HIKMET TABAK, MANAGING DIRECTOR OF KURDISH SATELLITE TELEVISION, WAS MISQUOTED IN AN ARTICLE YESTERDAY. HE DID NOT CALL #MED-TV# THE BIGGEST ACHIEVEMENT IN TURKISH HISTORY. HE SAID IT WAS THE BIGGEST ACHIEVEMENT IN KURDISH HISTORY.
By Nora Boustany

It was like bringing water to the desert and the biggest achievement in Turkish history, is how Hikmet Tabak, the managing director of Kurdish Satellite Television describes the impact of Med-TV on the self-image and cultural identification process of ethnic Kurds, separated by borders in their home region or scattered around the globe.
Med-TV is a four-year-old satellite channel broadcasting to the 35-million-strong Kurdish communities in Europe, the Middle East and North Africa. It is funded by seven Kurdish foundations around the world, Kurdish entrepreneurs in Europe and direct donations.
It has united people and brought them together. It brings news about them to the world and news from the world to them. After we started, money came in from everywhere. It was like a miracle, Tabak said about his programs, which use all four Kurdish dialects for news and programs on Kurdish culture, cuisine and women's health. It has made a great impact on Kurds. Just hearing the language reinforces their identity. Even having silent Charlie Chaplin movies makes them feel that if he belongs to others, he also belongs to them.
Kurdish farmers in Turkey were selling their goats to buy 60-inch satellite dishes and learn about Kurdish communities in other places. But for the ethnic group -- for which nation-building has been so elusive, as governments in Turkey, Iran, Iraq and elsewhere resist its attempts to come together -- unity via the stars and across the airwaves is also a tortured endeavor. The station, which beams programs to 70 countries, is being jammed by Turkey and, according to Louis Charalambous, a London-based lawyer for Med-TV, there is no legal solution to the practice. Jamming from a ship hits all transmission and all users on the satellite. It is like taking a hammer to crack a nut, the lawyer said.
But when the jamming starts, Med-TV ducks and shifts to other frequencies. They jam us, we avoid them, they track us and jam us again. It is like Tom and Jerry in space, Tabak said.
Med-TV, just by being a Kurdish channel, becomes a target. The Turkish state says we violate the constitution. For them, we don't exist, and so when we broadcast songs, we are violating their constitution, Tabak observed.
Turkey, Italy and Germany -- all three NATO members -- are embroiled in a messy diplomatic haggle over the fate of Kurdish separatist guerrilla leader Abdullah Ocalan. Ocalan, whose Kurdish Workers' Party (PKK) is blamed by Turkey for at least 29,000 deaths in a 14-year separatist campaign, was apprehended Nov. 12 in a Rome airport. Turkey and Italy would like to see him extradited to Germany, which has been reluctant to take him for fear of reaction among its 2 million Turks and Kurds; a formal extradition request by Turkey would be rejected because it has capital punishment, Italy's Constitutional Court ruled. We are bound to implement the laws of the country, Italian Ambassador Ferdinando Saleo said yesterday. It has nothing to do with the political authorities. The fuss being made is irrelevant.
Since Ocalan has not committed any crimes in Italy, he cannot be kept locked up there.
In the meantime, Turkish residents are flooding the Italian Embassy's home page with vigorous complaints, and Italian diplomats are politely declining flowers Kurds want to send to avoid embarrassment or pressure, according to Italian Embassy spokesman Alessandro di Franco. When news of Ocalan's arrest spread, 12 Kurds in Turkey set themselves on fire.
In such a volatile situation, Med-TV tries to have a calming effect and to report the news from a Kurdish perspective, Tabak explained. He has sent nine of his top analysts and reporters to Italy to cover Ocalan. But a 20-minute documentary about 100 Kurdish moments in this century, scheduled for viewing last week on the day Italian Foreign Minister Lamberto Dini was addressing a U.N. World Television Forum, was pulled at the last minute. Likewise, Med-TV canceled meetings in Washington with State Department officials who deal with human rights and with the department's South Europe desk this week, Tabak said.
Wherever we go, whatever we do, the Turks follow us and they are ahead of the game, said one of Tabak's assistants, who noted that the Turkish press, which has been tracking their itinerary, calls them Terrorist TV. Fresh Thinking' on European Defense British Defense Secretary George Robertson said he felt as if he were among family last Thursday evening when he gave a speech at the Council on Foreign Relations here on European security.
After an introduction by Sen. Charles Robb (D-Va.), Robertson -- a Scot -- told the audience that the Robbs and Robertsons, you know, are from the same clan. Said Robb: That's right -- my grandfather was from Glasgow.
But you are not a real Scot unless you can tell the odd joke that digs at the English, such as this one by Robertson. God, it seems, has just created Scotland, and is admonished for having endowed the place so lavishly: fine whisky, beautiful scenery, enterprising people, endless resources. Ah, says the Almighty, but wait 'til you see who I give them as neighbors.
Robertson's speech promised fresh thinking about European defense -- but also promised that this new Eurocentric approach, whenever it is defined, will not entail any change in Britain's special relationship with the United States or in the need for continued U.S. involvement in Europe.
Some have characterized this as Britain swapping from a transatlantic horse to a European horse. That is a false comparison, Robertson said. When Defense Secretary William S. Cohen asked him recently about the mixed messages the United States is receiving from Europe -- leave us alone; don't abandon us -- Robertson said he replied with the quip:
If you can't ride two horses, why are you in this circus? Both circus steeds, he said, are essential and must be kept in a healthy condition.[1]