Diyarbakır vs İzmir rhetoric dominates political landscape

Messages from some Democratic Society Party, or DTP, members saying the attitude they faced in İzmir over the weekend would be similarly applied to other parties when they visit Diyarbakır have caused concern among many here.

“What we are doing is just warning. There can be some reactions in certain places,” DTP co-chair Ahmet Türk told reporters Tuesday at Parliament. Türk ruled out any retaliation and added that the party was working very hard to stop provocations by different groups.

A DTP convoy was attacked by some civilian groups over the weekend in the Aegean coastal city of İzmir, the country’s third-largest city, on the grounds that the flag of the outlawed Kurdistan Workers’ Party, or PKK, was raised alongside that of the DTP.

The incident has sparked concerns about whether the government’s Kurdish move has boosted nationalistic feelings throughout the country, outside of southeastern Anatolia.

DTP deputy Aysel Tuğluk was seen to indirectly threaten the other parties when she said they would face similar reactions when they visit Diyarbakır on Monday. In response, Türk stated that they were just trying to emphasize the fact that the issue was sensitive and urge everyone to behave accordingly.

“We sincerely tell them that we must control our groups in order to keep the tension from growing. What we are doing is just warning [them],” Türk said. “We must all demonstrate a political stand that will nix the ill-intentioned groups’ plans to provoke the ongoing peace process.”

The DTP’s warnings were not welcomed by the Nationalist Movement Party, or MHP.

“I think it is a very wrong approach. They should be aware of the fact that they are about to fall into the [Justice and Development Party, or] AKP’s trap,” the MHP’s Devlet Bahçeli told the reporters at Parliament. “I know how I will go to Diyarbakır when the time comes.”

Responding to the allegations that those who attacked the DTP were from the MHP’s İzmir branch, Bahçeli denied this and said all MHP branches were warned against such provocations in advance. “The MHP members have no time for stoning or throwing eggs,” he said.

Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan urged both the DTP and the assailants to calm down, but said raising the PKK flag during the DTP demonstrations was not right.

“Prime Minister Erdoğan is trying to depict a legal political party’s activities as if they were illegal. It’s not correct,” Türk said.

He added that all the flags raised during the İzmir activities were the DTP’s.