2525 Massachusetts Avenue,
N.W Washington, D.C. 20008
(Copy to: Secretary of State, Hillary Rodham Clinton, U.S. Department of State, 2201 C Street NW, Washington, DC 20520)
October 25, 2010
Dear Ambassador Tan,
While the majority of the human family strives for peace, justice, and prosperity, a small faction of every society engages in violence. Even democracies are not spared from destructive behavior of violent individuals and groups. As bearers of an ancient legacy of living together with many cultures in peace, we are firmly committed to non-violence.
However, Anatolia, the home of a relatively democratic, pluralistic, and peace loving people, has been battered by an ugly, violent war for the past three decades.
Turkish armed forces, seeking unity in a single culture and nation, have been battling Kurdish insurgents who seek a right to assert their particular cultural heritage. The aspirations of the Kurds need not be in conflict with the sovereignty of the Turkish state and we do not take sides with either party to the conflict.
We do not judge who started what and how the violence in Anatolia was initiated and escalated. What is important is to end the violence with peaceful means and grant all the people of Anatolia an equal opportunity to secure their personal fulfillment.
We believe that most of the Turkish people are of good will and intelligence and would support a peaceful initiative, directing their military units to find common cause with the Kurds and work towards peace with them. We also believe that Kurds everywhere would join in a campaign to have Kurdish combatants join with the Turkish military forces in laying down their arms to end the violence.
We, as Kurdish National Congress of North America and a delegation of American citizens, would welcome the opportunity to help you and officials of the Turkish government to come together with spokespersons for the Kurdish resistance to confer, mediate, and explore a non-violent resolution of the conflict and to seek concurrence of parties on both sides to adopt policies, procedures, and practices that would assure all the people of Anatolia the right to live together in peace and harmony.
Toward that end, we are volunteering to visit the Kurdish leaders and encourage them to unilaterally end the war and denounce any form of violence or, failing that, to have them agree to meet and confer with officials of the Turkish government and its armed forces to explore nonviolent resolution of the conflict.
We would appreciate it if you could notify the authorities in Turkey so that they could make proper accommodations for our visit and let us know when would be a suitable time for us to start our mission. Please consider this also as a request by the undersigned for a meeting with officials of the Turkish government who have the authority to engage in a process leading to a peaceful resolution of the current conflict in behalf of the government.
Sincerely,
Kamal Artin, MD
Kurdish National Congress of North America-President
Other contributing volunteers for this peaceful mission in chronological order so far include:
Ralph D. Fertig, JD, ACSW, U.S. Administrative Judge (Ret.), Clinical Professor, University of Southern California School of Social Work
Nyma Ardalan, Kurdish National Congress of North America-Secretary
Luqman, Barwari, Kurdish National Congress of North America-Public Relations Chair
Michael M. Gunter, PhD, Professor, Dept of Political Science, Tennessee Technological University; Visiting Professor of International Politics at The International University in Vienna, Austria
Baha Jassemnejad, Ph.D. Professor and Chair of Department of Engineering and Physics, University of Central Oklahoma
Fouad Darweesh, MD, Associate Clinical professor at University California Medical school; Physician for Human rights, Amnesty International; Kurdish National Congress of North America-Former President
Kajal M. Rahmani, PhD, Professor of Anthropology; Research fellow at Department of Near Eastern Languages and Civilizations, Harvard University; Director, Kurdistan Justice and Peace Academy
Ihsan Efrini, Kurdish National Congress of North America-Board Member
Saman Shali, PhD, Kurdish National Congress of North America- Former President
Dyari Ahmed, Kurdish National Congress of North America-Treasurer
Mohammad Salim
We welcome other volunteers interested in peace to join us for this specific mission by submitting the following information:
Click here to submit your letter
