13th September, 2023

CYPRUS REPUBLIC AGAINST KENAN AYAS: Victory in the hunger strike! No to the silencing of the Kurdish people and the international movement, Solidarity Assembly for Kenan Ayas

march against the extradiction of kenan ayaz

THE EXTRADITION OF KENAN AYAS IS THE PARTICIPATION OF THE CYPRIOT STATE IN THE GENOCIDE OF THE KURDISH PEOPLE AND THE SILENCING OF THE ANTI-SYSTEMIC MOVEMENTS

In the era of individualism, de-politicization and weak or non-existent organized popular movements, it is difficult for us to understand the war and the decisions taken against us. Kenan Ayas is a fighter who has spent many years in the cells of the Turkish state under horrific torture and harmful hunger strikes. He is a man who has not stopped under any circumstances to cry out that the Kurdish people are living through the massacre, genocide, robbery and deprivation of rights and freedom. A man who has not stopped criticizing how capitalism is killing society internationally and how the freedom of society is through ecology and women’s liberation. He has organized thousands of courses and lectures in Cyprus and Europe to rescue the forbidden language of the Kurdish people, their oppressed customs and traditions and of course to politicize his people and all of us around social issues.

It is therefore understandable that when the Cypriot state defines such a person as a terrorist then this state is fighting against the self-consciousness of society and its efforts for equality and freedom. When it tries to imprison such a man and send him back to his torturers and the executioners of his people, then the Cypriot state is participating as an ally of the Turkish state in the war waged against the Kurdish people.

The Kurdish Freedom Movement is on trial in the face of Kenan Ayas, because any decision against Kenan can be turned against all Kurdish men and women since, the least a people facing genocide can do is to speak their language, uphold their customs and become politically aware. This particular decision can be turned against everyone especially due to the fact that there is not a single piece of evidence of Kenan’s involvement in armed action. However, in Kenan Ayas’ face, socialism, communism, anti-capitalism, criticism of the nation-state, the promotion of social self-defense, women’s liberation and ecology are also on trial, so we are all on trial. Lawyer V. Bissas, the executioner who represented the Cypriot state and undertook the dirty work on behalf of the German and Turkish state, stated this clearly during the hearing and said eloquently: “Kenan Ayas is not just a teacher of Kurdish culture, his texts and lectures are full of Marx, Engels and above all criticism of capitalism.” As it becomes obvious, there is an attempt to criminalize politicization and link it to terrorism, as it becomes obvious, they want to remove from Cypriot and international society the people who care about their political enlightenment, that is, they care about self-defense and the survival of societies. This is the justification for the merciless war against the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK). V. Bissas, as a fanatical representative of the modern destructive system, in his zealotry to show Kenan Ayas as a terrorist and the PKK as a terrorist organization, was not ashamed to charge them with the murderous bombings in the middle of a crowd that occurred in the center of Istanbul in broad daylight, again, without any proof. The tribunal has given a basis and space to all these unacceptable statements of V. Bissa and ignored the political and legal defence of Kenan Ayas, ignored the historical evidence of the connection between the German and Turkish states, ignored all the evidence of direct cooperation between the prosecuting authorities of the two states and decided to extradite Kenan despite the simple fact that Kenan Ayas has permanent papers in Cyprus.

It is no coincidence that the next day, all the mainstream channels in Turkey presented the case as an achievement of Erdogan. Shortly before the historic Turkish elections, the Cypriot state and all those super-patriots, super Greek politicians and bureaucrats in Cyprus dealt another blow to the Turkish people’s attempt to get rid of the Erdogan regime. The well-placed Greek-Turkish reconciliation of the last few days ahead of the elections, the US effort to bring the two states into a normal relationship within NATO, the ever-increasing presence of US military forces in Cyprus and the aspirations of the present government to join the NATO mechanism, and the mediation of the German state in the whole affair lead us to believe that the extradition of Kenan Agia is a real international conspiracy same as the one in 1999 when the Greek state handed Ocalan over to the Turkish state condemning him to imprisonment in solitary confinement which continues to this day. After all, it is well known that all the Erdogan regime asked for in order to accept Sweden’s membership of NATO was the extradition of Kurdish fighters.

For all these reasons, the case of Kenan Ayas concerns all anti-systemic and democratic forces fighting against Fascism, Imperialism, Capitalism and Genocide, for Ecology, Women’s Liberation and People’s Autonomy. It concerns those who fight for Freedom and Equality. The Kurdish people of Cyprus declared that: “If Kenan Ayas is a terrorist, then we are all terrorists”. We, for our part, must not accept the Cypriot state to participate further in the international war against the democratic popular movements, against the anti-capitalist awakening of the societies, not accept to take part in the physical, political and cultural genocide of the Kurdish people.

Kenan Ayas, although suffering from hunger strikes during his years of detention in Turkish cells, decided to go on another hunger strike. Together with him outside the courts, Kurdish people and locals are on strike and together they are demanding the obvious. To not be extradited to Germany, since he has political asylum in Cyprus,  to not label the struggle of the Kurdish freedom movement as terrorism, to not be expelled from the international society, to not silence intellectualism and lectures related to the freedom of peoples by the bloodthirsty system.

IMMEDIATE ANNULLMENT OF THE DECISION OF THE LARNACA DISTRICT COURT TO EXTRADITE KENAN AYAZ TO THE GERMAN AND BY EXTENSION THE TURKISH STATE

WE CALL FOR SOLIDARITY ACTIONS FOR THE ANNULMENT OF THE DECISION OF 16/5, TUESDAY, EVERYONE BE AT THE SUPREME COURT IN NICOSIA FOR THE FINAL DECISION, EVERYONE AT THE EMBASSIES OF THE REPUBLIC OF CYPRUS

KENAN AYAS IS ONE OF US.