‘Echo Gods and Silent Mountains’ by Patrick Woodcock – a review

Source: Kurdistan Tribune

"Echo Gods and Silent Mountains, in this reader’s opinion, is the best book ever written on Kurds: unique in both form and content. The book is a proof of Woodcock’s exceptional ability to commiserate with a nation invisible to the rest of the world; he becomes a Kurd, feels the plight, and carries the weight of a century of massacre, of endless pain. Woodcock is a genuine voice." writes Ava Homa

Read the full review ‘Echo Gods and Silent Mountains’ by Patrick Woodcock – a review

New Statistics Reveal the Size of Turkey's Kurdish Population

Source: Rudaw in English

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The Turkish Statistical Institute (TurkStat) recently published the birth records of Kurdish citizens in Turkey.

According to these records, there are 22,691,824 Kurds in Turkey, mostly born in Kurdish cities in the southeast of the country. Therefore, out of Turkey’s 74.7 million citizens, more than 30 percent are Kurds. These records only include people who have been registered at official government institutions.

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An open letter to Turkey – The Kurdish dilemma through the lens of a Kurd

Source: The Kurdistan Tribune

"The fact is, Turkey needs to step up a convincing ‘Kurdish opening’, allow a domestic Kurdish party to function without fear and continue/establish close ties with neighbouring Kurdish groups. Barzani and all those faithful to him would remain on side and reject instability in Turkey, if not for the love of the nation, at least for trading and economic purposes."

By Rebaz Hassan.A graduate in Political Economics. He has lived in London since 1990 and has made numerous visits to Iraq and Turkey.

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How the Kurds Have Changed Turkey’s Calculations on Syria

Source: Time

Syrian-Kurdish fighters last week took control of towns across northern Syria after Assad ceded them to shore up his forces in Damascus and Aleppo. Two weeks earlier, Iraqi-Kurdish leader Massoud Barzani had brokered a deal between rival Syrian-Kurdish groups, forming a national council and vowing to suppress their differences in order to pursue common Kurdish interests. That development stunned Ankara. Mainstream Turkish commentator Mehmet Ali Birand notes that the creation of an autonomous Kurdish zone in northeast Syria, following the emergence of a similar entity in Iraq, could portend the realization of one of Turkey’s worst nightmares coming true — “a mega–Kurdish state” along the southeastern border where the largest section of its own, restive Kurdish population of some 14 million is concentrated. Even the word Kurdistan is taboo in Turkey, where a separatist insurgency and efforts to suppress it have claimed more than 30,000 lives over the past three decades.

Read more: http://world.time.com/2012/08/06/how-the-kurds-have-changed-turkeys-calculations-on-syria/#ixzz22kugVy3O
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Syrian Kurds united against Assad – an interview with an insider

Source Daily Telegraph

" I think Turkey will never allow the PYD to control Syrian Kurdistan, not even partly, and that is why it opposes any attempt at a Kurdish semi-autonomous or a federal region" - Dr Abdulhakim Bashar, the former chairman of the KNC who now heads its foreign affairs committee (he's also the Secretary-General of the Kurdish Democratic Party of Syria).

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Leader of Free Syrian Army Says No Kurdish Region Allowed to Establish in Syria

Source: Rudaw

Colonel Riad al-Asaad, the leader of the Free Syrian Army 
“We will not allow one meter of Syrian land to be separated, and we will fight against anyone who tries to do so,” Asaad told the Turkish newspaper Bugun on Monday, attributing the FSA’s position to the principle of “one flag, united land.”

Read the full article: Leader of Free Syrian Army Says No Kurdish Region Allowed to Establish in Syria