2008 News | KHRP | Kurdish Human Rights Project

Charity Awards

Gruber Prize

Gruber Justice Prize

Impact Report 2009

2008 News

KHRP Deputy Director Speaks at Parliamentary Event on the Kurds in Syria

On 21 October 2008, KHRP Deputy Director Rachel Bernu delivered a speech at the Houses of Parliament as part of a meeting entitled ‘Human Rights and the Kurds in Syria: Discrimination and Repression’. Hosted by Jeremy Corbyn MP, the event also featured Abdelmajid Mellek, a member of the Democratic Union Party (PYD), and Dr Rebwah Fatah, Director of the UK-based organisation Kurdish Media.
Read more...

KHRP Publishes Latest Trial Observation Report

KHRP is pleased to announce the publication of its latest trial observation report, A Children’s Choir Face Terrorism Charges: Juveniles in the Turkish Justice System.

The report is based on the findings of a mission dispatched to south-eastern Turkey by KHRP in June 2008 to observe trial proceedings against members of a local youth choir who were charged under anti-terror legislation for singing a Kurdish song at a world music festival in the United States the previous October. Prosecutors said the song was associated with the outlawed Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) and that singing it amounted to disseminating propaganda on behalf of a terrorist organisation.

KHRP at House of Commons Lecture on Syria

KHRP Deputy Director Rachel Bernu will speak at an event at the House of Commons on 21 October 2008 entitled, ‘Human Rights and the Kurds in Syria: Discrimination and Repression.’

Syrian Kurds, who make up the country’s largest non-Arab ethnic minority, remain subject to systematic discrimination. The state has denied citizenship to at least 140,000 Syrian-born Kurds, who are thus denied equal access to socioeconomic rights. Kurdish identity has also been systematically assailed, with the suppression of Kurdish language in schools, the refusal to register children with Kurdish names, the prohibition of Kurdish language material, the replacement of Kurdish place names with Arabic names, and a ban on businesses with non-Arabic names. Freedom of expression and association also remain tightly controlled in Syria, and Kurdish activists are particularly vulnerable to arbitrary arrest and detention.

KHRP Challenges Turkey and Armenia at the OSCE HDIM

At the annual OSCE Human Dimension Implementation Meeting that took place in Warsaw from 29 September to 10 October, KHRP called into question Turkey and Armenia’s commitment to their OSCE obligations. Detailing numerous cases over the past year which demonstrate that these states are failing to meet these commitments, KHRP’s submissions put them on the hot seat, and sadly, they seemed unable to defend their positions.

Responding to a KHRP submission that noted that religious minorities often face several forms of discrimination, Turkey stated that ‘a peculiar aspect of Turkish democracy is that its concept of minority is based on religion rather than ethnicity’ and that ‘non-Muslim minorities’ are specifically protected under the Treaty of Lausanne. Unfortunately, this statement itself demonstrates Turkey’s lack of commitment to OSCE principles. KHRP highlighted that not all non-Muslim minorities are protected by this treaty, including Christians from traditions that developed after it was signed in 1923. Furthermore, the statement illustrates how even today, Turkey does not recognize the illegitimacy of its stance towards other minorities. Although the OSCE Human Dimension criteria clearly states that states should support ethnic and cultural minorities within their borders, Turkey continues to act on an unworkable principle that denies the very existence of ethnic/cultural/linguistic groups that are not Turkish, even when one such group, the Kurds, make up at least 20 per cent of its population.