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Peter Boyle
Kurds and their supporters rallied at Sydney City Corridor sq. on Sunday to affix world protests over the ‘cancelling’ of Kurdistan within the Treaty of Lausanne, 100 years in the past.
Under is a brief speech I made on the rally:
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First, I wish to acknowledge that we’re gathered right here on the land of the Gadigal individuals, the indigenous individuals of this nation whose land was stolen from them by British colonialists 235 years in the past.
One of many first human rights campaigns I used to be concerned with in Australia was for the rights of the First Nations individuals as a result of once I got here right here as an immigrant, I witnessed with my very own eyes the horrible legacy of struggling that the colonisers inflicted on First Nations individuals. This is similar story that we’re gathered right here as we speak to protest towards the Treaty of Lausanne: colonialism and its legacy of struggling, genocide and years of oppression that got here from an act of colonial decision-making 100 years in the past.
As our pal Mansour stated, with a stroke of the pen a whole individuals had been cancelled, disadvantaged of recognition, disadvantaged of legitimacy, and consequently subjected to systematic oppression and genocide.
What’s the lesson from this historical past?
The lesson is that we will by no means belief these colonial powers that did this to so many peoples around the globe.
And we aren’t speaking about an act of injustice within the distant previous as a result of it continues as we speak. A lot of those self same colonial powers that first drew up a secret settlement in 1916 – the Sykes-Picot settlement to divide the Center East between themselves – are nonetheless highly effective.
And even after the Russian revolutionaries who overthrew the Tsar in 1917 uncovered the Sykes-Picot settlement, the colonial powers went on, as victors within the First World Struggle, to place that colonial carve-up into apply.
They did that first by the Treaty of Severin after which lastly within the Treaty of Lausanne in 1923.
None of those agreements represented honest remedy of the individuals who lived in that a part of the world. They solely mirrored the slender and egocentric pursuits of those huge colonial powers.
That’s what occurred with the Treaty of Lausanne, and the Kurdish individuals have paid a horrible worth.
The Kurdish individuals weren’t the one colonised individuals to pay a horrible worth because of such acts of colonial cancelling of complete peoples as a result of that’s what occurred to the First Nations individuals of this nation as properly. They, too, had been ‘disappeared’ with a stroke of the pen!
We mustn’t ever permit that to occur once more.
So, what ought to be our message as we speak be for our authorities right here in Australia? It’s our authorities, a minimum of in idea. We have now all made our properties right here after fleeing from persecution or poverty in different components of the world. We have now began new lives by exhausting work and love and assist for one another in our communities. So, what’s our message to our authorities?
It’s: Be on the facet of the victims of colonialism and never on the facet of the colonial powers. That’s what our authorities ought to do. Be on the facet of the oppressed and never on the facet of the oppressors – not on the facet of the colonial powers which, within the Lausanne Treaty, cancelled the Kurdish nation and folks.
Be on the correct facet of historical past on the facet of justice and freedom.
Peter Boyle is a well-known journalist and political activist dwelling in Sydney, Australia. He’s additionally a correspondent of the Inexperienced Left Journal.
