Letter to Sigmar Gabriel over Turkish offensive against Kurds

Letter to Sigmar Gabriel over Turkish offensive against Syrian Kurds — German Foreign Minister and Vice Chancellor Sigmar Gabriel presides the weekly cabinet meeting at the Chancellery in Berlin, Germany, August 2, 2017. Photo: Reuters

Dr. Amir Sharifi | iKurd.net

Sigmar Gabriel
Werderscher Markt 1 10117
Berlin Postal address: 11013 Berlin .

Dear Minister:

We as concerned Kurdish Americans in Southern California raise our voices against the Turkish invasion of Syria and call for worldwide condemnation of the crimes that are being committed against long suffering Kurdish and Syrian people.

As you know Turkey in violation of international humanitarian laws and Geneva conventions, is waging a brutal and relentless war against Kurds in Syria, indiscriminately using German made weaponry against non-combatants and Kurdish freedom fighters who for the past five years have been in the forefront of fighting against the Islamic State in Syria. Kurds like all other Syrians have suffered great calamities.

Turkey is now bringing them new calamities, with a deadly combined force of its army and Jihadists “ to crush” Kurdish natural right to life. Manu people have lost their lives and many have been wounded and maimed. The weapons your Government supplies to Turkey are now being used against civilians.

Although we feel encouraged by your expression of concern and the German federal government’s decision not “to deliver [tanks] into areas of tension”, we feel that NATO in its entirety bears a greater responsibility not to justify an unfair and deliberate war that has no basis in morality nor in international law.

The Kurds in Syria with great sacrifices and help from the West were able to save themselves and the world from the terror of ISIS Your Governments broadened its support for Kurdish forces in Iraq and Syria to defeat ISIS and Kurds have delivered fatal blows to ISIS.

The position and support of your Government was crucial to the success of the alliance against the Islamic State. At the time Kurds were fighting to build a society based on the principles of freedom and democracy within a federated Syria, the Turkish government was funding and supporting Jihadist forces in Syria and building an autocracy at home.

In light of such a history, we find any support for the current Turkish Government objectionable in the face of its total disregard for human life and sordid alliance with Jihadist forces. We strongly feel it is the moral responsibility of your respective Government to completely stop the sale of armaments to Turkey, notorious for debasing even your country and its democratic institutions for being moderately critical of the Turkish flagrant human rights violations. Inhabitants of Afrin and surrounding areas are now under the Turkish siege.

Every day that the occupation continues, more children, women, and men are losing their lives to a tyrannical, corrupt, and megalomaniac politician who is willing to go to any extreme to destroy a pluralistic, secular democracy in Western Syria. As the invasion enters its first week, thousands of besieged, trapped, and displaced people require humanitarian assistance that only the US or NATO can provide in the face of the Turkish animosity.

In the spirit of global responsibility and recognizing international conventions, we urge your Government to stop supporting the Turkish military aggression and authoritarianism and its bloody assault on civilians and the heroic (People’s Protection Units (YPG), Kurdish Women’s Protection Units (YPJ, and Syrian Defense Forces (SDF), whose sacrifices to the war on terror has repeatedly been applauded.

These daring freedom fighters have made the world a safer place for all of us and should not be abandoned. More than applause, they now need your Government’s support as they face an existential threat from a full military invasion. The Turkish assault is not only against Kurds but their Western allies. We as advocates for peace hereby appeal to your Government and major NATO Member States to stop the sale and shipments of arms to Turkey and to bring international pressure on its government to end the invasion of Afrin and further escalation of the conflict.

Cordially

Dr. Amir Sharifi

Dr Amir Sharifi, is the president of the Kurdish American Education Society KAES, Los Angeles, California and Lecturer at California State University, Long Beach. Director of the Kurdish Human Rights Advocacy Group ( KHRAG).

The opinions are those of the writer and do not necessarily represent the views of iKurd.net or its editors.