To support the struggle of Kurds or not to intervene in the Kurdish issue? Debate between Vardan Voskanyan and Gevorg Melikyan

A few days ago, the media reported that the Kurdish rebels, escaping persecution crossed the Armenia-Turkey border and surrendered to the Armenian authorities. Vardan Voskanyan, the head of the Department of Oriental studies at Yerevan State University, referring to this information notes that in fact, we are dealing with misinformation since in such cases the official communication should be used as a source.

 “The problem is that Turkey and Azerbaijan often try to use the Kurdish cards against Armenia, that Armenia allegedly supports Kurdish terrorists. We are talking about the Kurdistan Workers' Party, which Turkey considers a terrorist organization, but for us, neither political nor armed members of the PKK can be considered terrorists, so first we need to clarify the terminology,” Voskanyan notes.

According to Vardan Voskanyan, the part of the PKK that fights against Turkey, from our point of view, is guerrilla warfare, but from the point of view of Turkey and the US, this battle can have a different terminology. “The Syrian wing of the PKK is not considered by the United States as a terrorist organization, while the same party operating in Turkey is perceived to be a terrorist organization. For us, the PKK members are partisans fighting in Turkey for their rights, as well as against Turkey's invasion of the north of Syria,” says Voskanyan. Find the details in the program “Paradigm”.