Turkish police officer fired for making far-right rap video in ruined Kurdish city

A police officer who filmed an ultra-nationalist rap video in the ruined district of Sur in the southeastern Turkish city of Diyarbakir was suspended on Wednesday, according to the Diyarbakir governor's office.

The video, titled "I Am Alone Father" and subtitled "in memory of soldiers martyred in Sur", was filmed despite the district being under 24-hour curfew due to fighting between the Turkish military and Kurdish militants.

The rapper, who is masked in the video and referred to on YouTube as SAT5, prowls around the ruined buildings of the historic Kurdish-majority district spouting nationalist slogans and slamming the "Kurdish lie" and the "Zionist plan".

"Father we have veered away from the six pointer," he raps, referring to Turkey's founder Mustafa Kemal Ataturk and the six principles of Kemalism.

"Everybody awaken, stand up; they are all Armenians, all crooks. Who am I? The son of a Turk; the one who has been ostracised. The missionaries have taken over the entire place."

Far-right Turks often accuse people they deem traitors of being "Armenians" and the term has been thrown around frequently with regards to the unrest in the southeast.

The rapper begins the video picking up a gun and walks by posters of Ataturk and a pile of burning flags belonging to the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) and Syria-based Peoples Protection Units (YPG).

He gives a "warning to the youth being wasted away" that there is a need to "either solve the problem or hang those who create the problem".

"Love it or leave!" he adds, quoting the commonly used phrase adopted by Turkish nationalists from the American far-right calling on foreign elements in Turkey to either show partriotism or leave, while adding that he is "not a fascist".

"The solution is simple if you ask me," he concludes. "Shoot them in the head if they don’t change!"

The video ends with a black screen listing the names of police officers and security personnel killed in fighting in the southeast.

The Diyarbakir governor's office said on Tuesday that no permission had been granted for filming such a video and that it would be launching an investigation.

Many have alleged strong links between the Turkish police - particularly those deployed in the Kurdish-majority regions - and far-right political organisations such as the Nationalist Movement Party (MHP) and its paramilitary wing the Grey Wolves.

Pictures have frequently been released of police and other security officials making the "wolf sign" gesture, associated with Turkish ultra-nationalist and anti-PKK politics:

Sur has been under curfew since early December, after fighting broke out between Turkish security forces and Kurdish militants belonging to the PKK "youth wing" the Patriotic Revolutionary Youth Movement (YDG-H).

According to a report released by the opposition Republican Peoples Party (CHP) around 80 percent of buildings in Sur have been destroyed in the fighting, while the Turkish Health Ministry said that around 355,000 people had been displaced by the fighting.

Thousands of militants, security officials and civilians have been killed since a two-year ceasefire broke down last July, according to the Turkish government, a figure Kurdish groups have disputed.