Will Turkey’s Kurds ever disarm? That is the question that most Turks will be asking in response to the call by the jailed Kurdish rebel leader Abdullah Ocalan for the group to prepare for peace. Kurds in Turkey, on the other hand, will have a different question: can the Turkish government be trusted? In both cases, the other side will have to trust a bit, move a bit and hope for the best. Otherwise the 30-year conflict between the Turkish state and separatist Kurds will never end.
The latest – and most promising – stage of this conflict came in the past two years, after then-prime minister, and now president, Recep Tayyip Erdogan approved official talks between his government and Ocalan, who is currently serving a life sentence in Turkey for treason.
In response, Ocalan declared a ceasefire in a struggle that has claimed more than 40,000 lives. That ceasefire still holds, just, but the end game for both sides remains opaque.
From the Turkish perspective, the Kurds must disarm. This is what Ocalan is proposing, an end to the military war and a move to, as he put it this week, “a democratic solution”. What the Kurds will ask in return is unclear. A 10-point proposal released earlier this year was vague.
Distrust, even hatred, of the PKK runs deep in Turkey; many Turkish families have lost members to terrorist attacks. Many Turks do not believe that the Kurds will ever give up their idea of creating the nation-state of Kurdistan, which would incorporate some land from Turkey’s south-east. The newly-emboldened Syrian and Iraqi Kurds across the border have only encouraged this perception.
There are those in Turkey’s government who would happily sabotage any deal with Ocalan. But Mr Erdogan must rein them in. The proposals for Kurdish disarmament remain the best option to end the conflict; there are, currently, no others. Thus both sides must grasp the moment. Solving one part of the Kurdish question will be a step forward, especially at a time of so much regional conflict.
The Brutalist
Director: Brady Corbet
Stars: Adrien Brody, Felicity Jones, Guy Pearce, Joe Alwyn
Rating: 3.5/5
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UAE currency: the story behind the money in your pockets
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The smuggler
Eldarir had arrived at JFK in January 2020 with three suitcases, containing goods he valued at $300, when he was directed to a search area.
Officers found 41 gold artefacts among the bags, including amulets from a funerary set which prepared the deceased for the afterlife.
Also found was a cartouche of a Ptolemaic king on a relief that was originally part of a royal building or temple.
The largest single group of items found in Eldarir’s cases were 400 shabtis, or figurines.
Khouli conviction
Khouli smuggled items into the US by making false declarations to customs about the country of origin and value of the items.
According to Immigration and Customs Enforcement, he provided “false provenances which stated that [two] Egyptian antiquities were part of a collection assembled by Khouli's father in Israel in the 1960s” when in fact “Khouli acquired the Egyptian antiquities from other dealers”.
He was sentenced to one year of probation, six months of home confinement and 200 hours of community service in 2012 after admitting buying and smuggling Egyptian antiquities, including coffins, funerary boats and limestone figures.
For sale
A number of other items said to come from the collection of Ezeldeen Taha Eldarir are currently or recently for sale.
Their provenance is described in near identical terms as the British Museum shabti: bought from Salahaddin Sirmali, "authenticated and appraised" by Hossen Rashed, then imported to the US in 1948.
- An Egyptian Mummy mask dating from 700BC-30BC, is on offer for £11,807 ($15,275) online by a seller in Mexico
- A coffin lid dating back to 664BC-332BC was offered for sale by a Colorado-based art dealer, with a starting price of $65,000
- A shabti that was on sale through a Chicago-based coin dealer, dating from 1567BC-1085BC, is up for $1,950
Results
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Test
Director: S Sashikanth
Cast: Nayanthara, Siddharth, Meera Jasmine, R Madhavan
Star rating: 2/5
Tree of Hell
Starring: Raed Zeno, Hadi Awada, Dr Mohammad Abdalla
Director: Raed Zeno
Rating: 4/5
