks on Iraqi Kurdistan, and his allies applaud, the Turkish Government pursues with impunity its atrocities on its own Kurdish minority, amply assisted with military supplies from the West.
It is strategically inconvenient to condemn, much less intervene, to prevent the major human rights crime which is being perpetrated in South Eastern Turkey, the Kurdish region. Some 15,000-20,000 Kurds have been killed, over 2,000 village razed, and 2-3 million people displaced into internal exile in Western Turkey. ,Kurdish MPs have been murdered and imprisoned and their parties banned, and disappearances and torture are commonplace.
Pro Kurdish newspapers have been closed, their premises bombed and their journalists murdered and detained. The Turkish Government denies the existence of a Kurdish minority, and thus the problem itself, while the use of the Kurdish language is banned except in songs and private conversation.
Last November, astonishingly, Turkey was accepted into customs union with the EU. Ireland, which now holds the presidency of the Council of Ministers, should use its considerable influence to require immediate implementation of the conditions set for customs union membership and which (surprise, surprise!) remain unfulfilled.
Ireland's history and present position make it uniquely qualified to lead the EU in requiring Turkey to change its policy as part of a comprehensive package to give the Kurds, throughout their historic territory, the status and rights that they deserve.
Yours, etc.,
Plaid Cymru Office,
Wind Street,
Llandyshul,
Ceredigion, 5A44 4BD.