Journalist Ramazan Öztürk, who witnessed wars in 107 countries of the world, said, "When peace in the Middle East comes to the fore, time slows down and drags its feet. When those who do not want peace prevail, everything will be broken very easily."
ANF
ISTANBUL
Wednesday, December 31, 2025
The process, which started on February 27 with the call of Leader Apo, is about to complete its first year. Despite the Turkish government's slowing down and insisting on steps, the hope for peace was welcomed by the peoples of Turkey and Kurdistan. The insistence of the government and its supporters on war is finding less and less support.
He followed the wars both in the Middle East and in many parts of the world; Journalist and photojournalist Ramazan Öztürk, who is known to the world with his photographs of the Halabja Massacre and who makes documentary news by watching wars and post-war events in 107 countries, describes the developments with the words "Wherever the possibility of peace develops, time slows down".
Öztürk evaluated what he saw in his journalism life, which he started in 1975, the power of photography and the recent developments in Kurdistan to ANF.
'PHOTOGRAPHY IS A MIRROR, IT REFLECTS WHAT IT SEES'
Defining himself as a news photographer and emphasizing that he both takes photos and writes news, Öztürk stated that photography is a mirror and continued his words as follows: "I am a news photographer. I am a journalist, but I both take the photo and write the news. It has been like this since the first day I started my profession. For me, photography is a mirror; it reflects what it sees. Of course, I separate those who manipulate. I think a single frame of photograph can tell an event that you cannot tell in books.
Photography is actually the common language of humanity and at the same time a pure expression of humanity. In this respect, the photograph can carry the frozen moment to years later without changing it, if there is no intervention. Photography is a mirror for me that does not create doubts such as 'is it so' or 'is it really like this'."
Stating that he has witnessed many wars or post-war life in 107 countries of the world and that the world is at many breaking points, Öztürk said, "I have been to almost all the wars in the last 30-35 years. I went back to the Iran-Iraq War for years and filmed the post-war period in both Iran and Iraq. The Halabja Massacre, the First and Second Gulf Wars, the Bosnian War, the Kosovo War, the uprising in Albania, the Chechnya-Russia War, the coup against Yeltsin in Russia...
There is also the war in our own country; For example, the civil war in Kurdistan. The war never ended there, it continued continuously. I watched the conflicts in Afghanistan; I also went and made documentaries about wars after the war periods.
I shot 107 news documentaries in 107 countries of the world that are experiencing breaking points. I went back to the aftermath of the Vietnam War and made a documentary about the bad traces that war left on human life for generations. I documented the effects of the poisonous gas used there and the people affected by it. I have prepared documentaries about the effects of the Pol-Pot regime in Cambodia and the aftermath of the civil war in Mozambique."
'A PHOTO WAR CAN START OR END'
Pointing out that a photograph has the power to start or end a war, Öztürk emphasized that the photographs of the Halabja Massacre are proof that the Saddam Hussein regime used chemical weapons and continued his words as follows:
"A photograph is so effective that it can cause a war to start or end. As an example of the end of a war, we can give the photograph showing the moment when a Vietcong guerrilla was killed with a gun resting on his head in Vietnam. This shot revealed the Vietnam War to the eyes of the world.
For example, the photo of the 'silent witness' in the Halabja Massacre revealed that Saddam Hussein used poison gas both during the Iran-Iraq War and against his own citizens. Rafsanjani, who ruled Iran at that time, thanked me. He told me, 'We tried to explain to us at the UN that chemical gas was used for eight and a half years, but we could not convince anyone; because everyone supported Saddam. But you, as a journalist, proved this and caused the end of the war.'
Think of a mass genocide by a cruel dictatorial regime in a country against a race or a faith group; Consider a photograph documenting this. The Halabja Massacre became evidence against Saddam in Iraq. In fact, Bush said, 'We will come to avenge this baby.'"
'MY JOB IS TO TAKE PHOTOS AND LET THE PUBLIC HEAR AND INTERVENE'
Emphasizing that the main job of a photographer is to take photographs, Öztürk stated that the power and effect of photography should be well understood and continued his words as follows:
"I was not in between whether I should take photos in the war zone or not, but there were photos I did not publish, but they were not from conflict zones. On the contrary, I should take photos in conflict zones so that the world public opinion knows what is happening. Both conscientiously and if an intervention is necessary, so that this intervention can take place. Let the public know what happened there.
An example of this is a photograph taken in Africa; There is a vulture waiting for a child who is dying of hunger. Our people are exaggerating it. I am a human being first, then a journalist. Should the child be saved or should a photo be taken? I don't save the child, I take photos. I raise the world with the photo I take. Because that child will die anyway; Who will know? Millions of children will die. But when I take that photo, I actually save the child.
I do not intervene when they shoot someone in a war environment; Because they can shoot me too. If they are already shooting one, they are shooting thousands. That's why I take a picture of it. Just like in the case of Vietnam."
Stating that he did not hesitate to take photos but did not publish some photos, Öztürk explained the following about this situation:
"There is a very interesting photo that I took but did not publish. I am interviewing Rafsanjani in Iran. No one thought he would make an appointment. There was a cameraman with me during the meeting; I asked him if he could take pictures of me.
I multiplied the Halabja photos while I was leaving; I also took copies of Sabah newspapers where Halabja photographs were published. In the past, when they went to Iran, they would paint if there was something like a newspaper or magazine with them and there was a woman with her head uncovered. But they did not touch my newspapers because I was informed in advance that I would go. I took five or six issues of Sabah newspaper with me.
I went in, I sat down. I have Turkey's Ambassador to Ankara with me. I got up with my good intentions and bought the Sabah newspaper; I will show you photos of Halabja. It was on the first page, but I wanted to show the rest. I went to the bedside and opened the newspaper. When I opened the inner page, I saw the beautiful photo of the second page. Rafsanjani did not give up, but the ambassador and the Consul General in Istanbul were discolored. I photographed Rafsanjani looking at the beauty of the second page of Sabah newspaper.
Wherever I gave it, it would be a cover, but I said: 'I won't do this.' This was a humanitarian situation. This man did not look consciously, and I did not show it consciously. I said I would not publish it. I still haven't published it."
'THE MARAŞ MASSACRE IS A SMALL HALABJA MASSACRE'
Öztürk, who took the most well-known photographs of the Maraş Massacre, one of the biggest massacres in the history of Turkey and Kurdistan, emphasized that the Maraş Massacre was almost a small Halabja Massacre and said the following about what he saw there:
"The Maraş Massacre, due to my age and as far as I have read, is an event that people have difficulty understanding in recent history. There have been bigger massacres and bigger wars than that; But I say this by comparing it with the events in my own country, where I am old, and which I have seen and known to have happened.
Do you know what impressed me the most? We were wandering the streets; The bodies were full. A soldier was collecting the bodies, both crying and collecting them. We entered a street, the houses were old. A very old woman was sitting in front of the house. He was looking at the street with frozen eyes. There was a cross on the house next to it.
I said: 'Auntie, do you live in this house?' He said, 'Yes'. I said, 'Are these people on the side also your neighbors?' 'Yes, my son, I have been in this house since I came; We are neighbors with them.'
I said, 'Well, auntie, what happened to people?' Oh, he suffered... They had been living together for centuries.
And what I can never forget is this: There was a 'liberated zone' on the streets. When I first went, there were no police, no gendarmerie. Not even 24 hours had passed since my first attempt. There was smoke, the fire brigade could not go everywhere.
I was working at Günaydın newspaper. I had friends from Tercüman and Hergün newspaper with me. They were not doing anything to them; idealists, MHP supporters. They were going to enter the forbidden zone. I said, 'Tell me that I am one of you, let me enter.' They accepted and we entered. Smoke was still coming out of the houses.
A person with a drooping mustache greeted us. He pointed to a house and said: 'When Ecevit said that we had the Maraş events under control in the evening, we burned this house.' A nine-ten-year-old boy on the street said, 'Brother, brother, there is a body here.' I turned and looked; They crushed the man's head with a stone, it was flattened. After the child told me this, the person who said 'we burned this place' turned around and kicked the child. 'How can you call it a corpse? He said, 'Slaughter, carrion.' I still have difficulty understanding this. Then, because of that mood, I quit, interrupted it.
I went, Interior Minister İrfan Özaydın was holding a press conference at the provincial building. He was saying, 'We took it under control like this'. I stood up in that mood and said: 'Mr. Minister, I come from a neighborhood where no one enters. A child was kicked there because he said, 'There is a body here.' You won't call him a 'corpse', they said 'kill him'.' He was at a loss for words.
The collected bodies were brought to the Maraş slaughterhouse. There were women and children piled on top of each other. Pregnant women, young girls whose bellies were cut with a rake... I saw these. I also saw some body robbers they caught. They brought someone. When they put their hands against the wall, they had bracelets on each arm for five or six watches.
The Maraş Massacre is, in my opinion, a small Halabja Massacre."
'WHENEVER THERE IS PEACE IN THE MIDDLE EAST, TIME SLOWS DOWN'
Expressing his impressions and views on the process that has started recently, Ramazan Öztürk stated that whenever peace is talked about in the Middle East, time slows down and continued his words as follows:
"This process has been attempted several times before, but it has been disrupted. Because the intention was not to achieve peace; It was to obtain political rent, to get votes. When they saw that they could not get this, they disrupted the process. There is a fascist and racist vein in Turkey's structure. No matter who is alive, there is an imposition of one belief and one identity. There is a segment with this perception. Unfortunately, this segment, what we call the 'deep state', also exists in the background.
Whenever peace is on the agenda in the Middle East, time slows down and dragging feet. When those who do not want peace win in the end, it is very easy for the process to be disrupted. Everything is turned upside down with one or two provocations, which we have experienced.
Everyone is saying something about the peace process that has started now, and they are not wrong to say it. Because when you look at the lessons and conclusions learned from what happened in the past, you fall into a dilemma: There are some doubts such as whether it will be overturned, who is calculating what, what interests are at stake, and they are right here.
And I say: This time there are many accounts again, but is this account higher than the previous accounts? That's how it should be. Because this issue cannot be solved with a calculation that remains under it.
'PEACE WILL NOT COME TO THE MIDDLE EAST WITHOUT RESOLVING THE KURDISH ISSUE'
Why do I say that? Because Turkey's most radical and nationalist party is leading this process. He has not taken a single step back for a year. We know this party since its establishment.
There is a mind far above the past attempts. Would it be bad if it was solved this way? No, it would be good. If a truly democratic system is to be established, if everyone has constitutional rights and if everyone has the courage to face their own past, that would be very nice.
In fact, taking such a radical step would only be possible if a party like the MHP and its leader came to the fore. The AK Party could not have managed this alone, the CHP could not have succeeded. The CHP has a nationalist vein within itself; who looks at "everyone is Turkish" and this is a solid vein.
As for the conclusion, with the important developments in the world and in the Middle East, the bosses of the world have realized that peace cannot come to the Middle East without the solution of the Kurdish issue. As time passes, everyone suffers. As for my own final opinion, I would be skeptical of this process without legal signatures."
ISTANBUL
Wednesday, December 31, 2025
The process, which started on February 27 with the call of Leader Apo, is about to complete its first year. Despite the Turkish government's slowing down and insisting on steps, the hope for peace was welcomed by the peoples of Turkey and Kurdistan. The insistence of the government and its supporters on war is finding less and less support.
He followed the wars both in the Middle East and in many parts of the world; Journalist and photojournalist Ramazan Öztürk, who is known to the world with his photographs of the Halabja Massacre and who makes documentary news by watching wars and post-war events in 107 countries, describes the developments with the words "Wherever the possibility of peace develops, time slows down".
Öztürk evaluated what he saw in his journalism life, which he started in 1975, the power of photography and the recent developments in Kurdistan to ANF.
'PHOTOGRAPHY IS A MIRROR, IT REFLECTS WHAT IT SEES'
Defining himself as a news photographer and emphasizing that he both takes photos and writes news, Öztürk stated that photography is a mirror and continued his words as follows: "I am a news photographer. I am a journalist, but I both take the photo and write the news. It has been like this since the first day I started my profession. For me, photography is a mirror; it reflects what it sees. Of course, I separate those who manipulate. I think a single frame of photograph can tell an event that you cannot tell in books.
Photography is actually the common language of humanity and at the same time a pure expression of humanity. In this respect, the photograph can carry the frozen moment to years later without changing it, if there is no intervention. Photography is a mirror for me that does not create doubts such as 'is it so' or 'is it really like this'."
Stating that he has witnessed many wars or post-war life in 107 countries of the world and that the world is at many breaking points, Öztürk said, "I have been to almost all the wars in the last 30-35 years. I went back to the Iran-Iraq War for years and filmed the post-war period in both Iran and Iraq. The Halabja Massacre, the First and Second Gulf Wars, the Bosnian War, the Kosovo War, the uprising in Albania, the Chechnya-Russia War, the coup against Yeltsin in Russia...
There is also the war in our own country; For example, the civil war in Kurdistan. The war never ended there, it continued continuously. I watched the conflicts in Afghanistan; I also went and made documentaries about wars after the war periods.
I shot 107 news documentaries in 107 countries of the world that are experiencing breaking points. I went back to the aftermath of the Vietnam War and made a documentary about the bad traces that war left on human life for generations. I documented the effects of the poisonous gas used there and the people affected by it. I have prepared documentaries about the effects of the Pol-Pot regime in Cambodia and the aftermath of the civil war in Mozambique."
'A PHOTO WAR CAN START OR END'
Pointing out that a photograph has the power to start or end a war, Öztürk emphasized that the photographs of the Halabja Massacre are proof that the Saddam Hussein regime used chemical weapons and continued his words as follows:
"A photograph is so effective that it can cause a war to start or end. As an example of the end of a war, we can give the photograph showing the moment when a Vietcong guerrilla was killed with a gun resting on his head in Vietnam. This shot revealed the Vietnam War to the eyes of the world.
For example, the photo of the 'silent witness' in the Halabja Massacre revealed that Saddam Hussein used poison gas both during the Iran-Iraq War and against his own citizens. Rafsanjani, who ruled Iran at that time, thanked me. He told me, 'We tried to explain to us at the UN that chemical gas was used for eight and a half years, but we could not convince anyone; because everyone supported Saddam. But you, as a journalist, proved this and caused the end of the war.'
Think of a mass genocide by a cruel dictatorial regime in a country against a race or a faith group; Consider a photograph documenting this. The Halabja Massacre became evidence against Saddam in Iraq. In fact, Bush said, 'We will come to avenge this baby.'"
'MY JOB IS TO TAKE PHOTOS AND LET THE PUBLIC HEAR AND INTERVENE'
Emphasizing that the main job of a photographer is to take photographs, Öztürk stated that the power and effect of photography should be well understood and continued his words as follows:
"I was not in between whether I should take photos in the war zone or not, but there were photos I did not publish, but they were not from conflict zones. On the contrary, I should take photos in conflict zones so that the world public opinion knows what is happening. Both conscientiously and if an intervention is necessary, so that this intervention can take place. Let the public know what happened there.
An example of this is a photograph taken in Africa; There is a vulture waiting for a child who is dying of hunger. Our people are exaggerating it. I am a human being first, then a journalist. Should the child be saved or should a photo be taken? I don't save the child, I take photos. I raise the world with the photo I take. Because that child will die anyway; Who will know? Millions of children will die. But when I take that photo, I actually save the child.
I do not intervene when they shoot someone in a war environment; Because they can shoot me too. If they are already shooting one, they are shooting thousands. That's why I take a picture of it. Just like in the case of Vietnam."
Stating that he did not hesitate to take photos but did not publish some photos, Öztürk explained the following about this situation:
"There is a very interesting photo that I took but did not publish. I am interviewing Rafsanjani in Iran. No one thought he would make an appointment. There was a cameraman with me during the meeting; I asked him if he could take pictures of me.
I multiplied the Halabja photos while I was leaving; I also took copies of Sabah newspapers where Halabja photographs were published. In the past, when they went to Iran, they would paint if there was something like a newspaper or magazine with them and there was a woman with her head uncovered. But they did not touch my newspapers because I was informed in advance that I would go. I took five or six issues of Sabah newspaper with me.
I went in, I sat down. I have Turkey's Ambassador to Ankara with me. I got up with my good intentions and bought the Sabah newspaper; I will show you photos of Halabja. It was on the first page, but I wanted to show the rest. I went to the bedside and opened the newspaper. When I opened the inner page, I saw the beautiful photo of the second page. Rafsanjani did not give up, but the ambassador and the Consul General in Istanbul were discolored. I photographed Rafsanjani looking at the beauty of the second page of Sabah newspaper.
Wherever I gave it, it would be a cover, but I said: 'I won't do this.' This was a humanitarian situation. This man did not look consciously, and I did not show it consciously. I said I would not publish it. I still haven't published it."
'THE MARAŞ MASSACRE IS A SMALL HALABJA MASSACRE'
Öztürk, who took the most well-known photographs of the Maraş Massacre, one of the biggest massacres in the history of Turkey and Kurdistan, emphasized that the Maraş Massacre was almost a small Halabja Massacre and said the following about what he saw there:
"The Maraş Massacre, due to my age and as far as I have read, is an event that people have difficulty understanding in recent history. There have been bigger massacres and bigger wars than that; But I say this by comparing it with the events in my own country, where I am old, and which I have seen and known to have happened.
Do you know what impressed me the most? We were wandering the streets; The bodies were full. A soldier was collecting the bodies, both crying and collecting them. We entered a street, the houses were old. A very old woman was sitting in front of the house. He was looking at the street with frozen eyes. There was a cross on the house next to it.
I said: 'Auntie, do you live in this house?' He said, 'Yes'. I said, 'Are these people on the side also your neighbors?' 'Yes, my son, I have been in this house since I came; We are neighbors with them.'
I said, 'Well, auntie, what happened to people?' Oh, he suffered... They had been living together for centuries.
And what I can never forget is this: There was a 'liberated zone' on the streets. When I first went, there were no police, no gendarmerie. Not even 24 hours had passed since my first attempt. There was smoke, the fire brigade could not go everywhere.
I was working at Günaydın newspaper. I had friends from Tercüman and Hergün newspaper with me. They were not doing anything to them; idealists, MHP supporters. They were going to enter the forbidden zone. I said, 'Tell me that I am one of you, let me enter.' They accepted and we entered. Smoke was still coming out of the houses.
A person with a drooping mustache greeted us. He pointed to a house and said: 'When Ecevit said that we had the Maraş events under control in the evening, we burned this house.' A nine-ten-year-old boy on the street said, 'Brother, brother, there is a body here.' I turned and looked; They crushed the man's head with a stone, it was flattened. After the child told me this, the person who said 'we burned this place' turned around and kicked the child. 'How can you call it a corpse? He said, 'Slaughter, carrion.' I still have difficulty understanding this. Then, because of that mood, I quit, interrupted it.
I went, Interior Minister İrfan Özaydın was holding a press conference at the provincial building. He was saying, 'We took it under control like this'. I stood up in that mood and said: 'Mr. Minister, I come from a neighborhood where no one enters. A child was kicked there because he said, 'There is a body here.' You won't call him a 'corpse', they said 'kill him'.' He was at a loss for words.
The collected bodies were brought to the Maraş slaughterhouse. There were women and children piled on top of each other. Pregnant women, young girls whose bellies were cut with a rake... I saw these. I also saw some body robbers they caught. They brought someone. When they put their hands against the wall, they had bracelets on each arm for five or six watches.
The Maraş Massacre is, in my opinion, a small Halabja Massacre."
'WHENEVER THERE IS PEACE IN THE MIDDLE EAST, TIME SLOWS DOWN'
Expressing his impressions and views on the process that has started recently, Ramazan Öztürk stated that whenever peace is talked about in the Middle East, time slows down and continued his words as follows:
"This process has been attempted several times before, but it has been disrupted. Because the intention was not to achieve peace; It was to obtain political rent, to get votes. When they saw that they could not get this, they disrupted the process. There is a fascist and racist vein in Turkey's structure. No matter who is alive, there is an imposition of one belief and one identity. There is a segment with this perception. Unfortunately, this segment, what we call the 'deep state', also exists in the background.
Whenever peace is on the agenda in the Middle East, time slows down and dragging feet. When those who do not want peace win in the end, it is very easy for the process to be disrupted. Everything is turned upside down with one or two provocations, which we have experienced.
Everyone is saying something about the peace process that has started now, and they are not wrong to say it. Because when you look at the lessons and conclusions learned from what happened in the past, you fall into a dilemma: There are some doubts such as whether it will be overturned, who is calculating what, what interests are at stake, and they are right here.
And I say: This time there are many accounts again, but is this account higher than the previous accounts? That's how it should be. Because this issue cannot be solved with a calculation that remains under it.
'PEACE WILL NOT COME TO THE MIDDLE EAST WITHOUT RESOLVING THE KURDISH ISSUE'
Why do I say that? Because Turkey's most radical and nationalist party is leading this process. He has not taken a single step back for a year. We know this party since its establishment.
There is a mind far above the past attempts. Would it be bad if it was solved this way? No, it would be good. If a truly democratic system is to be established, if everyone has constitutional rights and if everyone has the courage to face their own past, that would be very nice.
In fact, taking such a radical step would only be possible if a party like the MHP and its leader came to the fore. The AK Party could not have managed this alone, the CHP could not have succeeded. The CHP has a nationalist vein within itself; who looks at "everyone is Turkish" and this is a solid vein.
As for the conclusion, with the important developments in the world and in the Middle East, the bosses of the world have realized that peace cannot come to the Middle East without the solution of the Kurdish issue. As time passes, everyone suffers. As for my own final opinion, I would be skeptical of this process without legal signatures."
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