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Netherlands: PKK to be monitored

01 January 1994

Following the outlawing of the Kurdish PKK in Germany and France last November and December, the Dutch and Belgian police and security services have stepped up their efforts to monitor the activities of Kurdish political organizations. However, both governments have declared they do not intend to follow the German and French moves despite heavy pressure from the Turkish government. Following fierce riots between Turkish and Kurdish groups in Brussels in early January, the Belgian Minister of the Interior Mr Louis Tobback stated he suspected Turkish fascist Grey Wolves of provoking the riots. The Dutch authorities officially give no comment on such matters. However, the BVD, the internal security service, in its latest annual report claimed the Grey Wolves to be all but non-existent. Police officials have stated off-the-record that they feel the estimated 60,000 Kurds in Holland have far more to fear from the Turkish MIT secret service than from reported PKK extortion attempts. In Holland inquiries into rumours of extortion rackets run by PKK-affiliated groups have so far failed to produce any solid proof, although court cases against 2 alleged PKK and 5 alleged Dev Sol members for extortion are forthcoming in The Hague next March.

The activist monthly Konfrontatie has just reported on a case in which a Kurdish activist in Rotterdam claims to have been abducted for several hours by three men who spoke Dutch, Turkish and English. The Dutch man introduced himself as a police officer before the Kurd was forcibly taken in a car to be questioned for several hours. The captors asked him to become an informer on the Turkish leftist Devrimci Sol movement for Dfl.15,000 a month, an excessive amount of money by Dutch standards.