Kurdistan Bloggers Union

“Since our village is a big village with 200 houses, a security station is established in it. It was the middle of June in 1993. Since it was very hot in the summer, my father and brothers were on the roof. Suddenly there was an explosion. At first we couldn’t understand what was happening. People were running forth and back. We were looking out from the window. Somebody on the street told us to go inside. The soldiers were shooting towards the village. We didn’t know where my father was. My mother heard that somebody yelling that my uncle was shot. I suppose my father must have gone to look for him. Till the morning we stayed under the bed. The shooting continued. In the morning the soldiers brought us all in the village yard. It was there that my mother saw my father’s corpse. They told us to leave the village. They burnt everything down and shouted we helped the terrorists. We heard later that some of the men in the village have buried the dead secretly after we were forced to leave. “

"This husband of mine who doesn’t speak anymore was arrested and tortured several times. I don’t know what the charges were. There is always something. Soon after his last arrest, the soldiers came to the village. They brought us all together in the village yard. They asked whether we would finally agree to become guards. We said no. So they burnt down all our houses and forced us to leave. We went from village to village, from one kinsmen’s house to the other. No one took us for more than a couple of days. We came here. Look at the barren walls, the barren rooms. There is nothing. We have nothing. We are nothing. And my husband can’t speak, nor work, nor go out. Possibly, because of torture. "

"We were farmers. We lived well and had hope. It was our home. But in 1995 due to terrorism they burnt down our villages. And believe me when I say it was for nothing that they did so. Even if you would put me in front of the President I will say the same thing. We weren’t guilty. Believe me. We weren’t guilty. Our village was near the center. We had never seen a terrorist. It was for nothing. Why? Because they want to make that region disappear. The soldiers came and burnt it down. Some soldiers were compassionate and let a few families take out something to wear. Some left without anything. Our cat remained in the house and was burnt as well. The state doesn’t do such things. But I am telling you. Believe me the state did this to us. We came here. We only suffered. My sons are high school graduates. But, when they say they are from the region, people close their doors on them. We are the citizens of Turkey. The state shouldn’t discriminate against us. What else can I tell to you? What other story can I possibly tell? My husband died of sorrow soon after we came here.
Well, I can tell you that I was happy in the village. We had everything. My sons went to school. We had money. We had green pastures and a beautiful land. Everything grew there. It was beautiful. I had friends and a good husband. I don’t know if you know how farming is done. But we had all the equipment to do it. Specifically, in the last years things had improved considerably. We had electricity and water. We didn’t hurt anyone. We lived peacefully. We had no reason to leave the village if it weren’t for the state. What they did has no reason. "

"You know village life. Its not like you have everything. But it is definitely better than this. The snow in winter. The green in spring. It is your home. Your homeland. What can be better than your homeland? You have your own home made beds. Home made food. Real vegetables and fruit. The water is for free. Beautiful mountains. We lost everything. We could take nothing when they burnt down the villages. Everything was destructed. The houses, the animals. It has been four or five years. I still wake up thinking I am there. Then I remember. I am in this place. "


These testimonies extracted from the paper of Nazan Üstündag, from the Department of sociology in Bogaziçi University, Istanbul, on the displaced Kurds in Turkey. If we consider that millions of people have lived the same thing, if we include children who borned later in this inheritage of violence and suffering, how will Turkey manage, economically, socially, clinically its post-war time ? Armenians or Assyro-Chaldeans who survived to the genocide mostly fled the country, so it had not to assimilate their trauma. But these millions of devastated Kurds are mostly in Turkey. So in Western cities, urban dwellers begin to realize that something is rotten in Atatürk's realm, especially when the State refuse to see facts. And it will last and could become worse. How many times, how many generations will be necessary to restore such dammages ? All the consequences on economy, criminality, mental and physical health are not near to improve without any policy toward refugees.