Important major events have always been experienced in peoples history, sometimes they take the forms of movements, organization, great achievements, victories. Sometimes it is about great destruction, disasters, losses, defeats. History is a whole, with its truths, wrongs, gains and losses, comes to our day with its own internal structure.
STEP BY STEP 1982
The movement was very young. He was very young. There was an ideology, a program, and an organization, yes, but it had not gained much experience. Perhaps the most unified thinking power and program in Kurdish history had been determined. The organizational lines were clear, it was a movement appropriate of its age. No public support had been given yet, but with the power of thought, the militant essence was achieved in a short time.
The Turkish State responded with the coup of 1980. The aim of the course was to crush the democratic opposition in Turkey and in general, to liquidate it. With the support of the international imperialist states in the Middle East, Turkey sees the reactionary awakening of the Kurds, as a threat. The emerging Kurdish movement began to organize itself.
With the previously learned lessons, the revolutionary youth leaders were executed and murdered on March 12. But all the dynamics of society could not be suppressed: the impact of the coup was insufficient. In today’s conditions, this was enough.
Taking into account the developments in the region, the growth of the Kurdish movement was based on a constitutional system against an anti-democratic militarist mentality, with a military junta led by Kenan Evren, designed to re-tighten the state with extensive preparation but a high militarist fascist racist mentality.
In practice, all existing organizations were based on burying them in the depths of history by destroying and destroying the Kurds. Very soon also suppress the opposition in Turkey. They crushed left-wing democratic movements Our revolutionary organization in Kurdistan was not enough to stop responding in and stop it. There was no power preparation at that level. Most of our cadres were in jail. With the coup, the existing forces were not pulled out of the province.
Feeling the Impact’s footsteps, Leader APO had left Turkey to secure the leadership of July 1979. He had passed to Syria. The greatest assurance of our revolution or the assurance of the future was actually provided by this step. In a very short time, the society was suppressed and intimidated. The media, the institutions were taken over, the coup working in their service with everything they had: mouths, words, laws, constitutional orders. With great self-confidence, they have now begun to achieve their goals one by one. One of their other targets was prisons. Because there was a great revolutionary potential in prisons. Most of the leaders of the revolutionary movements of Turkey Mamak, Metris had gathered in Istanbul-Ankara prisons.
Leading cadres in a movement like the PKK gathered in Diyarbakır, one of the biggest centres of Kurdistan. They based the Kurdish movement in Diyarbakır, burying the PKK among the concrete walls, destroying the matriotism of Kurdistan and aiming at socialism in its entirety. They took special precautions for this and made preparations.
Kemal Yamak, formerly the Head of the Special Warfare Department, and then the Cyprus CON plan, was sent as the martial law commander of Diyarbakır. Esat Oktay Yildirim is a typical Turkish racist officer. As we said outside, there was no situation where a social movement could give power to dissent opposition prisons. Prisons were completely isolated, organizational ties with the outside were completely severed. A special policy was also implemented in Diyarbakır. They approached the peak. For example, in Mamak, there are pressures on the Metrist and there are tortures. But they did not impose betrayal and confession, as in Kurdistan, as in Diyarbakir.
Particularly in the PKK, the revolutionary movements, and organizations, the aim was to destroy the trust completely, the sound of resistance at tribunals had turned into the sound of betrayal and surrender. The message sent to the people was: “see how the people you relied on kneel in submission before us. Don’t trust them; parties, politicians, we are the owners of this state. Let no one get dragged into any false dreams and hopes.”
In fact, we can summarize the message that they want to give. Instead of killing a lot of people in Diyarbakir, they actually analyzed and synthesized all of them and based more on the ideological-political massacre. In order to achieve this, they aimed to intimidate, oppress, debilitate, starve, with psychological attacks by using the material and spiritual means to leave people unorganized and to discredit their belief.
The July 14 dungeon resistance, which takes the name of the great death fast in the history of our party,is the action in Diyarbakir Prison which led to the martyrdom of Kemal, Hayri, Akif, Ali and some other friends who were left disabled as a result. The action, which was ended just at the verge of death, created the line and principles of PKK militancy.
July 14, how these events came to life
The resistance in Diyarbakir was ended in May 1981, but the promises made were not kept. The first resistance ended in 81. In prison, the state has achieved a great advantage. He was in control. Not content with this, he imposed betrayal by gradually increasing torture and pressures, weakening people physically and mentally. Towards the end of 1981, people were publicly interrogated, tortured and pressured to become betrayers.
People didn’t give up that easily. There was a great internal reckoning, of course, since the organizational structure was distributed, each person who was now isolated on the outside, found themselves isolated in the inside.
People were taken under a great siege and confessions were imposed under these conditions. The lack of resurrection was never normalized. This approach has been repeatedly criticized. Not digested, not accepted. Because the culture of the PKK militants in general, depending on the shape of the leadership of both the living and the spiritual life of the culture of resistance was nothing to surrender. Therefore, it was a great burden for us to live without thinking of this.
As a result, friends agreed that a new death fast resistance was needed. This process took a little longer. The courts were deliberately extended so that the number of confessors was increased. Mazlum Dogan was unable to tolerate this extension. On March 21, the day of Nevruz, the historical meaning of the resurrection, resistance, life, existence, freedom came to life through a self-sacrifice action. Mazlum fell martyr. Then the action of ‘the Fours’ developed on May 18.
Hayri Durmuş had aimed to declare in courts, during his defence that the “PKK must prove itself in these dungeons with the death fast resistance. Not outside, on the mountains, but inside, within these four walls, it must prove its unbreakable bond to this case.” After these comrades fell martyr, there was no point in waiting for defences.
AND DEATH FAST RESISTANCE STARTED
The big death fast was announced in court. The content of the statement was as follows: “There are tortures in prison, you judge us for our purposes for our thoughts, you give us heavy penalties, but you do not allow us to defend ourselves. In this case, there is no point in living. If I die as a knowledgable, principled believer: my will is that you put the words ‘he left, owing a debt to his people’ on my gravestone.”
Direnişin fedakailik düzeyi çok önemli, dikkat edersek bir ihanet ötesi ve kabul edilmiyor. Nasıl bir insan nasıl bir ruh bu şartlarda bu kadar zor bir ölümü tercih edebiliyor, herhangi bir duvar dibine dizip kurşuna dizmiyorlar. Günlerce, aylarca an an eriyerek hissederek acılarını kabullenerek böyle bir ölüme gitmek büyük bir dirayetle, büyük bir sabır, büyük bir ruh, ve büyük bir yürek vardır burada. Bu eyleme başlanırken kesinlikle sonunun ölüm olunacağı biliniyordu yani Türk Devleti’nin normal dışı talepleri karşılayacağı ve uzlaşma gelecek çözecek bir durumu yoktu.
The sacrifice level of the resistance is very important. What kind of a human being is able to prefer such a difficult death under such conditions. But the enemy does not just put them near a wall and just shoot.
There is great patience in these actions, a great spirit, and a great heart to go to such a death by accepting the pain and feeling for days and months. At the beginning of this action, it was known that the end would be death, that is if the Turkish State did not have any plans to meet the demands and solve the future.
“EFFECT AND RESULTS”
Before he died, with a great sense of responsibility, he said that “if the torture was stopped and the right of defence was given to the cadres remaining in the cell, you would leave the act and negotiate.” He was a person who always had a sense of responsibility that thought about the life of friends and the future of the movement.
The big death fast was a call to life for those who went abroad, for those who stare in Europe, who was confused, who was not in prison, who lost their self-confidence and lost their hope. After the martyrdom of these friends, both Esat Oktay’s system of betrayal and confessions collapsed.
Ideologically a great victory, a great success was achieved. Across was a great army at the hands of NATO such as Turkey, who had lost against a handful of insurgents in the dungeon. These insurgents saw that people would die, but they would not betray.
In Kurdistan, instead of surrender and betrayal, the sparks of the resistance spread from Diyarbakır to the mountains and abroad. The historic results were great, the PKK army was created. The level of the militant personality of the party was determined. The basis of the PKK sacrificial militancy, which has lasted until today, was the yeast.
Muzaffer AYATA
