Australian Greens leader Adam Bandt, Greens foreign affairs spokesperson Senator Janet Rice and New South Wales MLC David Shoebridge pledged support to the Kurdish struggle for freedom, justice and peace at a well-attended function in the Democratic Kurdish Community Centre in Western Sydney on February 26.
鈥淔reedom and human rights are non-negotiable,鈥 Bandt said, noting that the major parties have often traded off such principles even while paying lip service to such values.
鈥淚n this country, where we enjoy liberties and democracy that people in many other countries don鈥檛 have, we should enjoy them but also use them to ensure that other people have those same rights to self-determination, liberty and freedoms. You have our strong support and will always have it,鈥 he added.
Rice said the Greens would call out the Turkish government for its human rights abuses and attacks on Kurdish people. 鈥淭he Turkish government should cease its attacks on the Kurdistan People鈥檚 Democratic Party (HDP) and immediately comply with the European Court ruling and release all those who it has unjustly detained.鈥
She said the incarceration of Abdullah 脰calan in solitary confinement was 鈥渁bsolutely outrageous鈥. 鈥淗is human rights have been trashed and it is all the more galling when he has denounced violence, advocated a peaceful resolution to the conflict and has advocated for participatory democracy processes, which respect the human rights of all.
鈥淭here is no doubt if there is going to be peace with the Kurdish people, 脰calan is going to be core to that,鈥 she argued, adding 鈥渢he Australian government should be loudly calling for this torture of 脰calan to cease鈥.
Shoebridge made reference to the Russian invasion of Ukraine, saying the violence was 鈥渋nexcusable鈥. 鈥淲e see a powerful nation aggressor against a smaller nation, with homes being destroyed, families being destroyed and I am glad it is being called out.
鈥淏ut Kurdish people know this has been happening to your homeland for years. You know that the Turkish government has been sending drones to kill your people. You know that the Kurdish people have been standing in a war of self-determination and to protect their own families from the violence of Islamic State 鈥 And where is the news coverage of that? Have political leaders here been calling out that? Well they haven鈥檛.鈥
There is a 鈥渃ollective blindness鈥 and 鈥渃ollective silence鈥 about the human rights of the Kurdish people that has to end, he said. 鈥淚 give you this commitment that I won鈥檛 be silent about this if I am elected to the Senate. I will join my colleagues inside and outside Parliament, as I have done in the NSW Parliament, to call for the urgent release of Abdullah 脰calan as a core part of a peaceful and just settlement for the Kurdish people.鈥
The Greens said it would seek an urgent review of the terrorist listing of the Kurdistan聽Workers Party (PKK) by the Australian Parliamentary Joint Committee on Intelligence and Security. 鈥淭here is a real distinction between a liberation movement and a terrorist organisation, and it is time our government understood that,鈥 Shoebridge said.
The Greens MPs expressed their admiration for the achievements of the Rojava revolution in North and East Syria and said they would like to visit the territory liberated from the Islamic State.