Is Turkey using chemical weapons against Kurdish rebels? German weekly Der Spiegel reported on its website Thursday that it had obtained photographs showing the bodies of fighters from the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) that had been killed by chemical weapons. The report, which is based on a report published over the weekend, claims German experts have examined and confirmed the photographs’ authenticity.
According to the report, the horrifying images show burned, maimed and scorched body parts. Kurdish human rights activists believe the people in the photos are eight members of the PKK underground, who were killed in clashes with the Turkish military in September 2009.
The photographs were transferred to a human rights delegation including German activists, journalists, and far-Left Turkish politicians.
A “far left Turkish politician” just has to be an interesting beast. From what I can gather, they are modeled after “social democrats” everywhere, which means that socialism is more important to them than freedom. This group seems to descend from pro-Soviet roots.
The report said the photographs were transferred to a forensics lab and were examined by experts from Hamburg University Hospital. Expert Hans Baumann confirmed the initial suspicion that it is highly probable the eight Kurds died “due to the use of chemical substances.”
This is not the first time Turkey is suspected of using chemical weapons, in violation of the international treaty to which it is a signatory. Such suspicions have led German politicians to call for an independent international probe into the matter.
It would be spectacular if those same German politicians were more serious in stopping Iran from going nuclear. How many German banks and German industrialists are doing business with Iran (maybe through appropriate cutouts to maintain semi-plausible deniability)? But only semi-plausible.
Gisela Penteker, a Turkey expert with the international medical organization International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War, noted that Turkey has been suspected of using chemical weapons for years. “Local people have said that again and again,” she explained. Finding proof is difficult, however, she said, because bodies were often released so late that it was hardly possible to carry out a thorough autopsy.
Meanwhile, Berlin daily newspaper Die Tageszeitung, also reported that it has obtained additional, shocking pictures, supposedly autopsy photographs of six other killed Kurds.
The paper also reported that the Turkish Foreign Ministry rejected the claims, saying, “Turkey is a signatory to the Chemical Weapons Convention, and its armed forces do not possess any biological or chemical weapons.”
Well, that’s comforting. Turkey, of course, is the newest addition to the international blame-Israel-first coalition, made up of the Arab league, most European nations, Russia and China…. and, of course, the American Left, including American academia and American media.
Good luck finding any significant American media outlet covering this, or an American academic calling for an international investigation…. of the sort they called for when Israel defended its Gaza blockade from Turkish ships. Now, THAT really deserved an “impartial” international investigation by that neutral arbiter of peace and truth, the United Nations.
But a few Turkish Kurds killed with banned chemical weapons? That doesn’t even make the radar screen, let alone the news.
It would seem that the Turkish government’s zone of protection from such investigation has widened, in exact proportion to its recent hostility to Israel. After all: the enemy of my enemy is my friend.
And to most of these people, Israel is surely the enemy.
