PodcastKurdish associations on racist attack against Amedspor: Kurds at the target
The East and Southeast Associations Platform (DGD), which consists of about 500 associations, has said that Diyarbakır’s football team Amedspor is a symbol of Kurds and Kurdistan which is why it has recently come under a racist attack.
Ferhat Yaşar / Gazete Duvar
The East and Southeast Associations Platform (DGD), embodying about 500 associations, has slammed the recent racist attack against the players of Amedspor, the football team of the Kurdish-majority province of Diyarbakır.
At a press meeting held at the Istanbul branch of the Human Rights Association on March 8, DGD president Abdulhakim Daş said: “The reason for the attack is that Amedspor represents Kurdish values through sports. Amedspor has become a symbol for Kurds and Kurdistan. (Referring to the posters of JİTEM member Mahmut Yıldırım and white Toros) The posters unfurled during the match symbolize the massacres of the deep state against Kurds in the 1990s and the murder of 17,000 people. These attacks are continuing since the 1990s. And these unfurled posters remind us of the deep state.”
The press meeting was held both in Turkish and Kurdish. The Diyarbakır province is referred to as Amed by the Kurdish people.
During a March-5 dated match, Bursaspor fans threw water bottles and explosive materials at Amedspor footballers. Moreover, posters of “white toros” and Mahmut Yıldrım were unfurled in the tribunes.
“White Toros” – an old vehicle specially designed for Turkish drivers by French Renault’s local representative – symbolized the embodiment of state fear in the 1990s in Turkey's southeast. Hundreds of Kurdish people became victims of enforced disappearances in Turkey during this period, abducted by gendarmerie intelligence, or JİTEM, with Toros brand.
Mahmut Yıldırım, known by the code name “Green,” also played a role in these notorious murders.
Istanbul Amed Associations Federation Board member Zübeyde Caner also took the stage during the press meeting, saying that the attack was not just committed against Amedspor, but “all social fractions, especially Kurdish people.”
“This is all the result of a perception that was formed and perpetuated all these years against Kurds. It needs to be finally seen that the extensive organization of these attacks against Amedspor is the result of a deep perception made to be formed against Kurds for several years,” Caner said.
(English version by Didem Atakan)
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