The supporters of Amedspor, the football club of Turkey’s Kurdish populated province of Diyarbakır, have protested against a cultural festival organised by the Turkish government in the historical district of Sur.
The “Sur Road Culture Festival” to be organised by the Ministry of Culture and Tourism in partnership with the ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) between 8 and 16 October will be carried out on the sufferings and memories of people whose houses are destroyed, Amedspor Barikat, a supporter group, said on Twitter.
Amedspor Resistance Group also protested the festival on social media and called it a treason against Sur.
“As we think the entertainment event called festival to be organised on 9 October is against the values of our people and will harm their dignity, we want to state that we are against such a mistake,” it said, calling on the people of Diyarbakır to ignore the event.
According to estimated figures, 4,985 building were destroyed when the Turkish security forces started a military assault on the historical quarter of Sur, right after a peace process between the Turkish state and the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) collapsed in 2015, the year Diyarbakır’s ancient sites were included on the UNESCO World Heritage List.
Six residential areas were totally razed, while most of the buildings were nationalised in 2016 by the government. Ahmet Davutoğlu, the then prime minister of Turkey, at the time announced plans to build new building complexes, promising that the ancient trading hub would be reconstructed like the Spanish city of Toledo.
For the residents of Diyarbakır, the stronghold of the Kurdish Political Movement, Sur became a site constantly reminding them of the brutality of the Turkish military, civilian killings, mass displacements and destruction of property.
