by Abdullah Öcalan February 1992
Which aims are we to pursue when preparing the uprising and
determining its out come, that is the
question we have to address. We have to carry out the uprising
bearing in mind today's concrete
conditions. In the contemporary situation we can carry out the
uprising on the basis of an authentic
Kurdish identity, by overcoming the insane counter-measures of
the enemy, his special war and
reformist tricks and machinations of all kinds. We have to be
very keenly aware of these
circumstances, because we cannot, as it is sometimes wrongly presumed,
prepare an uprising
arbitrarily, according to subjective whims and fancies. Along
with the uprising is political development.
It is already a big step that we can win a position in the uprising,
that we can utter the word uprising
and declare that we can dare an uprising. It must be emphasised
that the severity and extent of the
measures employed by the special war leads inescapably to an uprising.
Increasingly the enemy
spreads reformism as a method to stop a revolutionary uprising,
to deprive it of its essence and also to
cause panic through terror and in that way te liquidate it.
We want to emphasise again that this point has to be very carefully
considered. Our party, the PKK,
for the first time in its history, has achieved a position through
the uprising, and through its revolutionary
struggle made the uprising effective. The revolutionary aclivities
in Turkey and the conditions created in
the previous 20 years of struggle have for the first time become
favourable for an uprising. But the
stages of the uprising cannot be reduced to questions of technique,
nor must they be approached with
the attitude "if we want to we will make an uprising now".
This stage has only been achieved because
hundreds of thousands have fought and have given their lives for
this struggle. Only through the use of
wide-ranging revolutionary tactics and on the basis of the struggle
by the revolutionary vanguard based
on the people were we able to develop the uprising in a climate
of pacification characterised by
colonial rule and the collaboration of feudal lords and the special
war waged at a military and political
level. For this reason it is important to look at this development
as an essential one and to treat it that
way.
First Thesis
The uprising is one part and the most important stage of a protracted
peoples' war. The activities we
have carried out so far have not only ensured that the psychology,
consciousness and courage of the
people are adequate to the political tactics but alse that a level
of military organisation has been
reached to develop the uprising in practice. The activities of
the vanguard inside the country and
abroad have created the pre-condition for success. Of course that
is not everything, but it is an
important basis. If we talk about uprising then we have to look
at this precondition very carefully as a
first thesis.
If our first thesis is correct then from now on we will use
this important opportunity to realise our
centuries-old dream and accomplish the tasks with all our strength.
Whatever subjective inadequacies
there may be in the people and the vanguard, under the present
favourable conditions the necessary
actions cannot any longer be postponed for months on the grounds
of subjective reasons. The uprising
also cannot be regarded just as a spontancous uprising which develops
of itself. This is the approach
which the reformist and other forces would like to adopt. On the
contrary it is a stage which is the
result of a conscious action developed in a long struggle by a
revolutionary leadership. However small
the possibilities appear to be and however insufficient the stage
of preparation may be, the uprising
today, both for the people and the leadership, is a necessary
and imperative step.
Nobody can deliberately ignore this first thesis, nor can he
take the obviously reformist attitude by
saying: "Let us postpone it a little longer". It is
wrong to state that this phase should be put off because
we have not achieved an adequate level of preparation and organisation.
The participation of the
people alone already proves that the uprising is an unpostponable
opportunity for Kurdistan. Just as
important as the preparation and organisation is the mass participation
of the people in the uprising.
This results in the...
Second Thesis
It is an entirely incorrect approach to postpone the uprising
arbitrarily or to look at it as if nothing at all
had happened in the past. As if the very particular developments
of this present phase were
comparable to any other phase in the past and that nothing had
changed today!
Third Thesis
The aims must be realistically set. Even if in the present stage,
full independence is not realistic. as a
political aim the emphasis has to be put on it. E.g. we will not
accept a form of transitory or limited
power. We cannot go into an uprising with the attitude as was
prevalent, for example, in the uprisings
in Palestine or elsewhere, reduced to a demonstration for economic
demands, a reaction to repression
or as a popular festival for the people on certain days without
laying emphasis on the local and political
aspects of the situation. The aims cannot be set in this simple
way.
In such a case, in the interim-periods, this would only create
confusion as regards the aim of the
uprising. There exist liberated areas in which a revolutionary
government can be set up. There already
exist areas in which the political and military aims of the enemy
have been largely defeated and a
balance of forces can be established. There are areas which are
a white spot which are still under the
control of the enemy. In these areas we can set ourselves the
aim of starting a political development
through demonstrations. To set the same aims for every town without
taking into consideration the
particular prevailing conditions and circumstances cannot be realistic.
Areas like Botan, in which our armed struggle has been intensified,
will be the centres of great support
for the uprising behind the front. Having completely developed
our armed struggle in this area and
established the guerrilla army very widely and deeply there, the
uprising must aim at cutting off this area
from the enemy's territory and grabbing from him as many resources
as possible. The towns should be
protected by the guerrillas from outside and the town militias
so developed as to be able to sustain a
continuous struggle. In these areas complete control over the
rural areas and towns can be achieved
and armed uprisings can develop.
The aim is to take power and to act like a power. The authority
of the enemy will be destroyed. If he
still holds any authority, then it will be reduced to just a few
garrisons. When the people have achieved
full participation and taken control, the civilian collaborator
of the enemy will at best only continue to
exist in the structures of the Turkish army. Already at this point
the enemy is unable to move freely in
the towns and is forced to withdraw to certain position. The same
applies to the rural areas. The
conditions for this development are so favourable that the same
could be realised in Garzan and
increasingly in Dersim and other areas.
The success of these steps in this direction is closely connected
with the preparations. In the regions of
secondary importance surrounding this centre, the aims of the
uprising are different. In these regions of
secondary importance basically the struggle is already now quite
strong. Also in these regions of
secondary importance there already exists the armed struggle and
the Serhildan, the popular uprising.
The aims which we desire to achieve in the regions of secondary
importance can be summarized as
follows: that they be brought up to the state of our regions of
primary importance, which means, that
the control of the towns pass into the hands of our people, that
our armed forces are able to operate at
least without any major problems in the countryside and that the
guerrillas deepen their roots in the
people and completely isolate the enemy from his political power
and limit his control in the military
field.
The typical form of uprising in the regions of secondary importance,
depending on the particular aim, is
either an armed or a political one. From time to time the uprising
in these areas must be protected by
armed forces from outside and the political demonstrations in
the towns must be developed.
The regions of third grade importance also include to a degree
the Turkish metropolitan areas. This is a
completely new region for the revolution in Kurdistan. The aim
to achieve is that this region of third
grade importance develops through struggle to the level of struggle
achieved in regions of secondary
importance.
This is a very rough classification because the regions and
the stage of their development cannot be
rigidly classified. Because the development during the state of
uprising is very rapid it can happen at
times that a progressive area becomes a passive one. In the same
way an area in which the struggle
has had a weak development can be rapidly activated and become
a region of primary importance.
The classification of the different regions must never become
schematic. It is decided by the struggle.
But first the following has to be made clear: we are about to
take the power out of the hands of the
state and, to a degree, to conquer power in the name of the people.
This is happening in specific areas
and is transitory. In other areas we are engaged in powerful political
activities, activities aimed at
liquidating the political control of the enemy. What does this
mean? It means, that even if we do not
achieve independence, the people have reached a much higher stage
in the development towards
independence. In many different areas of life freedom is realising
itself for the people. The control of
the enemy is extremely weakened. In that sense the struggle for
independence is growing for us.
That is the nature of this phase. This includes also the proposals
for reformist solutions by imperialism
and collaborationist forces. Their tactics, in view of the probability
that the revolution in Kurdistan will
develop further through the uprising, that there will be liberated
areas and that a revolutionary reality
for the people could develop, is: "No to terrorism on both
sides". They try very hard to concretise this
scepticism by ridiculing as a dream any attempt to advocate independence
and peoples' power at the
present time and claim that it is necessary to live under the
political and military rule of the enemy and
apparently enjoy his 'brotherly love'. In connection with this
tactic there is in south-Kurdistan neither an
armed defence of the people, nor a peoples' parliament, nor independence.
Their sole aim is to force
the people to capitulate, to buy it with a false Kurdishness and
a few reforms which cannot be trusted
and to destroy its revolutionary substance and then on this basis
establish a Kurdish party which limits
itself to activities within a pre-determined legal framework.
Here we are faced with a tactic aimed at
autonomy.
That is the tactic that imperialism and in particular Turkish
colonialism is trying to sell under the name
of' 'Kurdish reforms'. They wish to achieve an organisational
form for this tactic. When it is openly said
from their side that even the PKK could fall under these intended
reforms, then this is the most sinister
form of liquidating the revolutionary substance. The enemy has
organised the provocations of 1983,
1986, 1988 and especially 1990/91 with this aim in mind and tried
to provide a legal basis to the
representatives of this provocation. Therefore we can define the
policies of the enemy in relation to the
prisons and to the guerrillas, the policy of amnesty for renunciation
(after all the law of liquidation is
also the repentance law), and the law reforms which enable the
publication of legal Kurdish
newspapers and the formation of a legal Kurdish party in the near
future, as a counter-revolutionary
activity which is waged together with the special war. They try
to introduce this policy under the mask
of reforms.
That is why the aim of this policy is reactionary. Revolutionaries
have the duty to be extremely vigilant
and follow these developments very carefully and defeat at all
times the aims of the reformist policies of
the enemy. Por example such is the autonomy for south-Kurdistan
(Iraq). It is of the kind that
imperialism and the collaborationists want to realise, the attempt
to neutralise the revolutionary energy
of the Kurdish people. They have been tyring it for the past 40
years and now they want it to finally
succeed. For that reason this danger in south-Kurdistan has to
be recognised and countered by
developing the tactic of the revolutionary uprising, just as it
is our revolutionary duly to hold fast to the
revolutionary aims and to recognise the reactionary reforms for
northwest-Kurdistan and to defeat
them.
Fourth Thesis
Our fourth thesis deals with means and forms. The forms of the
uprising include uprising with emphasis
on the political as well as on the military aspect. Weapons are
also part of the uprising; in an uprising
armed and unarmed forms are combined. The means and forms are
determined by the particular aims
in the specific regions. Certainly, they cannot be the same for
every region and each particular aim. The
forms of uprising can be viewed from different angles. It is possible
that in a war situation a town can
be held under our control temporarily or for a particular time.
It can also happen that we avoid open
use of arms in an uprising. This is determined by a correct revolutionary
approach.
The peoples' militias in the towns must be well prepared and
organised. They must be able to defend
whole parts of a town if necessary. The peoples militias have
to function like a lower stage of the
guerrillas. Even if they are not immediately deployed, the people
must be prepared for the armed
struggle and be in a position to get out the weapons and use them
when the day comes. Sometimes it is
possible to hold state institutions under revolutionary control
for a number of days. In some areas, and
depending on the strength of the guerrilla forces surrounding
the towns, the control over a town can be
temporary or permanent. At the same time our aim can be the conquest
and complete destruction of
the state institutions. The peoples militias themselves can develop
a position which would prevent the
towns being given up and makes it almost impossible for the enemy
to take control of them. Also the
guerrilla forces outside the towns can occupy the towns. Even
in this case, preparations can be made
in the towns and armed forms of action carried out.
The situation of the towns in the mountain areas is a very
special one. In such towns, armed
occupations, the leading of armed demonstrations and mobilisation
of people for the uprising, can be of
great importance. The forms depend on the size of the towns. In
addition some villages can be brought
under the complete control of armed forces. In many villages power
can be established on the basis of
the peoples' representatives. It is quite possible that a whole
series of villages and towns can be
declared liberated. Some villages can be protected by defence
units. In the present phase village and
town defence units can do a great deal. Especially in the rural
areas is it possible to deprive the
representatives of the state and the collaborators of any protection
and any power. And that is what
we will do.
If one form of action in many parts of a town brings down political
power and is an action that
increases our strength, then it is the correct action and a good
mobilising force. The action plays an
even greater role in the countryside. But of course that does
not mean that it couldn't play an important
role in the towns. The guerrilla can play the role of a strong
force not only through demonstrations of
the people but by well organised and well prepared defence units.
Both in the countryside and in the
towns large demonstrations must be organised. These demonstrations
must be carried out under
protection. And these demonstrations can be linked with the guerrillas.
In the large cities, mass
demonstrations should be organised. Every demonstration must have
the aim of politically conquering a
city completely. For example, it is possible that a city like
Diyarbakir can be fully taken out of the
control of the enemy. We must realise the tactic of demonstrations
widely, politically conquer all towns
of Kurdistan and in the rural areas make sure that the enemy has
no longer any control of them. At the
same time we must improve the present level of organisation and
forms of action through concrete
aims.
Another point we have to deal with in detail at the stage of
the uprising is that we have to turn many
mosques in Kurdistan into centres of agitation for the national
liberation struggle. We have already
developed sonic activities in this respect but that is insufficient.
It is necessary to take the mosques as a
whole out of the control of the enemy. There are many different
forms of these activities. For example
at the end of the Friday Prayer either the Imam of the mosque
or a representative of the ERNK can
address the people and make a speech about the stage of the uprising
and the tasks emerging from it.
It can be a call for the support of the uprising or for the National
Parliament. If the success of such
work is reflected in the uprising, that would be a support not
to be underestimated.
Fifth Thesis
In place of an uprising as a transitory highpoint it is better
to develop a long-term form of uprising.
Therefore it is important not only to think about the actuality
of the uprising but also about its
continuity. The uprisings which we want to organise we plan not
with short-term but with long-term
means. It is necessary instead of organising short-term uprisings
with narrow aims, to find a form of
uprising which transcends these narrow economic aims and intensifies
the political aims as a preliminary
stage for the next stage.
We have to approach the Serhildan and other actions with the
knowledge that everything can be won
by them and that much can also be destroyed. We must also leave
no room for any kind of approach
which conceives of the uprising as an unorganised act or that
we fail to engage ourselves fully in it just
because it is a long-term uprising.
For all of 24 hours every day we have to organise the uprising
with the right spirit, decisiveness and the
correct tactical approach. And we must not forget there is no
such thing as a one-day but only a
long-term thing. We are presently engaged in a form of uprising
which is in a long-term phase and
developing from a simple to a multifarious form, which demands
patience. But also never will one day
be like the next. We must develop an attitude just as if we could
fulfill our task within a single day. That
means an approach which is full of enthusiasm but at the same
time demands patience and maturity.
Sixth Thesis
We must be extremely conscious of the great necessity for organising
the masses at this stage of
uprising. Without an uprising the broad masses cannot be organised
but at the same time without
preparation and organisation there cannot be an uprising. We must
make a precise distinction as to
where the uprising is a better means to organise the masses and
where through organisation the
uprising can better develop.
The uprising provides a very important opportunity to lead
the masses into revolutionary struggle: it
develops the organisation and its activities. The organisation
must be developed from a minimum to a
maximum. A necessary precondition for this is to interlink the
uprising with the guerrillas.
The masses mature politically through the uprising. This too
is an important precondition. We must
work with the thesis that starting from this new stage of development.
The uprising turns into an
indispensable condition and becomes continuous like the formation
of an army.
Seventh Thesis
During the stage of the uprising the guerrillas will go through
a very important development. Thousands
of people will join the guerrilla army. The experiences of the
uprising in all areas will lead to an
enormous growth of the guerrilla army. While the uprising leads
to the building of a completely political
army in which the people are organised and which leads to the
creation of peoples militias, the guerrilla
army too will reach a higher stage of development. The guerrilla
army gives something for the uprising
but it also gets much in return. For this reason we should immediately
prepare for the guerrilla areas,
plan the training of thousands of men and women guerrilla fighters
and organise their accommodation,
logistics, etc.
Therefore we are not talking about the uprising as an absolute
political success but the uprising for
even more powerful guerrillas. With the big combined offensive
of guerrilla and uprising we create the
conditions where the guerrillas do not remain limited but grow.
Without a powerful uprising the
guerrillas cannot be developed nor maintained and no continuity
be won. That needs the big uprising.
Furthermore, the uprising demands imperatively that the representatives
of Kurdistan form a
representative national peoples assembly as its legitimate consequence
and expression.
Eighth Thesis
Perhaps in the present stage we will not be able to go over to
the formation of a state. But a parliament
of national representatives of the people will be established
as a determining force of the will of the
people and as the highest body of decision-making and the leading
force of the revolution of national
liberation. That is the reason why the national parliament which
is being formed is the most important
political aim of the uprising. The national parliament will in
the present stage actually act as the national
representation of the revolution. This parliament will discuss
the question of revolution at every level in
the whole of Kurdistan and make decisions and furthermore will
play the role of a control and
leadership organ. Even if it is not an actual government it will
possess a government-like leading role.
That is the most important political aim of the planned uprising
in the present stage in Kurdistan.
Initiatives for the founding of a Parliament of reformist circles
which represent the autonomist line have
in mind not the actual establishment of a parliament but on the
contrary they want to deprive this
parliament of any content. These forces are attempting today at
the highest level, to work for such a
parliament to use it as a cover. In view of the fact that their
aim is the formation of such a parliament
deprived of any real legislative power, our activities for the
formation of a parliament have been
oriented to make it clear that we are not just forming any old
parliament but a revolutionary parliament
which is closely connected with the uprising.
As a natural consequence the election campaign is closely tied
up with the uprising, and candidates will
be elected during the uprising. It is therefore necessary to develop
a system of election of candidates
which represents the real interests of the people who are bound
by the laws of the revolution and
represent the nation's interests.
Furthermore in connection with the elections a referendum could
be held. The referendum could be
held especially on the basis of the question "Are you for
joining together (with Turkey) on an equal and
free basis under the condition that Kurdistan is independent and
free?" and in that way assess the
mood of the Kurdish people and exert a mobilising effect. A further
aim of this stage of the uprising is
to reach an agreement on an official and internationally recognised
level that the majority of the peoples
on the basis of equality and freedom agree to a joining together/a
unity with Turkey) and demands its
right to self-determination on an international level.
Ninth Thesis
We must hold a referendum for independence and freedom. Even if
our peoples and neighbouring
nations already desire this, we must also convey to our people
the importance of unity on the basis of
independence and freedom. We are continually making preparations
in this direction.
Tenth Thesis
Our preparations in all areas are activities in preparation for
the uprising. For this, we are also
preparing the climate abroad. If it comes to very heavy repression,
then a part of our people can
withdraw in the form of guerrilla units into the mountains and
the other part be withdrawn behind the
front line. We are also extending our bases from the north into
the south. We can also establish
positions in east-Kurdistan (Iranian occupied part). Of course
it is also important to mobilise the
Turkish people in the metropolis and agitate them in the army
and develop this further. The possibilities
of creating diplomatic channels and of using them are even bigger
during the phase of the uprising as
are political negotiations with the enemy to keep the way open
if the enemy agrees to political
negotiations; all this is necessary. Activities on the political
level must be developed on that level. In this
connection some activities have already been organised. In particular,
the area of diplomatic work has
to be well prepared. The diplomatic work which serves the revolution,
has to be strengthened.
The slogans for our activities in the new phase are:
An independent part of Kurdistan or death! Freedom for the people
or death!
Forward to a parliament of national representation of the people!
Prepare the armed peoples uprising! Uprising in every town!
Light the fire of revolution in Kurdistan, everywhere in the countryside!
We want unity on the basis of equality and freedom!
No to every tactic of reform of the enemy!
Do not take any position in the government of the enemy! No to
autonomy under the control
of the enemy!
Forward to a collective revolutionary struggle! Everything for
the revolutionary struggle!
Everything for the national liberation front!
Put aside our internecine conflicts and rancour and unite to achieve
our basic aims!
Abdullah Ocalan
President
Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK)
10 April 1998
The President-elect of Armenia
Robert Kocharian
Dear Mr President
I am writing to congratulate you on your election as President
of Armenia and to wish you every success in forming your new
government. I want particularly to wish you well in implementing
democratic reforms and a political solution of the Nagorno
Karabakh conflict.
I also welcome and endorse the passage of a resolution in the
Belgian Senate calling on the Turkish government in Ankara to
recognise the reality of the Armenian holocaust perpetrated by
the last Ottoman regime in 1915-19.
This resolution of 26 March, I believe, can not be treated
as a transient episode but is of paramount significance in the
protracted campaign to end the political amnesia about 1915, deliberately
contrived by Turkish and foreign governments in the
past in order to perpetrate the carve-up of Asis Minor and the
Mid-East by the imperial powers at the Lausanne Conference of
1923.
The massacres during the First World War which shocked the
civilised world then became a precedent for an even more
appalling and destructive demonstration of genocide of the Jewish
people by the German Nazis in the Second World War. Let
us recall Hitler’s response to a critic of the "final
solution" of the Jewish problem: "Who complained about
the Armenians?"
Now, when the spectre of ethnic cleansing is once again stalking
the Balkans the courageous stand of the Belgian Senate, we
feel, must concentrate the minds of Turks, Armenians, Greeks and
Kurds alike the necessity for a wide- ranging discussion and
fresh analysis of the causes of the 1915 events as a precondition
for a genuine reconcilliation of ethnic groups and nations and
the settling of territorial disputes through negotiation. Such
a process, we are firmly convinced, will help Turkish-Armenian
and
Greek relations.
Our movement will continue to support all efforts to set in
train a genuine dialogue between all contending parties with the
self-evident proviso that the Kurdish claim to self- determination
and freedom will not be predujiced - as it was in Lausanne.
We urge the new governments of Armenia and Turkey to seize the historic opportunity.
We look forward to future co-operation with your government
and the Armenian people and wish you all the success needed
to move the peace process forward.
In the name of peace, freedom and reconcilliation, we remain
Yours respectfully,
Abdullah Ocalan
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