The Kurdish umbrella organization KON-MED has reiterated the demand for the lifting of the ban on the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) in Germany, which was imposed thirty years ago, and issued a statement on the demonstration held on Saturday in Berlin.

In the statement, KON-MED said that the PKK ban issued in 1993 had no legal basis and was part of the internationally agreed action against the Kurdish liberation movement. With the ban on activities, an official cover was created for the first time against the Kurds’ freedom of organization and assembly. “This step, which was purely political and had no basis whatsoever, became an illegal process in Germany, the country with the largest Kurdish population of criminalization.”

On 25 November a conference organized by the Cologne associations AZADÎ and MAF-DAD with the title “30 years of ban on activity against the Kurdish freedom movement: lifting the PKK ban – strengthening democracy” will take place in Berlin.

Mechanism for implementing Turkish demands

Dozens of Kurds have been arrested in Germany over the past thirty years, KON-MED continued: “In fact, with this practice, which was formalized as a PKK ban, the German state has become a mechanism that fulfills the wishes of the Turkish state implemented. The Kurdish people have no other goal than to exercise their democratic rights. The PKK ban decision, which has been used as a cudgel against Kurds for thirty years, is a disgrace for Germany. The Kurdish people have rejected this injustice and shame through their resistance. Therefore, this ban no longer has any meaning for the Kurdish people. The Kurdish people do not recognize this decision and will not give in in the fight against this injustice and lawlessness.”

Police provocation failed

As for the demonstration held on Saturday, KON-MED said that thousands of people in Berlin demanded the lifting of the ban on the PKK despite being provoked by a large police presence.

Apparently, the police attacks were intended to produce images of “violent Kurds” ahead of the demonstration in order to justify the ban. KON-MED underlined that this attempt failed due to the calm attitude of the demonstrators: “The provocations of the German police against the people who gathered in the early hours of the morning on Berlin’s famous Oranienplatz did not achieve their goal. We condemn cooperation with the Turkish regime, which is fueling the war in the Middle East, carrying out massacres in Kurdistan and organizing ISIS mercenaries. With the ban on the PKK, the German state is implementing the demands of the Turkish state. The German state should turn away from this mistake, listen to the just demands of the Kurdish people and abandon its criminalization policy.”

The struggle goes on

According to KON-MED, there are one and a half million Kurds living in Germany, and thousands of them “made a declaration of intent and condemned the ban” on 18 November. The Kurdish umbrella organization thanked everyone who contributed to the successful event.