DIYARBAKIR, Turkey — Turkey’s ongoing security operations in the Kurdish-majority southeast are aimed at crushing Kurdish demands for self-rule and the grounds for any democratic discussion on the issue, the co-chair of the Democratic Regions Party (DBP) said in an interview with Al-Monitor.

Kamuran Yuksek argued that the entrenchment of armed Kurdish militants behind ditches and barricades in residential neighborhoods was a “reaction” to Ankara’s policies rather than a cause of the current clashes. He warned the conflict could grow into a civil war.

Yuksek studied electronic communications at Ankara University from 1997 to 2000, but dropped out to join the Kurdish political movement. In 2009, he was arrested in a massive crackdown on Kurdish activists accused of collaborating with the outlawed Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK), and served five years in prison. After his release, he was elected co-chair of the DBP, the second pro-Kurdish party after the Peoples’ Democratic Party (HDP). More than 100 Kurdish mayors in the southeast belong to the DBP, whose main objective is to steer political preparations for eventual self-rule in the region.

The text of the Jan. 12 interview follows: