PKK  TERROR  in Turkey

In this page you will find information about PKK... A terrorist organization that caused death of thousands of people, and suffered millions of mums,fathers, children and wifes of death civilians, soldiers and also of terrorists...

No one on the earth can know how much we - Turks and Kurds - had suffered during that violate preiod...

They sad "we are fighting for the freedoom of Kurds" but had killed lots of Kurds

They sad "we are fighting for the humanrights" but had killed civilians including our babies...

Those were some pieces from our suffers, but at the end like the end of every bad man "baby killer" Abdullah Ocalan was been caught by Turkish special forces (with the help of CIA and Mossad)... So our suffer's of our people now became less...
But we want him to have a fair justice and he'll have this against all the things he had done...(by Faruk kilickaya)

And you will find information (taken from international sources) about this terrorist organization.
 

PKK:Kurdistan Workers'Party
(PKK) (Turkey)
Description

Established in 1974 as a Marxist-Leninist insurgent group primarily composed of Turkish Kurds, in recent years the pKK has moved beyond rural-based insurgent activities to include urban terrorism. Seeks to set up an independent Kurdish state in southeastern Turkey, where they said there is a  predominantly Kurdish population.

Activities

Primary targets are Turkish Government security forces in Turkey and civil public including also Kurds but also has been active in Western Europe against Turkish targets. Conducted attacks on Turkish diplomatic and commercial facilities in dozens of West European cities in 1993 and again in spring 1995. In an attempt to damage Turkey's tourist industry, the PKK has bombed tourist sites and hotels and kidnapped foreign tourists. But Turkish security forces had maken every needed preprationfor security of turists...

Strength

Approximately 10,000 to 15,000 guerrillas. Has thousands of sympathizers in Turkey and Europe.

Location/Area of Operation

Operates in Turkey, Europe, the Middle East, and Asia.

External Aid

Receives safehaven and modest aid from Syria, Iraq, Iran and also European countries (including Greece, Germany, Italy, France, Belgium).
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Some of the financial sources of the PKK can be cited as follows:

Money collected through robbery
Money collected through drug trafficking and arms-smuggling.
Revenues obtained from the "special nights" organized by branch organizations in Europe.
Aid campaigns periodically organized by the party.
Grants and subscriptions.
Sales of publications.
Revenues obtained from commercial establishments belonging to the organization.

Extortion:
"Aid" received through intimidation from constructors and merchants running business in the region.
Smuggling of illegal workers.
Transfer of money to the organization from the people entitled to payments in European countries, under refugee status.
PKK routinely extorts money from people who start new businesses, and benefits from bids on government contracts. Moreover, in order to finance the purchase of more sophisticated weaponry such as Stinger rockets (a number of which were discovered in mountain depots raided by the security forces in the spring of 1994), the PKK has begun to "tax" rich businessmen of Kurdish origin nationwide. Other professionals--doctors, contractors, builders, farmers, and teachers reportedly are not immune to extortion either.(a)
Although the largest portion of PKK's income is derived from drug smuggling, its annual budget is estimated to be TL 863 billion (U.S. $86 million). This includes income from extortion in both Turkey and abroad, especially from Kurdish and Turkish workers, most of who reside in Germany.(a)

The British National Service of Criminal Intelligence - NSIC) reported that in 1993 PKK extorted 2.5 million pounds sterling from immigrants and businesses. According to the same source, PKK obtained 56 million DM from drug smuggling in Europe in 1993.22 In addition, only those businessmen of whom PKK approves entered bids for government contracts in the southeast, in return for a "commission" to the organization. Likewise, temporary workers in the southeast who were paid a monthly net salary of TL 12 million (U.S. $1,000) were forced to give up TL 8 million (U.S. $700) of this sum to the PKK.(a)

International Connections(a)
Since PKK attacked Turkish villages from northern Iraq during the Iran-Iraq war, the Turkish Air Force raided PKK camps innorthern Iraq in 1986-1987, with the approval of the Iraqi government. This did not please Iran because it was not in a position to discriminate between PKK and Iraqi Kurdish guerrillas, or so it claimed.

Beginning with 1993, Turkey has been exposed to PKK attacks from Iranian soil. Iran may not have had any qualms about PKK's existence on its territory because it did not fear that PKK would serve as a model for Iranian Kurds.

Syria is yet another neighbor that has opted to support PKK, among other international revolutionary factions. There was nothing unusual about this as long as Syria served Soviet interests in the region. However, after the demise of the Soviet Union, Syrian leadership not only continued to accommodate PKK's leader in Damascus but also stepped up its involvement with PKK.

The Southeastern Anatolia Development Project (GAP) and subsequently the waters of the Euphrates and Tigris rivers became an issue of power politics between Turkey, Syria, and Iraq. Turkey, since 1987, has been trying to reassure its neighbors about the release of the downstream water. By the early 1990s president Hafez Assad therefore chose to force Turkey into releasing more water by increasing his support for PKK. The declarations of PKK's leader, Ocalan, about his objection to the building of the Birecik Dam on the Euphrates River is indicative of the general symptom in the Middle East of using the Kurds for one's own ends.

Syria has incessantly assured Turkey that it is not supporting PKK. But in light of Turkey's ongoing development projects as of 1987, Syria escalated its involvement with PKK and at the same time refused to cooperate on the management of water flow, despite a number of protocols signed for that purpose.
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Terrorist Activity

In mid-1997 it was announced that have been killed by the security forces in the 13 years since the PKK launched its operations. Some have also been killed and in that same period. The terrorists murdered citizens. Together with the death of nearly in terrorist acts caused by the PKK prior to 12 September [1980 coup], the organization has been responsible for the deaths of 31,837 people in all.(1)

The other side effects of terrorism for the same period were as follows: Some , attended by students in 22 districts of two provinces, remained shut in 1996, and have been killed so far. According to June 1995 findings of the State Ministry for Human Rights Affairs, have been evacuated in 19 provinces. Whereas, the State of Emergency Region Governorate announced that 753 villages and 1,535 hamlets were completely evacuated, and 235 villages and 141 hamlets partially evacuated.(2)

In order to make the organization's voice heard in the western regions of Turkey, PKK leader Abdullah Ocalan signed a protocol of cooperation with the DHKP-C [Revolutionary People's Liberation Party-Front] organization at the end of 1996.(3)

The PKK operations significantly lessened when the PKK lost logistic support< FONT COLOR="#000000"> with the evacuation of the villages and hamlets. At this time, the terror organization started using Palestinian Hamas-style suicide bombings. It organized suicide operations, waged mainly by women terrorists, in Tunceli, Adana, and Sivas.(4)

In consequence, the security forces stepped up their activities in the tourist areas where the organization might launch such suicide attacks and efforts were made to capture the suicide bombers that the organization infiltrated into the country.(5)< /FONT>

Two large operations, one at the end of 1992 and another in March 1995, were launched against the PKK, which had fully entrenched itself in northern Iraq after the Gulf War. The PKK suffered heavy losses during both operations. Enlistment in the organization dwindled as effective operations were conducted in the cities as well. Some 1,912 PKK members died and 132 were captured alive during the ground actions of the Steel Operation carried out by the Turkish army in northern Iraq in May 1997. Some 965 PKK members died during the air raids. A total of 113 Turkish officers and soldiers were killed and 325 injured during this operation.(6)

The PKK tried to spread its operations to the Black Sea and Inner Anatolia. It started undertaking actions in Black Sea cities like Ordu and Giresun following the difficult situation it was forced into in the southeast Anatolia region. The PKK's subsequent actions in Antalya, such as stopping vehicles and setting them on fire and engaging in clashes with security forces, have demonstrated the dimensions of the threat.(7)

The PKK began also in the 1990s to abduct tourists who visited Turkey. It was noted that at a time when the PKK was on the verge of being eradicated, they also set fire to hectares of forests in the Mediterranean region, actions that are noticeable and potentially damaging to Turkish tourism.(8)

Over the year 1997, the Turkish army dealt severe blows to the logistical support system of the organization by neutralizing 3,302 terrorists in various operations including those in northern Iraq. Over the past one year 484 terrorists were captured alive, 415 surrendered, and 303 PKK members were arrested. During the same period, security forces lost 192 soldiers and 95 others were wounded; in addition, 49 village guards were killed and 14 wounded.(9)
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Terrorism in Turkey
An Analysis of the Principal Players
Dr. Ely Karmon, ICT

The last few weeks have witnessed a wave of terrorist attacks throughout Turkey, some of them the most deadly in years, recalling the dark days of the 1980s:
 

- when a hand grenade was thrown into a coffeehouse in Istanbul. In another attack in the city seven buses were firebombed.
March 4th - a Kurdish suicide bomber killed herself and wounded three civilians outside a police station in southeastern Turkey. Local officials said they believe the bomber was a Kurdish guerrilla protesting the capture of Abdullah Ocalan. The bombing took place in the town of Batman, the scene of a shootout between Ocalan supporters and police two weeks earlier. The Batman bombing was the first suicide attack since Turkish commandos captured Ocalan in Kenya on Feb. 15.
The same day four people died and the local governor was seriously wounded in a car bomb attack in the central Turkish town of Cankiri. Maoist guerrillas claimed responsibility for the attack.
March 10 - A time bomb exploded in a taxi on a busy shopping street in Turkey's commercial capital Istanbul, killing the driver and injuring eight passers-by. The far-left Turkish Workers and Peasants Liberation Army (TIKKO) telephoned newspapers claiming responsibility for the blast. The organization was believed to be also responsible for the attack in Cankiri.
Hours later a second explosion ripped through parked cars in another shopping area in the same part of the city. There were no reports of any injuries.
The following day explosives experts defused two bombs in Istanbul: a pipe bomb found near naval facilities on the European side of the city and another explosive device in the yard of a car dealership on the Asian side.
March 13 - attackers set a crowded six-story department store on fire, killing at least 13 people in one of Turkey's deadliest attacks in years. It was not clear if the assailants forced people upstairs with their guns, poured gasoline in the building and set it on fire, or if the blaze began after they hurled firebombs from a car in front of the store.
The following day a bomb blast under a truck in Istanbul killed at least one person and wounded five others. Explosive experts defused a second bomb planted inside a crowded Burger King fast-food restaurant on the outskirts of the city.
It should be noted that Kurdish militants, extremist leftist groups and militant Islamic groups are all active in Istanbul, a city of 12 million people. Firebombings are common in the city, but they usually target empty parked vehicles or banks at night.
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Turkish political analyst Dogu Ergil said he believed that the attack on the Istanbul department store was carried out by the PKK or by underground urban leftist groups linked to the rebels. “After losing ground militarily in the southeast and losing their leader, they are moving to attacks on urban centers to put pressure on Turkish society and on public opinion,” Ergil said.
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PKK activities in Turkey :

Turkey  -1996- :

Turkey continued its vigorous pursuit of several violent leftist and Islamic extremist groups, especially the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK), responsible for terrorism in Turkey.

The PKK launched hundreds of attacks in 1995 in Turkey, including indiscriminate bombings in areas frequented by Turkish and foreign civilians, as part of its campaign to establish a breakaway state in southeastern Turkey. For example, the group set off a bomb outside a cafe/grocery store in Izmir on 17 September, killing five and wounding 29. The PKK also continuedùalbeit with less successùits three-year-old attempt to drive foreign tourists away from Turkey by attacking tourist sites. In August two US citizens were injured by shrapnel in a bombing of Istanbul's popular Taksim Square. Moreover, the PKK continued to expand its activities in Western Europe, especially in Germany, where its members frequently attacked ethnic Turks and Turkish commercial establishments.

A successor to the Marxist/Leninist Devrimci Sol (Dev Sol)ùknown as the Revolutionary People's Liberation Party/Front (DHKP/C)ùand several Islamic extremist groups were active in 1995. Dev Sol has been responsible for several anti-US attacks since 1990, and the DHKP/C continues to target US citizens. In July the group took over a restaurant in Istanbul, holding several civiliansùincluding three US touristsùhostage. All of the hostages eventually were released unharmed. Loosely organized Islamic extremist groups, such as the Islamic Movement Organization and IBDA-C, continued to launch attacks against targets associated with Turkish official facilities and functions. They may have been responsible for the attempted assassination in June of a prominent Jewish community leader in Ankara.

PKK activities in Turkey were lower in 1997 than during the previous year, in part due to Turkish military operations into northern Iraq to disrupt the PKK's infrastructure for infiltrating its members into Turkey. PKK leader Abdullah Ocalan, residing in Syria, once again publicly threatened to target Turkey's tourist sites with bombs in an attempt to disrupt the country's vital tourist industry, but these attacks did not materialize.

The number of terrorist incidents committed by the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) in Turkey in 1996 declined significantly due to the group's unilateral cease-fire from December 1995 until the fall of 1996. Nonetheless, the PKK was responsible for sporadic terrorist attacks during the cease-fire period, most notably, the 30 June suicide bombing against a Turkish military parade in Tunceli. The attack killed nine security forces personnel and wounded another 35. The suicide bombing marked the first time the PKK had used this tactic even though PKK leader Abdullah Ocalan had threatened earlier in the year to use suicide bombings against Turkey's Western cities in an effort to drive away tourists.

Since the end of the cease-fire the PKK has stepped up its attacks against military and civilian targets in southeastern Turkey. The most noteworthy incidents include two more suicide bombings-in Adana and Sivas-in late October that killed two civilians in addition to eight security forces personnel. The suicide bombing in Sivas is of note because the city, well outside of the southeast, is in an area that the Turkish Government previously considered to be relatively secure. In two other incidents four schoolteachers were murdered outside of Diyarbakir in October and three tourists-including a US citizen-were kidnapped outside of Bingol in September. The US citizen and his Polish traveling companion were later released unharmed. There is no word on the status of the third hostage, reportedly an Iranian. The killing of schoolteachers and kidnapping of foreigners are traditional PKK terrorist acts but had not been seen in almost two years.

The number of violent PKK activities in Western Europe also was down in 1996, particularly after German Security Services Chief Klaus Gruenewald visited Ocalan in late 1995 to demand the cessation of PKK-instigated violence in Germany. PKK violence continued at a negligible level until early March when a PKK-affiliated demonstration in Bonn turned violent, injuring several German policemen. Ocalan later apologized for the incident and promised to suspend further PKK incidents on German soil.
 
 
 

Turkey 1998:
Turkey achieved some notable successes in its battle against terrorism in 1998, especially against the PKK, its foremost terrorist group. Turkey continued its vigorous campaign against the PKK in southeastern Turkey and northern Iraq. Turkey's large-scale military offensives appear to have affected greatly the PKK's ability to operate in Turkey. In March, Turkish military commandos captured Semdin Sakik, the PKK's second in command, in northern Iraq and bought him to Turkey. Turkish security forces launched a series of successful military campaigns in late spring and early fall that hampered PKK activity in southeast Turkey. In October, Turkey applied intense pressure on the Syrian Government to discourage Syrian support for the PKK. As a result, Syria forced PKK leader Ocalan to leave. Ocalan fled to Russia and then on to Italy where he requested political asylum. Italy subsequently refused to extradite Ocalan to Turkey and Ocalan left Italy. (Turkey scored a major coup against PKK terrorism in February 1999, when Turkish officials tracked down Ocalan in Nairobi, captured him, and brought him back to Turkey to stand trial.)

During 1998 the PKK continued to conduct acts of violence against military and civilian targets. On 10 April, PKK terrorists on a motorcycle threw a bomb into a park near the Blue Mosque in Istanbul. The explosion injured two Indians, a New Zealander, and four Turkish citizens. The PKK also continued its campaign of kidnappings in southeast Turkey. In early June, PKK terrorists kidnapped a German tourist and a Turkish truckdriver at a roadblock in Karakose. The German tourist was found unharmed the next morning near the kidnapping site, but the truckdriver still is missing. Immediately after Ocalan's arrest in Italy, the PKK conducted three suicide bombings in southeastern Turkey, which killed three persons and injured dozens of Turkish citizens, despite Ocalan's public renunciation of terrorism.

Several extreme leftist and other groups were active in Turkey in 1998. Leftist groups operating in Turkey include the Revolutionary People's Liber ation Party/Front, Turkish Workers' and Peasants' Liberation Army, Turkish Peoples' Liberation Army, and the Turkish Peoples' Liberation Front. Fundamentalist Islamic organizations operating in Turkey include the so-called "Turkish Hizballah," the Islamic Movement Organization, and the Islamic Great Eastern Raiders Front. Effective Turkish security measures appear to have reduced the threat from these fringe groups over the years. For example, on 31 December, Turkish police arrested the head of the Islamic Great Eastern Raiders Front, Salih Mirzabeyoglou, in Istanbul.
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Greeks:
Greek relations with Turkey remained tense as numerous members of the Greek Parliament continued to court PKK members. In April some Greek parliamentarians attended a reception hosted by the PKK's political wing, the ERNK. At the reception a self-proclaimed PKK representative announced plans to open an office in Athens under the PKK's rubric. Greek officials interceded to prevent the opening.

In November, 109 Greek parliamentarians-mostly from the governing PASOK party-signed a letter reiterating a standing invitation to PKK leader Abdullah Ocalan to visit Greece. The Greek Government distanced itself from the invitation, saying Ocalan was not welcome. In November, Ocalan arrived in Rome at the beginning of what became an odyssey to gain asylum in Europe. (After his capture in Nairobi in February 1999, it became known that Ocalan had transited Greece at least twice during his travels with the knowledge and assistance of highly placed Greek officials. At one point, Ocalan remained in Greece for several days. Senior Greek officials took responsibility for providing Ocalan with haven in the Greek Embassy residence in Kenya in February 1999.)