MHP’s Bahçeli cuts Tunceli visit short upon protests

Turkey’s main nationalist leader was forced to cut short a controversial visit to the eastern Anatolian province of Tunceli (Dersim) upon protests from residents infuriated with his remarks declaring their ancestors who participated in a rebellion as “terrorists.”

“No matter in which place in the world, a legitimate state, which has its people’s confidence and support, is obliged to prevent and eliminate dangers posed at it. In this respect, incidents that unfolded in Tunceli in 1937-1938 are a rebellion and those involved in the rebellion are the then-separatist terrorists. Considering them in relation with the children of Karbala, whom we admire, and offering apologies to them is both an insult and derogation,” Nationalist Movement Party (MHP) leader Devlet Bahçeli said Nov. 28, as he delivered a speech in front of the governor’s office surrounded by intense security measures.

Later, Bahçeli was originally scheduled to proceed to a cemevi, the Alevi house of worship, but protesters blocked the road to the cemevi with barricades, and turmoil erupted after a police attack.

Bahçeli was thus forced to cancel visits with shopkeepers – many of whom had refused to open their shops in protest at Bahçeli’s visit – as well as the trip to the cemevi, instead performing Friday prayers at the province’s largely unused mosque before departing.

With his remarks citing “the children of Karbala,” Bahçeli criticized Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoğlu who earlier dubbed the Dersim massacre as a “modern-day Karbala.”

The Battle of Karbala of 680 A.D., the supporters and relatives of the Prophet Muhammad’s grandson Husayn ibn Ali were all killed by the forces of Yazid I, the Sunni Umayyad caliph, who...