Our Statements

Let’s defeat the International Conspiracy!

Within the framework of the International Conspiracy, our leader [Abdullah Öcalan] was illegally kidnapped and handed over to the colonialist Turkish state. On its 23rd anniversary, we condemn this conspiracy full of anger and hatred. At the same time, we salute Önder Apo [Abdullah Öcalan], who found a clear answer to the International Conspiracy and his hostage-taking through his enormous resistance and struggle. We remember Halit Oral, Viyan Caf and all our heroic Şehits [fallen] who gathered around Önder Apo as a burning protective wall under the slogan ‘You cannot darken our sun’. We renew our promise to always remain united with them. Moreover, we salute the 23 years of uninterrupted resistance and support of our brave and patriotic people and all our international friends for Önder Apo.

At the beginning of the 21st century, the international forces of the conspiracy under the leadership of the USA prepared the `Greater Middle East Project` [GAP]. In this course, they identified the freedom struggle taking place in Kurdistan under the leadership of Önder Apo and the PKK as the biggest regional danger for their capitalist and imperialist plans. They considered the `Free Kurd`, `Free People` and the `Democratic and Free Society`, which Önder Apo tried to create with great efforts, as the decisive obstacle for the capitalist `Greater Middle East Project`. Therefore, Önder Apo was forced to leave Syria within the framework of the International Conspiracy. Tus, they wanted to destroy this great danger and enormous obstacle for the realization of their capitalist and imperialist interests. Consequently, the main goal of the conspiracy was to prevent the Kurds from developing into a free, strong-willed people with their own national identity in the 21st century. This was to enable them to reorder the Middle East based on their own colonialist interests. For this reason, Önder Apo’s arrest took the entire Kurdish people, the Kurdistan Freedom Movement and their national, democratic achievements hostage as part of a comprehensive International Conspiracy.

Önder Apo responded to this great conspiracy by defeating the comprehensive plans and projects that the forces of the conspiracy had developed regarding the Kurds and the entire Middle East. Önder Apo as well as the Kurdish people and the Kurdistan Freedom Movement responded to the conspiracy with an unprecedented resistance and self-renewal. The wall of resistance that our people and our heroic Şehits built around Önder Apo became the basis for the victory over the International Conspiracy. Because they considered Önder Apo as the expression of all the values created by him. They realized that in the person of Önder Apo, the ‘free Kurdish people’, that is, the Kurdish people themselves were to be excluded and imprisoned on a completely isolated prison island. They considered Önder Apo’s imprisonment as their own imprisonment. Our people recognized very clearly the connection with their own historical tragedy. Consequently, they decided to support the resistance on Imrali. Because they knew that they would achieve their own liberation only if they put an end to this tragedy.

Önder Apo’s attitude towards this great conspiracy and these imperialist plans represents an enormous resistance aimed at breaking the tragic fate foreseen for the Kurds. He has thus demonstrated his determination to end the genocide that has been determined as the fate of the Kurds for the last 100 years. Despite his difficult prison conditions, he has responded to the International Conspiracy with an enormous mental revolution. As a revolutionary popular leader, he has acted as a philosopher, sage, political scientist and historian. Thus, he has resisted on an ideal, mental and physical level to avert the tragic fate that was destined for his people. He has provided the Kurdish people and all other peoples, women and resisting oppressed people with the most progressive ideas of our era. Through the concepts he developed, he has brought forth a new paradigm for a free and democratic life. Through his theses for a free life and a free society, he has developed the strongest defense imaginable against the greatest conspiracy of our epoch. His defense of Democratic Civilization represents an effective defense on behalf of the Kurds, women and all the oppressed. Thus, it represents a defense of the free man and the democratic society. Under the conditions of imprisonment in Imrali, Önder Apo has developed a social paradigm based on democracy, ecology and women’s freedom. This paradigm and program will change the destiny of all oppressed people in the 21st century and serve as a basis for a new life and a new way of struggle. Önder Apo himself gave this paradigm the name ‘Democratic Modernity`.

As a result, the past 23 years of Önder Apo’s imprisonment on Imrali did not go as planned by the forces of the International Conspiracy. On the contrary, in the name of all of humanity, the idea of a democratic and free society was developed in a comprehensive way during this period. Today, these ideas of Önder Apo are being developed into a social system wherever Kurds live. Thus, they are developing into a new understanding of life and resistance. This represents an enormous source of inspiration for all oppressed people. In the course of this, a movement has emerged that is creating enormous excitement and hope.

The forces of the International Conspiracy, under the leadership of the USA, wanted to set both Turkey and Kurdistan on fire and thus make the 21st century the scene of a Turkish-Kurdish war. They aimed to bring the Turks and Kurds, who have always lived together in friendship, into conflict with each other. Thus, the International Conspiracy is not only directed against the Kurds, but against all of Turkey. However, due to his foresighted and prudent reaction, Önder Apo foiled the plan to set the peoples against each other. He did everything in his power to save Turkey from the hopeless situation of dying and killing and tried to use even the smallest chance for a democratic and peaceful solution of the Kurdish question. Letting even the smallest opportunity for a democratic solution and peace pass by unused, he described as bloodshed and murder. Accordingly, he always vehemently insisted on solving the existing problems through dialogue and negotiations. However, the leadership of the colonialist Turkish state and the Erdogan government thwarted every attempt of Önder Apo for a democratic solution and peace. Based on this attitude, the fascist Erdogan government interrupted the negotiations with Önder Apo in 2015, thus ending the solution negotiations. This represents the biggest conspiracy imaginable against the peoples of Turkey. As a result of the resulting genocidal attacks at home and abroad, the International Conspiracy was again put on the agenda and intensified once more.

With the help of new genocidal offensives, the genocidal, colonialist Turkish state is trying to achieve today what it could not achieve with the help of the International Conspiracy of February 15, 1999. It is also using the support of certain forces that were already involved in the conspiracy at that time. Today, the fascist AKP-MHP government and its international allies have revived the International Conspiracy and put it on the agenda again. The policy implemented daily in the Imrali prison is a special and systematic policy against a person. At the same time, this policy violates the law. It would be a big mistake to understand the measures there as a normal prison policy of the Turkish state. The special policy of total isolation implemented on Imrali is the main reason for the lack of a solution to the Kurdish question and for the ongoing disputes. Neither the Kurdish people nor the Kurdistan Freedom Movement are ready to accept the torture system and the policy of total isolation on Imrali. They are putting up a comprehensive resistance against this policy. This resistance will continue in the future.

The capitalist system of the 20th century did not accept the Kurds as an honorable people or nation with its own language, culture and identity. It always denied its existence as a nation. The hegemonic capitalist states of the 20th century colonized Kurdistan according to their imperialist interests and greedily divided the natural resources of the region among themselves. They divided Kurdistan and its people into several parts. They founded the Turkish nation-state with the aim of using it as a guard against the USSR. In order to ensure its regional hegemony, the Turkish state was granted the largest part of Kurdistan. On the basis of these agreements, the colonialist Turkish nation-state has pursued a strategy towards the Kurds that has clearly been a systematic policy of denial and annihilation for about 100 years. All governments of Turkey have since competed about who would implement this colonialist genocide politics directed against the Kurds even better than their predecessor governments. Numerous governments were formed, which took part in this colonialist-genocidal competition. But none of these governments were able to achieve their goal and save themselves from their defeat against the resistance of the Kurds. The current fascist AKP-MHP government of the colonialist Turkish state represents the most merciless of all previous governments in this contest. In the course of the history of the Republic of Turkey, no government has pursued such hostile policies towards the Kurds as the AKP-MHP government. It has massively increased hostility towards the Kurds. It should not be forgotten that hostility towards the Kurds is also hostility towards Turkey. Hostility towards the Kurds does not serve Turkey’s regional interests. As long as this policy is not given up, Turkey will not be democratized and will not be able to solve any of its numerous problems. Everyone must recognize this today. The fascist AKP-MHP government poses an enormous problem not only for the Kurds, but for all of Turkey. It has already gone down in history as a torturing, genocidal, tyrannical, raping and lying government that understands nothing about law and justice and commits massive robbery.

The genocide of the fascist AKP-MHP government knows no borders. Its hostility towards Kurds is not limited to Turkey, but has now spread to all areas inhabited by Kurds. It uses the lie of an alleged anti-terrorist struggle to bomb the mountains, valleys and civilian villages of South Kurdistan every day. In Rojava, it attacks civilian vehicles every day with armed drones and murders playing children with artillery attacks. It takes revenge on our Ezidi people, who were saved from the horrors of the Islamic State (IS), for the defeat of IS. Every day it attacks them with its drones and warplanes. This government also bombs our patriotic people in the Maxmur refugee camp every day with warplanes, thus trying to intimidate the people living there, force them to surrender and break their will. Most recently, brutal, coordinated airstrikes hit Maxmur, Şengal and Derik [in Rojava] simultaneously on the night of February 1. They represent a continuation of the genocidal attacks based on hostility towards the Kurds. The aim is to intimidate the Kurds and dissuade them from their struggle. However, it is obvious that the Kurds will only resist this genocidal policy and attacks with more strength and determination. Through its protests all over Kurdistan against the recent fascist genocidal attacks, our people have once again shown their fighting determination and strong will.

These brutal attacks clearly show that AKP-MHP fascism is struggling for its own survival. The fascist regime is in a phase of disintegration. The colonialist and genocidal policy in Kurdistan and Turkey is about to end and will not be able to prevent its own collapse. Today, Turkey has no other option but to solve the Kurdish question and democratize itself. Fascism and genocidal politics are only dragging out this phase, intensifying the chaos and increasing the casualties on both sides. This is because the AKP-MHP government today has no other means than war to keep itself alive. The peoples of Turkey today are desperate to get rid of this great burden. No single lie of the AKP-MHP government will help to save this government anymore. Colonialism will definitely end up on the garbage heap of history.

A people whose leader is held captive is itself in captivity. Therefore, Önder Apo’s captivity represents our own captivity, just as his freedom represents our freedom. As long as Önder Apo remains captive, all discussions about a solution have no meaning. Everyone must be aware that supposedly solution-oriented discussions that ignore Önder Apo’s continued imprisonment and the tightened, total isolation on Imrali do not cause any confidence. No one can expect a people that stands up for its identity, culture and honor and wants to determine its own destiny to take such discussions seriously, which lack any basis. Therefore, today more than ever, it is time to fight. It is time to resist oppression, tyranny and injustice. Accordingly, together with our people, we will definitely smash the International Conspiracy in its 24th year.

We call upon our people in all parts of Kurdistan and abroad to continue their struggle until victory for the end of total isolation, victory over the new and dangerous total war plans of the forces of the International Conspiracy and the end of the conspiracy with all their strength. Especially the Kurdish youth and the women have the responsibility to take a leading role in this phase. Therefore, we call upon the Kurdish youth and all Kurdish women to further strengthen their organization and actions in order to secure Önder Apo’s health, safety and freedom.

Over the past 23 years, the number of international friends of the Kurdish people has increased greatly. Very valuable and meaningful friendly relations have developed with the peoples of the Middle East as well as with the peoples of Europe and other parts of the world. The democratic and peaceful friendship between the peoples, religious communities and cultures and their democratic unity intended by Önder Apo has created completely new values for the whole of humanity, for democracy and freedom. We call upon all our international friends to stand together with the Kurds for Önder Apo, who has paved the way for friendship and democratic unity among the peoples. At the same time, we call on them to protest against the International Conspiracy and total isolation on Imrali that has been going on for 23 years and to hold all the forces of the conspiracy accountable, especially the Kurdish, genocidal and colonialist regime of Turkey and the fascist AKP-MHP government.

Co-Presidency

KCK Executive Council