History

France played a significant role in events which led to the partitioning of Kurdistan and a part of it being annexed by Syria. These events included the 1916 Sikes-Pikot agreement and the developments that ensued following the breakdown of the Ottoman Empire, such as the border agreements between Kamal Ataturk’s Turkey and French-mandated Syria (signed on October 20, 1921), the Mosul province problem, the 1923 treaty of Lausanne and other treaties in which France played an important role. Therefore France bears considerable responsibility for the fact that the Kurdish people are deprived of their national and human rights even today. At the time of the formation of the geographic borders of Syria, the Kurds asked the French mandate authorities to grant them the right of autonomy, something the French had done for other peoples inhabiting Syria at the time through the establishment of the states of Alawite, Druze, Aleppo, Damascus, and others. The Kurdish position that was presented to the Syrian constituent assembly in Damascus on June 28, 1928 included the following demands:

1. The right to use the Kurdish language in Kurdish areas, and to teach it in the schools.
2. Replacing employees working in the Kurdish areas with Kurdish employees.
3. Establishing a Kurdish army unit within the French army to protect the borders. (In spite of the fact that the Kurds were given the right to do so in the 2^nd article of the mandate’s constitution, several factors—most importantly French interests with Ataturk’s Turkey and the wish to please the Arab majority—prevented the implementation of this article.

Since that time, and especially after the departure of the French, successive governments that have ruled Syria have been changing the ethnic character of the Kurdish areas, namely Al Jazirah, Kurdagh and Kobani, which cover an area of over 20,000 square kilometres. They have pursued a policy of ethnic assimilation against the Kurdish people by ignoring and denying the fact that the Kurds constitute the 2^nd largest ethnic group in Syria, exceeding 12% of the total population and numbering over two million inhabitants.

Among the racist measures carried out against the Kurdish people, we would like to mention the following examples:

1. Since 1962, more than 200,000 Kurds have been stripped of their Syrian nationality and deprived of all their civil rights, such as the right to work, to participate in the nomination process and to vote, to obtain passports, to record marriage and birth certificates, to travel and stay in hotels, to register ownership of property, land and cars. Moreover, the Syrian authorities have confiscated the homes of Kurds whose nationalities were stripped from them, and forced them to pay rents to the state. (For more information regarding this matter, it is useful to refer to the 1996 annual report issued by the Human Rights Organisation. In its annual report of 1999, the organisation stated the following: "The organisation has not received any information regarding steps taken by the Syrian government to remedy the problem of Kurds born in Syria and who have been denied Syrian nationality.")
2. Beginning in the mid-1960’s, land of Kurdish peasants was confiscated. Then in 1973, Syria began implementing the "Arab belt" scheme along the border with Turkey, a strip 375 km in length and 10-15 km in width. Syrian authorities started distributing land owned by Kurdish peasants to Arab settlers brought in from the Al Raqqah area. This was done in an attempt to demographically change the whole area and to isolate the Kurds in Syria from their brothers in Kurdistan Iraq and Kurdistan Turkey, forcing them to emigrate from the Kurdish area to avoid persecution, poverty and unemployment.
3. In an attempt to destroy and eradicate all national and ethnic characteristics of Kurdistan Syria, and to assimilate and Arabise the Kurdish people by force, Syrian authorities have practised a policy of Arabising the names of towns, villages, commercial shops, ruins, and even Kurdish mountains. The racist and chauvinistic Syrian authorities made this obvious by insisting on considering Kurdish culture a danger that must be resisted by all possible means. A recent example of this war waged against the Kurdish culture is Resolution 768 taken by the governor of Aleppo on April 20, 2000. It orders the closure of all shops selling tapes and video cassettes in the Kurdish language, and bans all private Kurdish gatherings and festivities in the town of Aleppo.
4. Syrian authorities have refused to accept over 90% of all employment applications submitted by Kurds. Kurds have also been excluded from administrative, diplomatic and military positions. Kurdish students have been expelled from colleges and universities, and Kurdish labourers have been dismissed from work under false pretences (that of being a danger to state security).
5. Syrian authorities have mobilised the Arab masses racially. They would rather make peace with Israel than accept Kurds as Kurds and not as Arabs. Moreover, a Syrian governmental report on racism has stated that there is no Kurdish problem in Syrian—only Kurdish inhabitants.

In short, the Kurds are under siege in their own country, deprived of basic human rights. The Syrian constitution ignores the existence of a distinct Kurdish population in Syria. Moreover, non-Arab minorities inside the ruling Baath party are considered a "problem" that must be "solved", meaning they should be eliminated economically, socially, culturally and demographically through a tough policy of discrimination and isolation leading in the final analysis to ethnic cleansing.

This contradicts the right, granted by the UN charter, of a people to express its identity. Furthermore, it abolishes the legal identity of Kurds in Syria in contradiction to Article 6 of the Universal Declaration of Human rights under UN General Assembly Resolution (D.3) A217, dated October 10, 1948, which states that all human beings in all places should be granted the right to have their legal identity recognised.

Therefore, Kurds in Syria are denied all the rights enumerated in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights’ 30 articles and appendices. Kurds in Syria are considered guilty from the day they are born. They are subjected to increasingly intensified racist and discriminatory policies, resulting in increased internal displacement of Kurds from Kurdish areas--noticeable especially at the outskirts of Syrian towns and cities—and in emigration to neighbouring countries such as Lebanon and beyond, in search of a safe haven.

In spite of the fact that the Kurdish people have never enjoyed any of their lawful human and national rights, they are still clinging to the ethic identity, language, culture, heritage and traditions that set them apart from the people who surround them. All the racist policies implemented against Kurds have not destroyed their cultural heritage.

In the 1950’s, a large-scale Kurdish political movement emerged. It appealed for democracy, and adopted a policy of peaceful political struggle. Its various groupings have demanded the following:

1. Constitutional recognition of the existence of the Kurdish people in Syria, and recognition of the Kurdish movement as their legal representative.
2. Kurdish participation in the administration of the state’s affairs at the legislative, executive and judicial levels, in proportion to their numbers.
3. Establishing the Kurdish language as one of the official languages in Kurdish areas, as well as allotment of airtime for the transmission of Kurdish programs on Syrian radio and television.
4. Freedom of press for the Kurds.
5. Recognition of the Nuruz feast as a national Kurdish feast and as an official holiday throughout the entire country.
6. Establishment of administrative autonomy in Kurdish areas in the following manner:

1. Local administrative and security authorities should be placed in the hands of Kurds by means of free elections.
2. A distinct percentage of the state budget should be assigned to the Kurdish areas, based on the state of chronic neglect to which these areas have been subjected, the decline in their standard of service and the extent of their underdevelopment.

1. Cancellation of the "Arab belt" scheme, return of property seized from the Kurds, and compensation to Kurdish peasants for damages inflicted upon them.
2. Liberation of all Kurdish political prisoners. In spite of a universal interest in the issues of democracy and human rights, and in spite of the growing role played by organisations such as the Human Rights Commission and the International Parliamentarian Union which deal with such concerns, EU governments and the United States continue to marginalise the Kurdish problem. They use it only as leverage to further their own economic and political agenda. Humanitarian organisations, on the other hand, do not always succeed in their good intentions.

Paragraph 2 of each treaty with the EU has stated that respect for human rights and democratic principles should be a basic component of any such agreement. Syria was the last of the 12 "Mediterranean partners" to start negotiations with the EU concerning the treaty (refence?). There was no proof that any human rights issue was discussed during those negotiations. Moreover, French Prime Minister Jospin told Syrian Hafez Al Assad that "Europe is based not only on the principle of economic development, but on the principles of democracy and human rights. . . . And your country, having chosen Europe, should accept that fact." Insofar as France held the EU presidency at the beginning of July, 2000, and because it is well aware of the historical circumstances surrounding the Kurdish problem, we hope that it will play a positive role in alleviating the suffering of the Kurdish people in general, and those living in Syria in particular, even though UN Secretary General Kofi Annan stated in 1999 that "there are no internal problems (in Syria) henceforth."

In short, the Kurdish people in Kurdistan Syria—whose number exceeds two million, whose existence is not recognised, who are deprived of all democratic and human rights, and who are continuously facing persecution in all of its forms—call upon the international community to intercede with the Syrian authorities in order to find a just solution to their ordeal, especially now that the whole region is embarking on a process aimed at solving the issues of conflict between the Arabs and Israel. We would like to note here that a fair and comprehensive peace cannot be reached in the Middle East unless the region’s ethnic plurality and cultural diversity is respected within a framework of ethnic integration and religious tolerance, and unless all of the region’s people, including the Kurds, get to enjoy their human and democratic rights. Solving the Kurdish problem in Syria will be the true measure of democratic change that is supposed to take place in the country.

Finally, we hope that you will succeed in your efforts to shed light on the Kurdish problem in the French Parliament, and to build support for a movement that will influence both the French government’s and the European Commission’s commitment to democracy and human rights for the Kurdish people.