A5

SHIVERING IN SHADOW OF WAR
From Toronto Star - Feb. 7, 2003

JOE FIORITO

He smiled casually and said his name was Ali, and he nodded at the TV on the other side of the room. A subtle misdirection; maybe his name is Ali, and maybe it is not. He had reason to be cautious in my presence:

This was the day of Colin Powell's U.N. show-and-tell; I had just sat down, unannounced, in the Kurdish community centre on St. Clair Ave.; and Ali, along with some other Kurds, were watching reaction to the speech on Turkish television.

A lot going on here.

A quick primer: The Kurds occupy portions of northern Iraq and southern Turkey; they hate Saddam and are uneasy with the Turks. The Americans need the Turks in order to hit Saddam. The Turks are keen on preventing the formation of a Kurdish state. Tug one string, and unravel another.

There are 7,000 Kurds in Toronto. Like Ali, they nurture hope, but lack optimism. Ali says, "We hate Saddam with all our guts. He killed 5,000 Kurds in one night with chemicals. Of course we want to get rid of him. And we want a Kurdish state with all our hearts. But war is a question mark."

On the walls of the community centre, along with rugs and crafts and messages, I notice photos of the dead men the Kurds consider martyrs, and the imprisoned men they consider heroes.

Ali says, "I also question the sincerity of the Americans. When Kurds rose up after the Gulf War, the Americans didn't help. Remember, Saddam did not get his chemicals overnight."

On TV now there are commercials for Turkish soft drinks and snacks; and then, improbably, the face of Leslie Neilsen. After a brief station identification, there is a panel discussion: two journalists, two Turkish military men and two academics sit at a table shaped like a map of the region.

Ali translates: "This man is a retired general; he wonders if Turkey should get involved in the war. He wonders what is the goal. He says the goal is not to let the Kurds have their own state."

Ali says, "This hurts me."

He watches carefully and then translates again: "This is another retired general; he says if there is not going to be a Kurdish state, then Turkey should not get involved in a war." An older man has been watching quietly with us. He shrugs and asks if I would like some chay, tea. I would. He brings hot dark tea in a small glass on a silver tray.

Spass. Thank you.

One of the Turkish professors voices a concern: "The U.S. says it will keep the boundaries, but it doesn't say what will happen within those boundaries."
The other professor adds, "The question is, what are the Americans saying to the Kurds."

The Kurd who gave me chay worries idly with his tesbih, a string of black beads used not for prayer but to keep his hands busy, and perhaps to remind him of the names of God: Most Merciful, Most Loving, Most Forgiving.

Ali has been in Canada for eight years. I ask him where he is from. He breaks out into a smile and shows me a map of Kurdistan. "I am from Diyarbakir, a beautiful city, 2,000 years old. Around the city is a wall, the second longest after the one in China. The region is very rich in water. This is farming country < cotton. One-point-five million people are living here. During the war, the old people and the women went to live in the countryside."

I cannot imagine; not true, I can.

Now the TV camera cuts to a shot of the Olimpiyat coffee shop in Slopic, a suburb of Sirnak, a Turkish town on the Iraqi border. Ali says, "The men are Kurds. They are speaking Turkish. We are not allowed to speak our language. We have no rights. We cannot broadcast in Kurdish. We cannot educate our children."

One of the men in the Olimpiyat says, "We can't pay our rent because the economy is so bad. After the Gulf War, 10,000 refugees came here." Another says, "Let's talk about jobs, not war." Cut to a commercial.

Outside the community centre, Ali stops me on the sidewalk and tells me a story which he says illustrates all the problems of the Kurds:

"A lamb and a wolf are swimming across a river. The wolf says, `Wait, I am going to eat you.' The lamb says, `Why? I am innocent.' The wolf says, "You are kicking dust in my face." The lamb says, "But how can this be? We are in the river." The wolf says, "Well, maybe it was not you who was kicking dust; it must have been your father."

And you know the name of the wolf.