Kurdish nationalism in Armenia
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Subject: Kurdish nationalism in Armenia
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Kurdish nationalism in Armenia
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RFE/RL NEWSLINE Vol. 3, No. 3, Part I, 6 January 1999
KURDISH NATIONALISM IN ARMENIA
By Onnik Krikorian
The arrest last month in Rome of Abdullah Ocalan, president of
the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK), has led to a dramatic increase in
support for the Kurdish national liberation movement, even among those
Kurds living in countries where repression has not been particularly
evident in recent years. In Armenia, Ocalan's arrest has served to
accelerate the trend among the country's 50,000--60,000 strong Yezidi
community to identify themselves not only as Yezidi but also as Kurds.
The Yezidi are indeed Kurdish, speaking the same language as
the majority of the Kurds (Kurmanji), and all Kurds were originally
Zoroastrian before the majority converted to Islam. The Yezidi
religion--even with elements of the Zoroastrian, Islamic, and
Christian
faiths--closely resembles that of the Armenians before the adoption of
Christianity, and the PKK has recently acknowledged that fact in an
attempt to clarify the origins of the Kurdish nation. Visiting Armenia
in June 1998 in what was most likely a recruiting drive, Mahir Welat,
the PKK representative to Moscow and the CIS, affirmed, "I am a Muslim
Kurd but I also honor all religions. All Kurds used to be Yezidi
[Zoroastrian] in the past. Some of us were forced into becoming
Muslim,
but now it is our intention to return and to educate ourselves again."
The Yezidi are currently the largest ethnic minority in
Armenia, the Muslim Kurds having left during the early years of the
Karabakh conflict. Moreover, both the Armenians and the Yezidi fled
Ottoman Turkey during the massacres of 1915, and both harbor the same
hatred
of the Turkish and [Muslim] Kurdish perpetrators that has shaped much
of the identity and policy of present-day Armenia.
Although relatively small in size, the Yezidi community in
Armenia still has strategic significance for the PKK. An upsurge of
Kurdish nationalism in Armenia would inevitably affect an estimated
200,000 Muslim Kurds who have assimilated into Azerbaijani society.
Indeed, with the PKK representative to the Caucasus based in Armenia
and with Welat's recent visit, the situation of the Azerbaijani Kurds
may already be targeted for attention.
According to Welat, "the attitude of Armenia toward national
minorities is considered part of the generosity and graciousness of
the Armenian people. Azerbaijan has many nations too, but if we
consider their national policy, it is very bad. For those who show
loyalty
toward Azerbaijan, the attitude towards them is normal, but for those
such as the Kurds, the attitude is quite different. They do not have
normal lives."
Official PKK policy is to praise Armenia but to criticize
Azerbaijan for the treatment of its own Kurdish population--despite a
notable silence when the Kurds living in Kelbajar and Lachin were
expelled by Armenian forces during the Karabakh conflict. The PKK
even remained silent when, under the presidency of Levon
Ter-Petrossian, there was a short-term policy to promote a Yezidi
identify far removed from any Kurdish origin. That policy, however,
only strengthened the resolve among the Yezidi to develop a strong
Kurdish identity. Yezidi villages now openly demonstrate their support
for the PKK by displaying portraits of Ocalan and PKK guerillas on
their walls. In early December, buses ferrying villagers to Yerevan to
attend the 20th anniversary celebration of the formation of the PKK
displayed ERNK (National Liberation Front of Kurdistan) and PKK flags,
and a recorded message from Ocalan himself was broadcast to the
hundreds who attended.
While the reasons for the increase in Kurdish nationalism
among the Yezidi are complex, there is little doubt that one
significant factor is a marked reluctance among many Armenians to
consider Armenia
anything other than a mono-ethnic country. Even though policy toward
minorities may change under President Robert Kocharian, the Yezidi
have so far been overlooked during the development of the new social
and political structures. Thus, it was inevitable that the opportunity
to find themselves an integral part of a nation fighting for
liberation would prove attractive. With Ocalan in Rome and with the
Yezidi having found a new identity desirable in a new Armenia, open
support for the PKK in Armenia is currently politically expedient in
that it is
directed against Turkey.
As the result of the developments in Rome--and regardless of
sensitivities over identity in the past--50,000 Yezidi in Armenia have
come to identify themselves as Kurds virtually overnight. But that new
sense of purpose may pose problems in the near future, both for the
Yezidi themselves and for Armenia. Given the sensitivity of the
Kurdish question, it is uncertain how long Armenia will continue with
its new-found tolerance toward a minority that enthusiastically
identifies itself with a movement that might well achieve autonomy in
eastern Turkey, which many Armenians consider part of historical
Western Armenia. (Some Armenian political groups such as the
Dashnaktsutiune--
the Armenian Revolutionary Federation--have reportedly held talks with
the Kurds on reconciling the two nations' respective claims on those
territories.)
And if there is indeed an upsurge of Kurdish nationalism among
the Kurds of Azerbaijan, Baku may choose to attribute that development
to a deliberate policy of destabilization on the part of Armenia,
rather
than lay the blame on the PKK or on its own reluctance to address the
needs and aspirations of a significant ethnic minority.
The author is a free-lance journalist currently based in
Yerevan. The views expressed in this article are his own
and do not necessarily reflect the position of any
organization with which he may be employed or otherwise
affiliated.
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