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Turkey escalates its war on the Kurds

Peter Boyle — Thu, 04 Jul 2024 08:00:00 +1000

In a recent escalation of the Recep Tayyip Erdoğan regime’s ongoing war against Kurds, the Turkish armed forces has deployed about 1000 troops and 300 tanks and armoured vehicles in Duhok province in Iraqi Kurdistan, reports Peter Boyle.

Calls from prominent Australians for freedom for Kurdish leader Abdullah Öcalan

Peter Boyle — Fri, 13 Oct 2023 16:15:00 +1100

Prominent Australians have joined the global call on the government of Turkey to free Kurdish leader Abdullah Öcalan, reports Peter Boyle.

Solidarity Minded mutual aid group plans to work with Yazidi massacre survivors

Peter Boyle — Wed, 16 Aug 2023 14:00:00 +1000

Peter Boyle spoke to Ryan Capozzi from Solidarity Minded, a mutual aid group specialising in mental health that is planning to work with Yezidi survivors of the Daesh (Islamic State) massacre in Iraqi Kurdistan nine years ago.

Kurds and supporters protest 'canceling' of Kurdistan in Treaty of Lausanne 100 years ago

Peter Boyle — Mon, 24 Jul 2023 12:30:00 +1000

Kurds and their supporters rallied as part of global protests over the "canceling" of Kurdistan in Treaty of Lausanne, 100 years ago. Peter Boyle reports.

Video: Rally calls on Australia to stand up against isolation of Kurdish leader

Peter Boyle — Mon, 17 Apr 2023 11:45:00 +1000

Kurdish-Australians and their supporters called on the federal government and other world powers to stand up against isolation of Kurdish leader Abdullah Öcalan. Peter Boyle reports.

Turkish state weaponises earthquake disaster against Kurds

Peter Boyle — Wed, 22 Feb 2023 11:45:00 +1100

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan is weaponising the triple earthquake disaster in south-eastern Turkey and north-eastern Syria against the Kurdish population by blocking and delaying emergency responses, reports Peter Boyle.

Video: Turkish dictator Erdogan weaponises earthquake disaster against Kurds

Peter Boyle — Wed, 15 Feb 2023 21:15:00 +1100

Turkish dictator President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan is using the earthquake disaster as a weapon in his ongoing war on the Kurdish people according to Zerebar Karimi.

Campaign for freedom of Kurdish leader Abdullah Öcalan takes to Sydney Harbour

Peter Boyle — Tue, 07 Feb 2023 14:15:00 +1100

Kurds and supporters began a month-long campaign to free imprisoned Kurdish leader Abdullah Öcalan by sailing through iconic Sydney Harbour in a flag and banner-dressed yacht. Peter Boyle reports.

Nilüfer Koç: ‘Iran uprising gives new hope for oppressed people’

Alex Bainbridge — Thu, 17 Nov 2022 15:00:00 +1100

Nilüfer Koç from the Kurdish National Congress spoke at the Ecosocialism 2022 conference about the popular uprising in Iran, war in Ukraine and Rojava Revolution. Alex Bainbridge and Susan Price report.

International silence over Turkey’s use of banned chemical weapons against Kurds

Peter Boyle — Thu, 20 Oct 2022 13:30:00 +1100

Shocking video footage was released on October 18, showing the painful death of two young Kurdish freedom fighters, who were among 17 people recently killed in a chemical weapons attack by Turkey, reports Peter Boyle.

Iraq: Western powers accused of complicity in Turkish airstrike on Kurdish refugee camp

Steve Sweeney — Mon, 07 Feb 2022 19:15:00 +1100

Steve Sweeney writes that Kurdish officials have accused Western powers of complicity in Turkish airstrikes on the United Nations-administered Makhmour Refugee Camp in northern Iraq.

Abdullah Ocalan: Symbol of 100 years of Kurdish resistance

John Tully — Sun, 06 Feb 2022 13:45:00 +1100

Abdullah Ocalan's jailers hoped that by slamming shut the prison doors, the world would forget about him. But, as John Tully writes, Ocalan remains a living symbol of resistance to a century of oppression by the Turkish state.

Turkey attacks Kurdish refugee camp in northern Iraq

Peter Boyle — Fri, 25 Jun 2021 10:45:00 +1000

About 13,000 Kurdish refugees from south-eastern Turkey live inside the UNHCR-recognised Makhmur refugee camp, which is being attacked by Turkish forces, reports Peter Boyle.

Palestinians, Kurds and confusion

Sarah Glynn — Mon, 17 May 2021 14:45:00 +1000

The Kurds and the Palestinians are fighting the same struggle against oppression, writes Sarah Glynn, but it is worrying to see debates among Kurds about support for the Palestinians, and antagonism from some Palestinians towards the Kurds.

Interview: Why trade unions should campaign to free Kurdish leader Abdullah Öcalan

Peter Boyle — Mon, 12 Apr 2021 09:00:00 +1000

Trade unions have a long, proud history of supporting struggles of workers and oppressed people around the world. The campaign to free Abdullah Öcalan is a continuation of this activism, says Clare Baker.

Kurds celebrate Newroz 2021 in NSW parliament

Peter Boyle — Sat, 20 Mar 2021 12:45:00 +1100

The Kurdish community in Australia held a Newroz (Kurdish New Year) celebration in NSW Parliament House, Peter Boyle reports.

Kurdish women’s solidarity with the Women's March for Justice

Kurdistan Women’s Liberation Movement — Fri, 19 Mar 2021 12:15:00 +1100

The Kurdistan Women’s Liberation Movement sent the following message of solidarity to the Women's March for Justice, which mobilised more than 100,000 women and their allies around Australia on March 15.

NATO again goes to war against Kurdistan

Marcel Cartier — Fri, 12 Feb 2021 11:30:00 +1100

Turkey has opened a new front in its ongoing war of annihilation against the Kurdish liberation movement, writes Marcel Cartier.

Biden will wage war on the Kurdish revolution

Marcel Cartier — Sat, 26 Dec 2020 23:30:00 +1100

President elect Joe Biden has been described as a "friend of the Kurds", writes Marcel Cartier, but under his presidency, US attempts to undermine the Rojava Revolution by any means necessary is likely to continue.

Call for Kurdish unity as Turkey attempts a 'final solution'

Peter Boyle — Fri, 13 Nov 2020 12:45:00 +1100

Peter Boyle reports that the Turkish military is stepping up its attack on Kurdistan Workers Party guerilla bases and self-governing Yazidi communities in Shengal.

Turkey steps up military intervention in Iraq

Chris Slee — Fri, 14 Jun 2019 15:30:00 +1000

Turkish jets began bombing the Xakurke region of northern Iraq on May 26. The following day Turkish helicopters transported troops into the area. This was the latest step in Turkey’s growing military intervention in the predominantly Kurdish north of Iraq, writes Chris Slee.

British singer Joss Stone performs a concert in Rojava

Stuart Munckton — Thu, 21 Mar 2019 16:00:00 +1100

Famous British singer Joss Stone performed a concert in the largely-Kurdish region of Rojava in northern Syria after sneaking across the border.

Kurdish activist: 'I'm on hunger strike for freedom'

Stuart Munckton — Fri, 08 Feb 2019 12:00:00 +1100

Leyla Guven, a member of Turkey’s parliament for the left-wing, Kurdish-led People’s Democratic party (HDP), launched an indefinite hunger strike on November 7 from Amed Prison, where she was held jailed by Turkey’s regime. Her demand is for an end to the isolation of jailed Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) leader Abdullah Ocalan.

Jailed by Turkey since 1999, Ocalan is the recognised leader of the Kurdish liberation movement. Since 2011, his lawyers have been unable to met with him.

Syria: Assad threatens Idlib while Afrin resists Turkish occupation

Chris Slee — Thu, 13 Sep 2018 09:15:00 +1000

The Assad regime and its allies have been building up their forces around the rebel-held Idlib province, in Syria’s north-west, in preparation for a major offensive. Some bombing raids have already been carried out in the south and west of the province.

How women are increasingly leading Turkey’s socialist movement

Muhsin Yorulmaz — Fri, 03 Aug 2018 11:30:00 +1000

In common with many other countries, Turkey’s socialist movement has been marked by the dominance of men in positions of leadership and authority.

The patriarchy is a social order that has become dominant globally over the course of millennia and which connects with oppressive conceptions of the family, exploitation and inheritance — in short, with social class. Socialists cannot stand by as it recreates itself in the very structures we claim exist to overturn social stratification and oppression.

Policies of Turkey's Erdoğan’s, at home and abroad, are a desperate bid to buy time

Muhsin Yorulmaz — Sun, 29 Jul 2018 18:15:00 +1000

Russian revolutionary Vladimir Lenin was said to have remarked that there are decades in which nothing happens, and weeks in which decades happen. Muhsin Yorulmaz writes that, in Turkey, there is no escaping this particular truism.

Because of the rapid rate of betrayals, shifting alliances and crises, it becomes difficult to summarise what the Turkish government or state are “thinking” in a given week, even for those of us who speak Turkish.

Rojava revolution will democratise Syria

Stuart Munckton — Sun, 22 Jul 2018 15:30:00 +1000

The Kurdistan Communities Union (KCK) is an umbrella group of left-wing organisations in Turkey, Syria, Iraq and Iran that adhere to the ideology of Kurdish revolutionary leader Abdullah Ocalan (known as “Apo”), currently in jail in Turkey. Forces associated with the KCK have helped lead the Rojava Revolution in Syria’s north, which marked its sixth anniversary on July 19, the day Kurdish-led forces staged an insurrection.

The women of Kurdistan stand in solidarity with the women of Ireland – and call for a Yes vote to Repeal the 8th

Rosa Gilbert — Fri, 25 May 2018 14:15:00 +1000

As Ireland prepares for its referendum today, May 25, on repealing the constitutional amendment prohibiting free, safe, legal abortion, women and health workers in Rojava, the largely Kurdish area in Syria's north, have expressed their solidarity with Irish women’s right to choose.

With the exception of the Vatican state and Malta, Ireland has the most restrictive abortion laws in Europe. It exceeds Saudi Arabia and Qatar in its restrictions on women’s rights to basic reproductive health.

Whose Free Syrian Army? The Arab opposition resisting Turkey's Afrin assault

Stuart Munckton — Fri, 23 Feb 2018 17:15:00 +1100

When a democratic uprising broke out against the Syrian dictatorship of Bashar al-Assad in 2011, the regime responded with brutal repression. Aided by defections from the Syrian Army, this helped turn the mass protest movement into the armed conflict that wracks Syria today.

As Syria's conflict intensifies, where do democratic hopes lie?

Tony Iltis — Fri, 23 Feb 2018 14:00:00 +1100

The defeat of ISIS in Syria last year raised hopes that the long-running war that has displaced more than two-thirds of the population might be coming to an end. However, the attempted Turkish invasion of the Afrin region of Rojava (Syrian Kurdistan), which began on January 20, has underlined that the war is in fact intensifying.