Unite West Asia and Other Parts of the World Against Imperialism

by Nulifer Koc

First of all, I would like to commemorate all the martyrs of my country, Kurdistan, martyrs of Latin America, NorthAmerica, African continent, Asia continent, Europe. We do believe that the martyrs are those who hold up the path to the future. It is our duty to fulfill their dream for a socialist and democratic future. In the last 7 years in our struggle against the international tool called Islamic State, we lost 11,000 fighters – Kurdish fighters, Arabic fighters, Assyrian and Armenian fighters.

But the most strategic success in this world was the ideological struggle. We defeated the main rule of the imperialist powers, the classic principle of divide and rule. We learned we can succeed in our struggle if we bring the people together.

We brought Kurds, Arabs, the Christian Assyrians and Armenians, the Chechnyans and Turkmens in North and East Syria together. We had the historical victories against the project of United States, the so-called project of Great Middle East. We start to benefit from a war which was in the colonial interest of imperialist powers. We haven’t complained, we haven’t accused them that they are bad people. We said it is our duty as revolutionaries to create [an] alternative. Everyday [we] continue to see the people, that we must bring them together. For that it is important to overcome any influence by the imperialist ideology like nationalism, racism, and sexism.

For coming together, there was a need of common principle of the people. And one of the golden principles of our revolution is the liberation movement of women.

We said to the Arab comrades [that] we will work with you together if you respect women. And the same with our Christian comrades in Northern Syria. Because we learned from the experience of the former socialist revolution that the power of women is a guarantee for social revolution amongst the society.

That’s why I do believe there’s no sense not to say unite the people to fight and end imperialist war, racism and fascism, as much as sexism.

Dear comrades, some accuse the Kurdish liberation movement that they are collaborating with US and Syria. I would say no! We are the one in the Middle East who are fighting the imperialist moves of US in Middle East; against the Great Middle East project which started in Northern Syria to prepare the base of democratic confederation of Middle East, bringing the people together, because they separated us in the 19^th century. We’re bringing all of those together, but they’re separate from each other.

We are fighting against the US, not militarily, but ideologically and strategically. Because we’re defeating Turkey as the main instrument, as a member state of the NATO and ally of US. Defeating Turkey means weakening the American imperialist movement in the Middle East.  We are creating a different form of democracy in opposition to those in Iraq, Libya, and Syria and to other countries of the region.

Today we believe it’s important to be very hard in ideological ways but there is that conflict. Because we are surrounded by the so-called international coalition which includes 82 nation-states, led by US on one hand and on the other hand, Russia. I declare that in the Middle East, we experience that the Russian policy is no different from the US policy. Last year, when Turkey was occupying the Turkish city of Afrin, it was done because Russia and US have united with Turkey. They are punishing us, the Kurds, because they say, “The Kurds do not listen to us.” That’s right. We are not listening to Russia and we are not listening to Washington. We do believe that there is an alternative, the third way. We don’t look on the powers. We don’t believe in the nation-states. We do believe in the grassroots.

We do believe in the small people. Because if you bring them together, they are the main power for revolution. And indeed, we say I am thankful to Comrade Abdullah Ocalan. He was the one who prepared us for the war which is now happening militarily in the Middle East, but happening in different forms in Asia, Latin America, and European countries.

He prepared us for the first few steps. You must focus on [the] grassroots, improve local democracy, improve the new ideology of democratic nation with philosophy of unity of diversity, overcome any kind of nationalism, racism, and sexism. Because Middle East is the area of multicultural, multi-ethnic and multi-religion. Any kind of dogmatism, any kind of being focused on power or hegemony of aids can’t help us to move with the path for freedoms for the people. And he said, in the past because we were backed by Soviet Union or by the NATO pact, and both sides used us. In the 21st century, we learned and we say there’s a third way. No Moscow, neither Washington, nor Brussels.

So this made us into a power today and I think this is the right way to fight imperialism in the Middle East. So the project was towards creating true Kurdistan – the four parts of Kurdistan. It means democratisation of Turkey to North Kurdistan, democratisation of Iran to East Kurdistan, democratisation of Iraq to South Kurdistan, democratisation of Syria to West Kurdistan or Rojava. But this is the base of democratization of Middle East. And we are in the right way. And I hope today – there’s elections in Turkey, in Istanbul. So we will again confer these Kurdish people, opposition to Turkey’s democratic forces. But if the people are united, they can defeat the main instrument of the Americans, the Turkish government. And we are on the right path because in the last seven months, our comrades – 7,000 of our political prisoners, men and women, political prisoners of PKK and the women’s party, they started a hunger strike for the lifting of the isolation of Kurdish people’s leader Abdullah Ocalan. And once more we learned that resistance guarantee the victory. And now we have the victory and we will bring the main tool of US imperialism – Turkish, fascist government down. Today, the Kurdish people will vote against them in the city of Istanbul which is symbolic for old Turkey.  So today there will be elections happening in Istanbul. I hope we will achieve this today.

For this congress, I wish we will create bridges between West Asia and other parts of the world – because people of Middle East, we say West Asia. Well, I think now is the right time for all of us because the imperialist system is very weak and if all of us do their homework in their places – like, we do it in the Middle East, and Europe; and with revolutionary and progressive movement in your country. This is the historical moment which Lenin said, if there is movement, of course, and Ocalan said this is the right opportunity and right time to defeat and unite against imperialism.

**Nulifer Koc is the Co-Chairperson of the Kurdistan National Congress. She chairs equally with Comrade Ocalan. The Kurdistan National Congress includes 46 political parties all over North Turkey, East Iran, South Iraq, West Syria, and the Assyrian Arabic parties in Kurdistan. She has been fighting for 5 years in Iraq and Syria.