Celebrating ‘Newroz’ in Turkey: ‘Change We Can Believe In!’

As a sign of the approach of spring, ‘Newroz’ is being welcomed in Turkey as well as being celebrated in different parts of the world from Central Asia, Northwestern China, and South Asia to Balkans. With its widely accepted meaning, Newroz is the beginning of the New Year in Persian tradition and is an indication of the end of winter and start of the spring.
Since Newroz is an old tradition whose roots date back to ancient times, numerous cultures enjoy Newroz celebrations. In Turkey, although being widely welcomed, Newroz is a day which is mostly identified with Kurdish people. Between the 18th and 21st days of March people gather together, share a festival, and jump over the Newroz fire, which is a tradition dating back to Zoroastrian times in Iran and is a sign of the end of winter and the beginning of spring.
Celebrating ‘Newroz’ in Turkey
When the socio-cultural and political atmosphere of Turkey within which the Kurdish issue has been fueled as a problem is considered, celebrating Newroz or any kind of cultural events gains numerous meanings beyond being single celebrations in Turkey. Not to blame Turkey for its intolerance of cultural events, but the context in which the celebration of a single event turns into an inferiority-superiority complex between the state and different segments of society, especially in terms of politics, should be examined in depth.
First, the historical context of the issue has been harmful for both parties of the Kurdish issue in Turkey. Although Turks and Kurds have shared hundreds of years of deep-rooted history, first under the Ottoman Empire and then in Turkey, Turkey witnessed a severe social disparity between ethnically, ideologically, or religiously differing groups and the state in parallel to several historical stages, due to numerous political transformations and the rising threat of terrorism. Kurds were the largest group in society who has severely suffered from this disparity. Above all, after the 1980s terrorism threat sparked the strict measures of the state over the Kurdish population. Between the 1980 and 1990s[1], Turkey was criticized for ‘human rights abuses’ against Kurdish militants. Moreover, many Kurdish people were evacuated from their residences, during last decade especially, due to worsening conditions of the region resulting from heavy fighting between the PKK (Kurdistan Workers’ Party) terrorists and the state’s armed forces. Although socio-economic development of the region became one of the primary concerns of the state, it has not been achieved ideally, as the state presumed. This end was much more due to the terrorism threat in the region, which made conditions unbearable for social servants employed by the state, or it was a simple result of severe infrastructure damages in the region by terrorist groups as the symbols of state’s power in the region.
What has been done so far to overcome the socio-cultural disparity is one of the questions that some Kurdish people ask. The issue was addressed in the EU Progress Reports as well as the EU 2008 Turkey Progress Report.[2] After the enduring wrongs of Turkey , especially from 1980 to 1996, including many Kurdish people’s being taken into police custody for supporting the Kurdish cause or being maltreated in prison, today’s enhanced socio-cultural rights towards detainees and towards Kurdish people is surprising for many. However, during the last decade, Turkey has been putting forth a greater effort to heal the wounds of the previous experiences with Kurdish people and to enhance the socio-cultural rights which Kurdish people have always demanded from the state. Moreover, besides socio-cultural aspects, Turkey has been making significant efforts to contribute to the economic welfare of the eastern and southeastern regions of Turkey which are densely populated with Kurdish citizens.
It also can be seen that torture and maltreatment allegations have been significantly reduced due to substantial changes in Turkey’s Anti-Terror Law. Although some of its aspects are still criticized, the Law mostly complies with Turkey’s position as a member of the Council of Europe, a state party to the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR), and a party to the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR). In this respect, Turkey has been shifting to proactive approaches to the Kurdish issue instead of reactive approaches. In most cases, unjust treatment seems to be demolished from the scene.
Newroz’s different meaning in Turkey reflects itself in politicians’ messages and Kurdish people’s long resistance to celebrating this festival in public as well. Although the festival has been widely celebrated in Turkey for years, its ‘Kurdish’ connotations were not as welcomed by the state until the last decade. Since Turkey witnessed severe clashes between the PKK terrorists and state powers, after 1984 especially, people were hesitant towards accepting anything ‘Kurdish’ with a calm heart. Thus, Newroz celebrations in the last decade and state officials’ support of these activities are very meaningful, as they are the signs of real changes in mentality towards the Kurdish issue in Turkey. In this sense, the last Newroz celebrations on March 21st were a lively picture of this shifting way of thinking.
Valuing Celebrations as a Chance to Bring Cultures Together
Considering the sociopolitical aspects of common celebrations, the U.S. President Obama seems to be among those who value these events as a chance to bring cultures together as well as to transfer political messages in a peaceful atmosphere. The U.S. President’s video message for the celebration of Newroz directly addressed Iranian leaders and was aiming to stop Iran’s state support of terrorism and to call for Iran to take peaceful actions. He concluded his speech with a reference to Saadi, who is one of the major Persian poets of the 12th century: “The children of Adam are limbs to each other, having been created of one essence” and with a Persian phrase celebrating Newroz: ”Eid-eh Shoma Mobarak.” The message, which is accepted as a “historical gesture,” jumped over cultural, religious, and language barriers, since it contained a direct reference to the common essences of the Abrahamic religions, a reference to the significance of Persian culture for world civilization, and lastly, with the Persian phrase meaning “Happy New Year.” This significant attempt was a slight but meaningful sign of the US’ getting rid of its superiority complexes of sharing the same belief of genesis with Muslims and hailing their language and culture in accordance.
President Obama’s message reminds us of the inner complexes of our own culture which have been fed by the ethnocentric approaches of decades-long disputes confining us within our borders. What we seek is not some pragmatic message towards different groups in Turkey, yet, what we expect is sincere attempts of Turkish politicians to bring people together without making any differentiation on gender, cultural background, religion, or language. This stance will slowly but surely help the abolishment of the cultural barriers in Turkey as which has been tried to be accomplished in the last decade. In this respect Turkish governors’ and officials’ Newroz messages were noteworthy, for they all underlined the importance of peace and solidarity among people of Turkey.
Governors and state officials’ attempts to get in contact with diverse segments of society is not a Newroz-specific event in Turkey. Since Turkey has been acknowledging the significance of every single individual’s feeling at home in the country, state officials started to take concrete actions on numerous grounds. In this sense, Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s celebrating public saying ‘TRT Shesh li ser xêrê be’ —May TRT 6 be auspicious— in Kurdish after state-funded Kurdish channel TRT 6 started broadcasting was a late but appreciable attempt towards appeasing Kurdish people’s demands on broadcasting in their own language as well as valuing their language. Likely, previous words of the Chief of the Turkish General Staff, Ilker Basbug, can also be analyzed within the same context. In one of his visits to the region, saying ‘We love Diyarbakir,’ which is one of the southeastern provinces of Turkey and is densely populated with Kurdish citizens, the General also contributed to the perception of Kurdish people as equal citizens of the Turkish state. Since the army has been considered and represented as an opponent of any expansion in rights in Kurdish issue up until now, the General’s words were more than meaningful. Although being an obedient citizen of Turkey has long been kept above one’s other identities[3]; the state officials’ and governors’ attempts should be valued as remarkable initiatives when the historical context of the Kurdish issue is considered.
Not only Newroz, but any festival with cultural roots should be considered a chance to make people feel they share common roots, happiness, sorrows, and aims although all follow different paths toward that end. As it can easily be predicted, such a stance cannot be reached by unsympathetic comments on people’s attempts to enhance their rights in their country but by employing all possible means to satisfy expectations of people from their state. Whether we believe it or not, politics is a large part of the issue, thus, it is somehow responsible for the unsolved problems of Kurdish people in Turkey. Moreover, not only politicians, but also common people are responsible as well for the deadlocks in the Kurdish issue in Turkey. Since it is ‘we’ who will dance hand in hand regardless of people’s cultural backgrounds and it is again ‘we’ who will jump over the ‘fire’ which has been fueled in Turkey for decades by the sorrows and losses of the parties of this dispute.

Dilek Aydemir
e-mail: daydemir@usak.org.tr

The Politics of Child Abuse in Turkey

When the news on the accusation of one of the writers of the daily newspaper ‘Vakit’ for abusing 14 years old girl was released, Turkey was shocked. People were giving more or less similar reactions as they have given to any ‘child abuse’ case. The offender was condemned and people started to wait for a trial which will possibly end with the imprisonment of 76 year old Hüseyin Üzmez, a lawyer and a writer in a daily newspaper which is known with its radical Islamist inclinations. However, people realized that the previous news was ordinary when they realized the real shock: Hüseyin Üzmez is released since the Turkish Council of Forensic Medicine gave an approval on that they did not receive any implication of damage in girl’s mental and physical health. Many civil society organizations mostly women’s organizations held protests after the trial and especially on November 25, the ‘International Day for the Elimination of Violence against Women’.


The Public Reactions via Conflicting Protests


The collective reactions by civil society were considerable. In these reactions the Council of Forensic Medicine’s report was at the center and most of the protestors claimed that the report on the mistreated girl’s psychology was invalid. The protests towards the report of Council of Forensic Medicine were meaningful, since, the council’s decision directly affects the court’s punishment of the accused and draws the limits of this punishment.
According to the article 103 of the Turkish Penal Code, sexual abuse of a child is punished with imprisonment from 3 to 8 years. One of the following parts of the same article (103-6) clarifies the issue: If the sexual assault results in damage in victim’s physical or mental health, perpetrator is punished with imprisonment not less than 15 years.[1]


The council’s decision is still open to critics since it is problematic, even may unjust, and do not fulfill the answers of further questions. Moreover, public reaction to the issue was significant and deserved more attention. However, women’s demands to reach an act to protect women from violence are coincided with many other groups’ protests toward government. Since Üzmez is seen a conservative figure with his ‘radical’ background, many directed their protests toward government via the child abuse case. Thus, the case went beyond being an ‘ordinary’(!) abuse and turned into a public political case. Although people’s reflection of their restlessness on the decision (report) of a body of Ministry of Justice is meaningful and worthy of consideration, the conflicting aims of the protests were diversionary.


As a common approach, in these cases, the public reaction to the issue differs. Like the cases on violence against women, the mistreated girl was embraced by women’s organizations as a result of women’s internalization of the problem. The girl, thus, somehow, is pushed to carry her role of woman more than her role as a child. The problem is considered as an abuse towards the women’s rights, which is mostly true, however, the child’s side of the issue is somehow underscored. Thus, such attempts to protect the rights of women gains support mostly from women while men’s internalization of the issue stays weak. In the cases of this kind, it should be kept in mind that the mistreated one is a child and needs protection from whole more than an adult waiting support from her gender.


Defenseless Child in the Web of News


The high attention towards the reports of child abuse had some unintended effects as well. The increasing media reports and public worry focused on the dreadful details of sexual abuse which caused “trivialization, if not, commercialization of child abuse.”[2] The girl was reduced to a fogged face that is running into a court, or trying to get rid of the journalists who were following her in her every step; while the accused were visiting TV channels with his cocky lawyers and his head up. It was not that easy to differentiate who was to blush with the consequences of his/her behavior or who was to be proud.


Beyond what has been said, while the media attention to the issue grew higher in accordance with the public reactions, the girl’s rights and protection may abused as well. People found out where the girl lived and who her family’s close neighbors were, what her father’s job was and even how much he has been gaining monthly. Somehow, the details on sexual abuse were everywhere as well, which did not help to protect the child but assisted to damage her severely.


Moreover, the leading figures in many TV channels were more than volunteer to host Üzmez in their TV programs, and listen his unendurable comments on irrelevant topics like how religious he was and how his deviant behaviors can be legalized under certain conditions. The media figures’ competition to host and condemn the accused resulted in his open self defense more than helping public to produce a collective action towards the cases of this kind and to create an agenda on the improvement of the laws on protection of the vulnerable. Thus, unfortunately, most public reaction was a result of a constructed rage against the accused and the case appeared as a discrete one. However, it was a reflection of the chronic problems which we face in any child abuse case not only in Turkey but also all around the world.


Through a Global Conceptualization of the Politics of Child Abuse


As we focus on the scope of the politics of child abuse in the world, we see that the measures are not limited to sexual abuse but are covered under a broader title ‘violence against children’ or ‘child maltreatment’.


“…child abuse reports have been growing for the past ten years, with the total number of reports nationwide increasing 45% since 1987. In this data, the analyses showed that girls are three times more abused than boys. However, boys are under greater risk of serious injury and of emotional neglect than girls.”[3]


As National Committee for the Prevention of Child Abuse in the US announced, the child abuse cases is increasing in the US as it has been declared by other countries including Canada, Australia, England. Moreover, the UN Secretary-General’s Study on ‘Violence Against Children’ supported by the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF), the World Health Organization (WHO), and the Office of the High Commissioner on Human Rights (OHCHR) defines the child abuse as a widespread global problem.[4]


Figure 1: Cases of Child Maltreatment in Canada[5]





The UN’s study acknowledges governments about the scale of the problem and calls them to respond the human rights obligations they have accepted. The evaluation of the study reveals that many governments are on the way to reduce the multiple impacts of the problem and they try to conduct prevention strategies as well as therapeutic responses. The strengthening national and local commitment and action, promotion of non-violent values and awareness raising, enhancing the capacity of people who work with and for children, providing recovery and social reintegration services and developing and implementing systematic national data collection and research are listed among the recommendations of the UN study to the states in global community in the report.


As indicated by the extensive studies, the measures on the prevention of child abuse and provision of well functioning politics on the topic necessitate the collaboration of wide variety of fields. Furthermore, the measures should be supported by the laws to clear the fog on the issue and to address the responsible government bodies directly.


Since the violence against children is a widespread problem, the politics of child abuse require globally accepted measures against the cases of this kind. Thus approaching the child abuse as a discrete case and merely condemning the accused do not provide practical answers to the global standing of the problem, but may help to marginalize the case.





Dilek Aydemir (JTW)


December 4, 2008


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