Turkey not doomed to terror: CHP head

ANKARA

DHA photo

Main opposition Republican People’s Party (CHP) leader Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu has slammed the government’s security policies, saying citizens should not have to “get used to living with terror.”

“We are not doomed to live with terrorism, nor are we destined to be ruled by this government,” Kılıçdaroğlu told reporters before his party’s group meeting in parliament.

He also said arresting academics because they expressed their opinions, was the “greatest blow to democracy in Turkey,” adding that other than racism, hate speech and praising violence, people must be free to express their thoughts. 

“People must not be jailed just because they have put their signature on a declaration. There are international standards to adhere to,” Kılıçdaroğlu said. 

He was referring to the arrest of three academics on March 16 on charges of “supporting terror” after they read out a petition signed by more than 1,000 other academics. The petition, which called for an end to clashes between the security forces and the outlawed Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK), triggered angry condemnation from President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan and the government.

The CHP leader said Turkey was once a country that embraced scientists and academics fleeing Nazi Germany, but “now we have become a Turkey that is jailing its own academia.”

Kılıçdaroğlu also slammed the government’s apparent tolerance of the PKK’s build-up of weapons in urban areas during the now collapsed ceasefire, saying it was the ruling Justice and Democratic Party (AKP) that aided and abetted the PKK in order to win votes.. 

“In 2014 security forces wrote 290 notices about PKK deployments in cities, asking for permission to raid them. Somehow, 282 of these requests were rejected. It is the AKP’s prime minister and cabinet ministers who decided on that,” he said. 

While Turkey’s urban areas we being “turned into arsenals,” the prime minister appeared on two TV stations admitting that the government had ordered the security forces to avoid intervening, Kılıçdaroğlu stated.
“This was aiding and abetting. Isn’t this treason?” he added. 

Kılıçdaroğlu also referred to the statements of former Justice Minister Sadullah Ergin, who once said “Öcalan makes good evaluations of the politics of the region,” and Erdoğan’s senior advisor Yiğit Bulut, who once said “Öcalan is opening the path for Turkey.” He also criticized Deputy Prime Minister Yalçın Akdoğan’s comment that “Öcalan has experience in interpreting incidents.”

“If the CHP had said these phrases, the government would have raised hell,” he said.


‘Hitler’s tactic’

The CHP head slammed the government for “diverting attention” from its own failures.

“Every time they create an enemy to divert the country’s attention from their own responsibilities. This is a tactic used by Hitler too,” he said.

“They are trying to teach us to live with terror, saying should learn to live with terror ... Well we have no such desire to live with terror. We want to live in peace in our own country,” Kılıçdaroğlu said.

“I am not condemned to live with this government. I am not doomed to live with terror … I want to live in peace and serenity in my country. I want to be comfortable with my wife, my children and my friends. Those who are governing Turkey have no such concept as civilization in their minds,” he added, stressing that the state should be governed with a system of merit, not based on partisan loyalty.