News / Turkey

Turkey Kurds full of feelings of vengeance: PKK leader

Tuesday, 15 March 2016 2:18 PM [ Last Update: Tuesday, 15 March 2016 4:31 PM ]

People carry their belongings as they leave their houses during clashes in central city of Diyarbakir on March 15, 2016. (AFP photo)

A top militant from the outlawed Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) has warned the Turkish government to expect payback for the ongoing military offensive in the southeastern Kurdish-majority regions.

In an interview published in Britain's Times daily Tuesday, Cemil Bayik stressed that the PKK militants were now justified in taking any course of action against Turkish forces.

"The Turks looted and burnt everything they could in the Kurdish cities on which curfews were imposed," Bayik said, adding, "Until recently the war with the Turkish army occurred just in the mountains. Then it moved to towns and cities. Now there will be fighting everywhere."

"At this moment in the struggle, anything our guerrillas are ordered to do will be legitimate."

The 65-year-old also warned that the Turkish government forces should expect vengeance, saying, "So now our people are full of feelings of vengeance, calling on our guerrillas to avenge them. This is a new era of the people's struggle."

He also accused administration of President Recep Tayyip Erdogan of curbing democratic forces across Turkey.

"If Erdogan defeats us, then he can defeat everyone in Turkey who wants democracy, so our main aim now is the fall of Erdogan, " Bayik said, noting, "Our fight is now existential: to be or not to be."

The remarks come as the Turkish military has stepped up its military campaign against PKK militants after a huge bomb attack hit a busy square in the capital Ankara over the weekend, leaving 37 people dead and 125 others wounded.

Turkish people carry their belongings as they leave their houses during clashes in central city of Diyarbakir on March 15, 2016. (AFP photo)

No group has yet claimed responsibility for the bombing, but security officials say initial findings suggest the two perpetrators of the car bombing were linked to the PKK.

Since Monday, Ankara has also increased its aerial raids against PKK positions in northern Iraq.

The developments come as Ankara has been imposing curfews in several mainly-Kurdish towns in its southeast since August last year.

The operations began in the wake of a deadly July 2015 bombing in the southern Turkish town of Suruc. More than 30 people died in the attack, which the Turkish government blamed on the Takfiri Daesh terrorist group.

After the bombing, the Kurdish militants, who accuse the Turkish government of supporting Daesh, engaged in a series of attacks against Turkish police and security forces, prompting the Turkish military operations in return.

The PKK militants have had ambitions for an autonomous Kurdish region in Turkey since the 1980s.

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