Calls For Protests As Turkey Constructs New Ditch Along Border With Rojava

A call for protests has been issued in North Kurdistan in response to Turkey’s most recent efforts to isolate Rojava, writes Bilal Güldem in a new article for Özgür Gündem. The call was made after the Turkish army began construction on a new border ditch 3m deep and 2 m across between Qamişlo, the largest city in the Cizîrê canton of Rojava and Nisêybîn  (Nusaybin) just across the border.

These most recent efforts to cut off Rojava from Kurdish regions in Turkey are reminiscent of earlier attempts to reinforce the border between Nisêybîn  and Qamişlo in 2013. At that time the new fence installations were widely decried in the North and came to be known as the “wall of shame.” While the official reason for the construction of more border fortifications was for “security and to prevent the passage of civilians,” Turkey’s border policy has been widely read in North Kurdistan has an attempt to isolate Kurds from one another.

Responses to the ditch construction, which is currently over 1 km in length, continue to grow. Xecê Şen, a member of the DBP’s Party Council and an activist with KJA, told the paper that the construction of the ditch between Qamişo and Nisêybîn  shows once more how Turkey has supported ISIS, saying “the fundamental objective is to obstruct the Rojava revolution and the struggle occurring there and to prevent the popular defense developing between Rojava and North Kurdistan. They have began the construction of this ditch in order to take an active role along the border between Nusaybin and Kobanê.” Xecê underlined that these ditches were being dug with the intention that they would serve as “a graveyard for the Kurds.”

Co-mayor of Nisêbîn Sara Kaya said that these ditches represented “Turkey’s biggest shame,” adding that “the goal of these ditches is to destroy the unity between the people of Nusaybin and Qamişlo. From this moment we will demonstrate the utmost resistance against these walls.”

HDP Party Council member Nazım Kök also condemned the ditches, noting that the AKP was continuing with an ideology of artifical borders that divided the people of the Middle East from one another. Kök said “they were not able to destroy the brotherhood of peoples with their mines. Attempts to divide Binxet (above the border) from Serxetî (below the border) are inhumane. These ditches are being dug according to the ideology of the nation-state.”