Ekurd.net

DIYARBAKIR, Turkey’s Kurdish region,— Turkish intolerance towards name of Kurdistan puts in an appearance now in Viranşehir district of Urfa in Turkish Kurdistan in the southeast of the country.

Mazlum and Songül Erol, a couple has named their newly-born baby as “Kurdistan”, but they have allegedly been reviled at and denied by the birth registration office, Diha news reported.

Turkey’s highest court in July 2013 allowed a Kurdish couple the right to name their daughter “Kürdistan”, a word historically banned because it was considered seditious.

The appeals court overturned a lower court’s decision in 2013 to bar Yunus and Elif Toprak’s from naming their daughter after the region Kurds consider to be their ethnic homeland.

Father Mazlum Erol said: “I named our newly-born baby as Kurdistan. I applied to Viranşehir birth registration office. They registrated my daughter and gave me a sample of birth registration. But, when I went to take an identity card for my daughter, they reviled at me. The official in the birth registration office said me, ‘You are making propaganda of the Kurdistan Worker’s Party PKK’. He reviled at me and ejected me from the office. He instructed me to change name. I will not change the name of Kurdistan, even they will not give an identity card.”

Mother Songül Erol also spoke to DIHA and underlined: “We named our daughter Kurdistan. Whether they will give identity card or not, she will remain Kurdistan. We will never change her name.”

Others estimate over 40 million Kurds live in Big Kurdistan. More than 22.5 million Kurds live in southeastern Turkey (northern Kurdistan), estimated to over 12 million Kurds who live in northwestern Iran (eastern Kurdistan), nearly 3.5 million Kurds live in northern Syria (western Kurdistan) and 5 million Kurds live in northern Iraq (southern Kurdistan).

Newroz means ‘new day’ in Kurdish. Writing the word ‘Newroz’ in Kurdish is prohibited in Turkey because the Kurdish alphabet is still not recognized in Turkey, and use of the Kurdish letters X, W, Q which do not exist in the Turkish alphabet has led to judicial persecution in 2000 and 2003. Kurdish Newroz must be written as ‘Nevruz’ with Turkish alphabet.

Authorities considered the use of the words an expression of support for the outlawed PKK, which has called for independence and more recently autonomy for Kurd-populated regions in the country’s Kurdish region in south-east.

Until 2002, Turkey banned the use of the Kurdish language and the teaching of it in schools, with the words Kurd and Kurdish barred in public discourse.

Turkey which still denies the constitutional existence of Kurds, refuses to recognize its Kurdish population as a distinct minority. Kurds ask for more cultural rights for ethnic Kurds who constitute the greatest minority in Turkey. Kurds call for lifting the ban on education in Kurdish, paving the way for an autonomous democrat Kurdish system within Turkey. A large Turkey’s Kurdish community openly sympathise with PKK rebels.

(with files from AFP , Reuters, AP, DPA, diclehaber.com)

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