We publish year the editorial published in Özgür Gündem on Wednesday, the day after the paper was raided as part of the raids and arrests carried out in the context of the KCK operation.



Hundreds of people were taken into custody on Tuesday in the context of the “KCK” operation. The head office of our paper Özgür Gündem was also raided by police, which made copies of our hard disks. We wrote this article while the police was still raiding the office. Our columnists lawyer Ayþe Batumlu and Cengiz Kapmaz are also among the people arrested.

PKK leader Abdullah Öcalan had called on Prime Minister Erdoðan to guarantee a constitutional basis for the solution of the Kurdish problem. The prime minister responded to this call by preventing Öcalan from meeting his lawyers for four months. Moreover, almost all of Öcalan’s lawyers have been taken into custody on Tuesday. We hope this move by the PM has revealed the ultimate truth: the AKP government answer to Öcalan’s peace call was “taking everyone into custody”. Besides, it has become obvious who in this process wants war and do not stand on the side of peace. At the same time, it is ironic to see Erdoðan trying to justify the KCK operation by stating that “the judiciary process is not their business”. In an earlier interview to our paper, Öcalan’s lawyers said that “Öcalan was the last bridge”. This last bridge is now being sabotaged. If this is the case, who could now have doubts about who is to blame for what will come next? It is clear that Prime Minister Erdoðan and the AKP government are to blame for what will come in the future… The Prime Minister’s advisor must have been referring to this operation when, in his most recent statement, he said that new arrangements were to be made for Ýmralý.

Since being defeated by the BDP in the elections, the AKP government has, since 14 April of 2009, made every effort to put people in prison showing to be extremely prejudiced. Letting aside the rest, it will be enough to have a look at the history of free press to understand the current process well. Our colleagues who have been murdered by the state terror since 90’s are still in the heart of millions of people. We have nothing to say to those who think that we will be taken away from our intended path, except asking them: “Who do you think we are”... Indeed they know only to well that we will not give in, no matter what they do and how much they try to scare us, which is ultimately what they are mainly doing having nothing else left …

At every possible opportunity, the Prime Minister says that they are unable to deal with the Kurdish problem in a peaceful way. The same PM added that prisons will become more and more crowded. This is no doubt a way but it is the way of the cruel which, as he himself knows too well, won’t lead to any solution.

We don’t have any tools except for our pens. The whole world has seen what happened to those who write and to those who were slaughtered with napalm bombs and chemical weapons… The Prime Minister should not forget that time will come for him to be called into account sooner or later.

As to us, we are used to these pressures, we will continue on our path without taking a single step back since we know that only truth is going to win…