Kurds win limited voice in Turkish assembly

By Thomas Grove

DIYARBAKIR, Turkey (Reuters) - Pro-Kurdish politicians have got into Turkey's parliament for the first time in over a decade, but their demands for greater language and cultural rights could lead to clashes with Turkish nationalists.

Euphoria at their electoral success is tempered by realism in a country that does not recognize Kurds as an official minority and whose military is itching to strike back at Kurdish separatist rebels based across the border in northern Iraq.

"It's a struggle, but we have to be hopeful. We believe in our representatives," said Sirri Dogan, 36, in front of the pro-Kurdish Democratic Society Party (DTP) office in Diyarbakir, main city in the impoverished southeast, the Kurds' heartland.

Kurds account for about one fifth of Turkey's 74 million people. Life for many has been harder since Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) rebels took up arms in 1984 for a Kurdish homeland. More than 30,000 people have died in the conflict.

DTP-backed candidates stood as independents in Sunday's election to circumvent a rule that says parties must win at least 10 percent of the national vote to get into parliament.

They won four seats in the Diyarbakir area and 24 nationwide, enough to be allowed to form a parliamentary group once they take their seats next week. They will sit next to Turkish ultra-nationalists, sparking fears of fistfights.

Kurds have had no collective voice in parliament for 16 years. Then, deputies tried to take their oath in the Kurdish language, an illegal step that had them kicked out and eventually jailed.

"There's a great possibility for parliament to turn into an arena for Kurdish and Turkish nationalism, but experience should teach the Kurds to go easy because diving off the deep end took them out of parliament once," said Semah Idiz, a columnist at Milliyet, a centrist national newspaper.

TALK, NOT WALK

Aysel Tugluk, who won a seat, predicted a more normal parliamentary life this time, saying DTP-backed candidates would push for reforms and establish dialogue with other parties.

"The solution should be to stop the deadlock policy and accept that Kurds are their own people and there should be democratic transformations to let them use their language and examine their identity freely," she told Reuters.

The deputies' election promises in the restive, mostly Kurdish southeast included efforts to have Kurdish spoken in state schools and to make knowledge of Kurdish obligatory for police, doctors and all other state employees in the region.

Turkey's constitution states that all citizens are Turkish. Kurdish newspapers are forbidden. Limited state-run broadcasts in Kurdish are allowed due to pressure from the European Union, which Turkey aspires to join.

That pressure has helped fan Euroscepticism among Turkish nationalists. The far-right Nationalist Movement Party (MHP) has won 71 seats in parliament after an absence of five years, partly because of worsening conflict with the PKK.

Some analysts say the centre-right, pro-reform AK Party's decisive victory on Sunday may be good news for the Kurds.