Turkey’s parliament on Thursday rejected a proposal by the country’s pro-Kurdish party to investigate barriers to the public use of the Kurdish language, the İlke TV news website reported.
The motion, submitted by the pro-Kurdish Peoples’ Equality and Democracy Party (DEM Party), was voted down in the General Assembly with support from the ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP), its far-right ally the Nationalist Movement Party (MHP) and the nationalist opposition İYİ (Good) Party.
The proposal called for the establishment of a parliamentary commission to identify obstacles to the use of Kurdish in public life and examine measures aimed at protecting and developing the language.
Speaking before the vote, DEM Party lawmaker Gülderen Varlı said protecting and developing Kurdish is of vital importance for the principles of a democratic society and for cultural diversity.
Lawmakers from other opposition parties also expressed support for mother-tongue rights during the debate.
Okan Konuralp, a lawmaker from the main opposition Republican People’s Party (CHP) said his party viewed native-language rights as part of democratic reform and equal citizenship.
“The loss of languages is not only a sociocultural or anthropological issue,” Konuralp said. “It is also a problem that deepens social distance and weakens the will to live together.”
He listed several languages spoken in Turkey, including Kurdish, Armenian, Laz, Circassian, Syriac and Arabic and said all communities should be able to preserve and develop their languages without discrimination.
Necmettin Çalışkan, a lawmaker from the New Path parliamentary group — an alliance of smaller conservative opposition parties including the Democracy and Progress Party (DEVA), the Future Party (GP) and the Felicity Party (SP) — criticized what he described as growing political polarization in Turkey.
Kurds in Turkey are often pressured not to speak their mother tongue. Authorities frequently claim that people speaking in Kurdish are chanting slogans in support of the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK), which has been leading an armed insurgency against Turkey’s security forces since the ’80s in a campaign that has claimed the lives of some 40,000 people.
Prohibitions against the use of Kurdish in Turkey go back many years. Kurdish language, clothing, folklore and names were banned in 1937. The words “Kurds,” “Kurdistan” and “Kurdish” were among those officially prohibited. After a military coup in 1980, speaking Kurdish was formally forbidden, even in private life.
The visibility of Kurdish on TV and in the print media was only made possible in the early 2000s thanks to significant progress made in the country’s bid to become a member of the EU.
Yet the drift towards nationalism and the ruling AKP’s alliance with the far-right MHP in the last decade has led to an increase in anti-Kurdish racist attacks.
