Journalist looks into ideological codes of PKK in new book

ISTANBUL

“The Ideological Codes of the PKK,” the latest book by Turkish journalist Fikret Bilâ, which offers an in depth look into how the Syrian wing of the outlawed Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) has managed to attract young recruits from the western world, has been published by Doğan Kitap in the English language.

In his book, Hürriyet newspaper’s editor-in-chief Bilâ documents the relationship between the PKK and the Democratic Union Party (PYD) in Syria, an issue of recent tensions between NATO allies Turkey and the U.S., as Ankara sees both as linked terrorist groups but Washington singles out the PKK, cooperating with the PYD and its armed wing, the People’s Protection Units (YPG), on the ground.

“It was determined that the PYD was founded on Öcalan’s order and that the YPG was bound to it,” he says, citing a document found in an operation against the group in 2012.

Questioning the recent strategy of the PKK, the book also makes an interesting comparison between Abdullah Öcalan, the jailed leader of the PKK, and Murray Bookchin, the American anarchist and political theorist who died in 2006 at the age of 85, spotting the traces of the latter in the discourse of the former.

“Bookchin’s ‘Commune,’ underlines the ideology of communalism as a framework for cultural needs in the 21st century on an economic, social and political basis. It does not embrace hierarchy and domination but brings equality, freedom, justice and democracy. The model was suggested by Öcalan, who uses the concept of the ‘libertarian left’ for Bookchin’s dream, with the idea that this concept will receive easy acceptance and be easily defended, which is not realistic,” writes Bilâ in the book published by Doğan Kitap.

Fikret Bilâ began his journalistic career at Yankı newspaper from 1977-1980 and then returned to journalism in 1986 a few years after working at the Turkish Court of Accounts. 

Since then, he has become a household name in Turkish political reporting, writing for Nokta, Milliyet and Hürriyet and presenting a program on CNN Türk. 

He was appointed as the editor-in-chief of Hürriyet in early 2017. 

His books include “Phoenix: The Rebirth of Ecevit” (2001), “The Civilian Coup Attempt and Iraq Wars in Ankara” (2003), “Which PKK?: New Moves on the Chessboard” (2004) and “The Commanders’ Front” (2010).