Deep within the mountains of Turkey’s southeastern Hakkari province, bordering Iran and Iraq, Kurdish cattle house owners and farmers have regularly returned with their animals after a long time of armed warfare between Kurdish militants and the Turkish military.
“We’ve been coming here for a long time. Thirty years ago we used to come and go, but then we couldn’t come. Now we just started to come again and to bring our animals as we want,” mentioned 57-year-old Selahattin Irinc, talking Kurdish, whilst gently urgent his hand on a sheep’s neck to stay it from transferring all the way through shearing.
On July 11 a symbolic guns destruction rite in Iraqi Kurdistan marked a significant step within the transition of the Kurdistan Employees’ Celebration (PKK) from armed insurgency to democratic politics — a part of a broader effort to finish one of the most area’s longest-running conflicts.
The PKK, designated as a 15 may organization via Turkey and its Western allies, was once shaped in 1978 via Ankara College scholars, with without equal purpose of attaining the Kurds’ liberation. It took up hands in 1984.
The warfare has brought about 50,000 deaths amongst civilians and a couple of,000 amongst infantrymen, consistent with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan.
At the side of a number of different women and men, Irinc engages in animal husbandry within the grassy highlands on the foot of the Cilo Mountains and its Resko height, which stands because the second-highest within the nation at an altitude of four,137 meters (13,572 ft).
A spot of scenic good looks, with waterfalls, glacial lakes and trekking routes, Cilo has regularly opened its roads during the last few years to shepherds and vacationers alike because the armed warfare with PKK died down at the backdrop of peace negotiations.
A Kurdish farmer washes a sheep to assist it produce higher-quality wool as a canine walks thru a makeshift bridge within the mountains of Turkey’s southeastern Hakkari province on July 12, 2025. Deep within the mountains of Turkey’s southeastern Hakkari province, bordering Iran and Iraq, Kurdish cattle house owners and farmers have regularly returned with their animals after decades-old armed warfare between Kurdish militants and the Turkish military. (Picture via Yasin AKGUL / AFP)
However the picturesque mountains had lengthy been the scene of heavy combating between the Turkish military and PKK combatants who took benefit of the tough terrain to cover and strike. It left the Kurdish farmers steadily at odds with the military.
“In the past we always had problems with the Turkish soldiers. They accused us of helping PKK fighters by feeding them things like milk and meat from our herd,” every other Kurdish cattle proprietor, who requested to not be named, instructed Agence France-Presse, rejecting such claims.
“Now it’s calmer,” he added.
‘Last generation’
Even if the peace procedure introduced extra openness and simplicity to the area, tensions didn’t vanish in a single day.
Checkpoints stay provide across the town of Hakkari, and in addition to the primary get admission to level to the trekking trail resulting in the Cilo glacier, a significant vacationer appeal.
“Life is quite good and it’s very beautiful here. Tourists come and stay in the mountains for one or two days with their tents, food, water and so on,” mentioned farmer Mahir Irinc.
However the mountains are a difficult, difficult atmosphere for the ones making money of their enforcing shadow, and the 37-year-old thinks his technology may well be the closing to do animal husbandry some distance clear of the town.
“I don’t think a new generation will come after us. We will be happy if it does, but the young people nowadays don’t want to raise animals, they just do whatever job is easier,” he mentioned.
An open truck sporting greater than a dozen Kurdish girls made its strategy to every other farm within the center of the mountains, the place sheep waited to be fed and milked.
The cattle graze on the foot of the mountains for 3 to 4 months, whilst the elements is heat, sooner than being introduced again to the village.
“We all work here. Mothers, sisters, our whole family. Normally I’m preparing for university, but today I was forced to come because my mother is sick,” defined 22-year-old Hicran Denis.
“I told my mother: Don’t do this anymore, because it’s so tiring. But when you live in a village, livestock is the only work. There’s nothing else,” she mentioned.
© Agence France-Presse
