Osman Baydemir
Osman Baydemir
Osman Baydemiris a Kurdish politician, lawyer and human rights activist in Turkey. He is the current mayor of his home town of Diyarbakır and member of the Peace and Democracy Party...
NationalityTurkish
ProfessionPolitician
CountryTurkey
years names language
If someone tried to assimilate you for years, if your language was forbidden, if the names of your hometown were changed, what would do you but revolt.
war talking turkeys
In Turkey, we have lived almost everything that could be lived; war and torture... The war concept was consumed to its limits. But there is only one way we have not tried: negotiations, peace, and talking.
people funeral apologizing
I am at a crossroads; I have always been against armed opposition... I have chosen civil disobedience. But I will apologize to my people if there are funerals coming out of prisons. I will criticize myself and I won't be the mayor of Diyarbakir.
struggle mean violence
All of my life I have stayed away from violence and the instruments of violence, and have seen a legal, democratic struggle as the only means to achieve change.
attitude government views
I have had it up to here with the prosecutions, the government's attitude, the judiciary, the media's stance and the majority of Turks who view the Kurdish people's justified cause through a nationalist lens.
friday school creating
In primary school, every day and especially on Fridays, I was supposed to say, 'I am Turkish, and I am righteous and hardworking,' But all those things did not actually turn us into Turks. This system is somehow creating fake personalities.