The results of the June 7 general elections put the pro-Kurdish Peoples' Democratic Party (HDP) at the center of Turkish politics. While the Justice and Development Party (AK Party), which has ruled the country for 13 years, was not able to come to power alone this time, the HDP secured 80 seats in Parliament with 13percent of the vote.
The coalition talks between the AK Party and the Republican People's Party (CHP), the party that received the second most votes after the AK Party, were in progress while discussions over the future of the Kurdish-Turkish peace process and Turkey's Syria policy were being held publicly when a suicide bomb attack took place in Turkey's southern town of Suruç, in Şanlıurfa province on July 20, 2015, in which 33 people lost their lives.
Even though the government has said the primary suspect of the explosion is the Islamic State of Iraq and al-Sham (ISIS), individuals and groups close to the PKK immediately started to blame Ankara, alleging that Turkey was assisting ISIS. The PKK killed a Turkish soldier and two police officers as revenge for the Suruç blast. Meanwhile, HDP Co-Chair Selahattin Demirtaş was calling on Kurdish people to enforce their self-defense and to ensure their own security, though the security service at the Amara Culture Center was already provided by the HDP-run municipality. The police force was not allowed to do their job. This call increased the number of violent acts among pro-PKK circles. Two civilians and several more members of security forces were killed in retaliation.
Right after Turkey conducted an airstrike on ISIS positions in Syria two weeks ago as a sign of Turkey's becoming an active partner in the U.S.-led anti-ISIS coalition, it started to bomb PKK camps in Iraqi Kurdistan. In addition, anti-terror operations were conducted against the PKK and the outlawed Revolutionary People's Liberation Party-Front (DHKP-C) as well as ISIS in many cities in Turkey. The airstrikes on PKK camps and anti-terror operations have been proceeding since then in line with Ankara's statements, which came right after the operations, emphasizing that the operations were not one-offs, but part of a process. In the meantime, the PKK did not stop its violent attacks in Turkey. The number of Turkish security officials killed by the PKK has reached almost 20 in the last 15 days.
Needless to say, the reconciliation process is going through hard times. The PKK already declared a month ago that the cease-fire ended in a statement dated July 11. Already in 2015, the number of violent attacks carried out in Turkey by the PKK has exceeded 1,000. The progress of the reconciliation process had already been stopped before the recent conflict. The civil war in Syria and the last two year's power struggles in Turkey's internal politics have frozen the reconciliation process that began in the beginning of 2013.
Many people in Turkey, mostly Kurds, hoped that the reconciliation process, initiated by President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan while he was prime minister with imprisoned PKK leader Abdullah Öcalan, would pave the way for a successful politicization of the Kurdish struggle and would end the more than 30-year armed conflict. The HDP's success in the June 7 elections, which should be considered an ultimate gain of the reconciliation process, was supposed to seal the end of armed conflict and open an era for a civilian, politics-based struggle. However, what has been happening is quite the opposite. Many were expecting a reconciliation process to have a happy end through its politicization. But what we have found is a return to violence after gaining more power, a return of PKK terror, and as a consequence, a hard fight between the Turkish Armed Forces and the PKK.
It is now clear that the reconciliation process cannot continue with a PKK that preferred to leave the negotiating table. It needs new actors who represent all Kurds, other than the separatist PKK. The time spent with the PKK was not a waste, but a learning process.
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