In January 2013 three female Kurdish activists were gunned down in cold blood at their offices in Paris. The chief – and only - official suspect will stand trial in France early this year for their murder. However, despite an investigation by three examining magistrates the people who ordered the killings have never officially been identified. Instead, political, diplomatic and security concerns appear to have blunted the French judiciary's probe. Nonetheless, writes Jacques Massey, it is clear that the confrontational approach adopted by Turkish president president Recep Tayyip Erdogan towards the Kurds lies behind the shootings.
A French government cooperation agreement with Turkey on a range of internal security issues notably includes the export of French 'know-how' on crowd control. But the current protests and violent repression being seen on the streets of Istanbul (pictured) and Ankara have raised alarm among many on the Left who were already concerned about the ethics of the accord. As Lénaïg Bredoux reports, the agreement, which was signed under Nicolas Sarkozy and approved last year by President François Hollande, is remiscent of a similar offer once made to the now-deposed Tunisian despot Zine al-Abidine Ben Ali and is causing considerable unease within Hollande's parliamentary majority.
