Turkey’s National Action Party Resists Peace with PKK
The National Action Party (MHP) is poised to oppose peace with the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) on the grounds that it will compromise Turkish identity, writes Caleb Lauer.
ISTANBUL —Two dozen retired men, most in woolen blazers, turned their chairs to the café’s center table. A grey-haired member of parliament in a black overcoat had taken a seat, in from a light February rain following Friday prayers at a nearby mosque. Celal Adan, Nationalist Action Party deputy for Istanbul and a politician on the hustings, quickly came to the crux.
“Who is it that wants to break Turkey’s union? Not Turks. Not the state,” Mr. Adan told the men in this working-class Istanbul neighborhood. “The PKK has killed Turkish soldiers, and now they say ‘Let’s make peace’?”
No, he said. Turkey should not legitimize the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) by negotiating peace. “Those that strike our soldiers or at our flag … need to be tried in court.”
The Nationalist Action Party, known by its Turkish initials MHP, is the only party in the Turkish parliament opposed to the unprecedented movement under way toward ending the three-decade PKK insurgency that has killed more than 40,000 people.
