Kurdistan

Martin Thomas from Workers' Liberty spoke on Saturday 4 May 2019 at a May Day event organised by the Worker-communist Party of Iran (Hekmatist, Official Line) in London.

The event also featured speakers from the Worker-communist Party of Kurdistan, Iran Protests Live Information, the Frontline Socialist Party of Sri Lanka, and the Workers' International Network, and a speech from Iranian writer Narvin Parvaz.

Below is the text of the speech from Noori Bashir, representing the Worker-communist Party of Kurdistan.

On 19 December, US president Donald Trump announced a snap decision to withdraw US troops from Syria. At first he said the troops would be out within 30 days, but now it looks like several months at least. The plan is now conditional on assurances from Turkey regarding the safety of the Kurds in Northern Syria.

Dear comrades: We would like to take the opportunity to tell you what we think about the issues raised in your motion.

We recognise the long history of Kurdish oppression and we are for the rights of the Kurds to self-determination.

Urgent action to all Trade union & Left organisations

Re: Urgent action Against KRG

Dear Sir or Madam:

The political situation in Iraqi Kurdistan is deteriorating day by day. Kurdistan Regional Government announced in early 2016 that it would cut government employee salaries by 15 to 75 percent, depending on position and salary bracket, as part of austerity measures to deal with the ongoing economic crisis.

Kurdish forces retreated from Afrin in northern Syria on 19 March after Turkey seized control of the centre of the city.
On 25 March Turkish state media said they had full control of the city and were now “sweeping for landmines and IEDs to allow citizens to return.”

Lively and disruptive protests took place on Sunday 11 March at Kings Cross and Manchester Piccadilly rail stations, blocking the track in Manchester and closing King’s Cross.

They have pushed the Turkish military assault on Kurdish-held Afrin in Syria back into the headlines.
While a siege on the enclave of Eastern Ghouta has dominated much press coverage, what has happened in Afrin has been just as brutal.

Salih Musleem was formerly the co-president of the Kurdish Democratic Union Party, the political arm of the Kurdish Peoples Protection Units (YPG), in Syria.

He was invited to take part in a conference on the Middle East, but was arrested in a hotel in Prague by Czech security forces following a request from the Turkish Government.

He has now been released.

The Turkish government accused Musleem of being a terrorist.

Turkey’s incursion and bombing campaign in Kurdish controlled area of Afrin is a worrying escalation in a prolonged stand-off on the Syrian border.

Erdogan’s hostility to the expanding territory now under the control of Kurdish forces has been held back by the support of both Russia and the US for the Kurdish forces. But as relations have thawed between Turkey and Russia, the dynamic has changed.

Muhsin Kareem from the Worker Communist Party of Kurdistan spoke to Solidarity about the situation in Kirkuk.

The situation right now in Kirkuk is not one of a complete occupation; the city is look like to operate normally. But despite of Hashd Al- Sha’abi is now not in Kirkuk itself and deployed in outskirts, but the people are very worried and many have left especially the Kurds.

Over 100,000 Kurds have fled Kirkuk since the Iraqi army and the Hash’d al-Shaabi militia seized control of the territory, in the face of an overwhelming vote for an independent Kurdistan.

Kirkuk is of great importance for both Kurds and the Iraqi government. Its oilfields would have made any potential Kurdish state economically viable and allow it to quickly establish international trade links. Few oilfields now remain in the hands of the Kurdish peshmerga fighters.