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Comment by _bohm | Hacker News Reader

Given that I'm very far removed from these events, I don't think it's my place to make strong judgements about what is and isn't justified in what has obviously been a very long and bitter conflict.

That being said, I don't think the PKK explicitly uses these past offenses to justify their continued activity in the conflict. My understanding is that they continue fighting because the Turkish Kurds still lack any meaningful political representation, they oppose Erdogan's push towards Islamic national identity, and because the Turkish State continues to carry out military strikes against Kurdish targets outside Turkey's borders.

I'm by no means an authority on this topic so feel free to correct me if I've made any incorrect statements. It sounds like you're much close to this conflict than I am, in which case my heart goes out to you in wishing for a peaceful resolution to all of this.

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Just to clarify, %20-25 of the population is Kurdish in Turkey. In elections, PKK affiliated legal party gets half of the Kurdish votes and other half goes to Erdogan roughly. So, there is no single Kurdish identity in Turkey, more like split between these two. Ofcourse, there is a few percent which is not among these two. So, if you ask is there any Kurdish people in the government, yes there are a lot. Erdogan gets half of the Kurdish votes, so we can say Kurdish Erdogan supporters have enough representation. PKK affiliated party is not in government, because they didn't get enough votes but they are in parliament ofcourse representing their %10 votes.

I don't think PKK cares about Erdogan's Islamic Turkey dream. You don't see PKK or it's legal party saying anything about it in Turkey, I think they mention it only when they are talking to western media :)

In Turkey, there is secular opposition which is rougly %40-50, they stand against Erdogan's Islamic push but they still lack of %50 + 1 votes to dethrone Erdogan unfortunately.

PKK says they want federalism for Kurdish cities, you can advocate for that, it's okay, their legal party is doing that, that's fine. But when you're holding guns and saying my way or high way, that's a big no. So, if they really care about democratic, secular Turkey, they can put guns aside, get together with opposition in Turkey.

> So, if they really care about democratic, secular Turkey, they can put guns aside, get together with opposition in Turkey.

On the flip side, learn the lesson from the iranian revolution. When religious extremists control the government and want to impose their religion on anyone, who holds the guns is the most important questions.

giving them up might be the surrender and death of democratic secular turkey, over time.

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