Support Cease-fire and Positive Steps
The statements came in the wake of DTP calling on the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) to declare a new unilateral ceasefire and end armed activities. It also coincided with a public communiqué issued by more than 200 Turkish and Kurdish intellectuals demanding the PKK to end all armed acts unconditionally.
SDP chair Filiz Kocali said her party supported the appeal while voicing concern parallel to that expressed in the intellectuals' communiqué. She said the DTP appeal "has an importance that could prevent a Turkish-Kurdish civil war" which, she noted, the country was being rapidly dragged into.
SODEV Chairman Aydin Cingi said, meanwhile, that the ceasefire demand was "a very positive development".
Cingi: Public should press for peace, support government
In a statement he issued to the press on Tuesday, Cingi recalled that appeals for a ceasefire had been made many times before, but that neither a durable ceasefire was achieved after them nor were any concrete steps for a solution taken.
"In order to avoid living through the same suffering," he said, "The democratic public opinion should this time be more insistent, show effort for the problem to be solved through peaceful and democratic means distanced from violence and support the steps that the political administration takes in this way".
Kocali: Cease-fire alone will not end clashes
In her statement on the issue, Kocali called on everyone against war in Turkey, the country's democratic forces and its socialist movement to act in wake of news of a possible the ceasefire to force the state to either officially or in practice introduce its own ceasefire.
Arguing that a unilateral ceasefire would not end the clashes, Kocali warned "it will be unavoidable to have new clashes if military operations continue. She said the appeal would work only if government forces ended their own-armed operations and called on the state or government to sit for talks, if not with the PKK itself - with the DTP.
Cease-fire not the final solution
Kocali said that ceasefire itself on both sides could lead to a peace process and that for a lasting peace the state had to accept the Kurdish identity while placing the Kurdish language under constitutional protection.
Noting that it would be errors to assume a ceasefire is the same as solving the Kurdish issue altogether, the left-wing politician said it would be a platform for solving problems in a peaceful way.
She also added that the decision of the Kurds themselves on how the Kurdish problem should be solved and which alternative was best, as well as respect by the state in this decision, was a key to peace. (TK/II/YE)