According to what Turkish and Kurdish political analysts and supporters told Sky News Arabia, as Kurds in Turkey and Syria await more military clashes and arrests by the Turkish government, Kurds in northern Iraq expect more trade and the return of oil exports between the two sides.
The Justice and Development Party, Turkey’s ruling party since 2002, spoke early in its rule of ending crises with the Kurds, and it struck a peace deal with the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) in 2015, so that the troubles between them returned again.
Concern among the Kurds of Türkiye
Turkey’s Kurds voted for the opposition Ummah Alliance in recent presidential and parliamentary elections, hoping to oust the ruling Justice and Development Party, but the latter’s victory raised concerns about 4 dots:
The fate of the Peoples’ Democratic Party, which is affiliated with the Kurds, and a complaint has been filed against it to ban it, and Interior Minister Suleiman Soylu described it, in statements televised a few days ago , as “aimed at poisoning Turkish democracy.” The fate of the PKK and Abdullah Ocalan, that the Kurds seek to free him and the rest of the Kurdish prisoners. Continuous arrests among Kurdish politicians and activists. Continuation of security and military operations against the PKK in southern Turkey.
On these points, Turkish political analyst Jewad Gök told Sky News Arabia that the tension between the Kurds and the government will increase with the upcoming municipal elections.
In Gök’s words, the AKP “has become a nationalist party”, which increases the differences between them.
Mistrust among the Kurds of Syria
The Kurds have expressed their apprehension of new Turkish military operations in the areas of influence of the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) in northeastern Syria.
The representative of the Syrian Democratic Council in Egypt, Laila Moussa, told Sky News Arabia that Erdogan always calls Turkey after the 100, referring to the Lausanne agreement signed 100 years ago between Turkey and the countries of ‘Europe, and drew the current borders of Turkey, and the Turkish president also spoke of his desire to cancel it on the grounds that it is lower than the real borders of his country.
According to some Turks, the borders Erdogan is referring to include Kurdish-held areas in northeastern Syria, raising fears among Kurds that he is annexing them to his country.
Laila Musa adds on this subject: “It is not unlikely that Erdogan will support groups in Syria to confront (SDF), or intervene through a military operation”.
Optimism in Iraqi Kurdistan
As for the Iraqi Kurds, they expect more cooperation between the regional government of Iraqi Kurdistan, which is run by an autonomous system, and the Turkish president, according to Saad Al-Hamwandi, adviser to the leader of the Democratic Party of Kurdistan, Masoud Barzani, at Sky News Arabia.
Among the forms of this cooperation, hopes Al-Hamwandi, “the first gains will be the return of oil exports from the region to Turkey and the increase in trade”.
Al-Hamvandi described relations between Iraqi Kurdistan and Turkey as “good” and “will improve”, and also expected an agreement between Ankara and the Kurdistan region on the presence of the PKK in the region.
Kurds make up about a fifth of Turkey’s population of 85 million, and parliamentary elections on May 14 showed a drop in the Kurdish vote for the Justice and Development Party, in exchange for the awarding of more votes to the alliance of opposition nations.
The Kurds participated in the elections with the Kurdish Labor and Freedom Alliance, which won 66 of the 600 seats in parliament.
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