Watch the video from CommonSpace’s April forum on international self-determination movements

THE COMMONSPACE FORUM on the 25^th of April focused on Palestinian, Catalonian and Kurdish self-determination movements, with guest speakers Wael Shawish, of the Scottish Palestinian Society and Scottish Friends of Palestine, Roza Salih, of Scottish Solidarity with Kurdistan, and Oriol Roig Vilaseca, Catalan National Assembly (ANC) Scotland.

Here’s a video of the full discussion from the evening:

Sarah Glynn from the Scottish Solidarity with Kurdistan campaign group reports on the support for Kurdish hunger strikers in the Scottish Trade Union Congress.

From the mention of Welsh Kurdish hunger striker Imam Sis in Lynn Henderson’s presidential opening speech, the Kurds featured prominently at this week’s Scottish Trade Union Congress. 

Sarah Glynn, Scottish Solidarity with Kurdistan activist, analyses the local elections in Turkey, which have seen President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan suffer a serious setback

YESTERDAY’S [31 March] Turkish election may only have been for regional control, but the one thing on which everyone is agreed is its importance. Although President Erdoğan was not himself up for election, he put himself at the centre of the campaign, with a frenetic programme of election rallies that demonstrated his belief that the vote is a referendum on his leadership.

Sarah Glynn from Scottish Solidarity with Kurdistan provides a model letter for supporters of the aims of the Kurdish hunger strikers to send to the European Committee for the Prevention of Torture over the imprisonment and isolation of Kurdish leader Abdullah Ocalan

Sarah Glynn from the Scottish Solidarity with Kurdistan campaign group visited Strasbourg to meet with Kurdish hunger strikers.

These videos were recorded on 25^th January in the Kurdish Community Centre in Strasbourg, where eleven men and three women are on indefinite hunger strike. They have one, simple, demand: that the Turkish Government complies with their own constitution and international conventions on human rights and ends the isolation of imprisoned Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) founder, Abdullah Öcalan.

Solidarity activist Sarah Glynn visited Kurdish women in Rojava where she was inspired by their commitment in the face of multiple threats

SARAH GLYNN of Scottish Solidarity with Kurdistan was part of a women’s delegation to Northern Syria earlier this month, where she witnessed firsthand the Kurdish women’s commitment to rebuilding the war-torn region, even as threats and instability continue on all sides.

GMB and Unite campaign to free Kurdish leader imprisoned in Turkey sends ‘birthday greeting’ via British ambassador

MARKING THE 69th birthday of jailed Kurdish leader Abdullah Öcalan, a UK trade union campaign calling for his freedom has sent a birthday card and pointed letter to British Ambassador to Turkey, Sir Dominick Chilcott.

Human ‘statue’ of Kurdish symbol of resistance unveiled in Dundee

ACTIVISTS IN Dundee demonstrated solidarity with the Kurdish people in Northern Syria this Saturday (24 March) by unveiling a human ‘statue’ of Kawa the Blacksmith, a symbol of resistance.

Campaigners from Scottish Solidarity with Kurdistan (SSK) came together with the Dundee Trades Union Council to oppose ongoing Turkish aggression in the region.

Turkish assault on Kurdish-controlled Afrin condemned by cross-party parliamentarians

AMID TURKISH airstrikes and ground attacks in Northern Syria with the aim of removing the Kurdish YPG (People’s Protection Units), SNP MP Chris Stephens wrote to Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson on Wednesday, urging him to take action to end the violence.

‘Glasgow Girl’ Roza Salih speaks to CommonSpace about the Kurdish people’s global struggle for equality and autonomy, and how revolutionaries in Syria have succeeded in creating a radical democracy with women at its core

“MANY countries in the Middle East have forgotten women’s role - they have forgotten 50 per cent of the population.” Roza Salih, co-founder of Scottish Solidarity with Kurdistan, tells CommonSpace how the new governance system established in Rojava, Northern Syria, is revolutionary in more ways than one.