Mimihan Halbin Zaidan

Golik – Reactions continue in Turkey and North Kurdistan against the implementation of the “Climate Law,”which was introduced in 2025 and came into force last July.

Residents and environmental activists believe that the law” protects capital, not nature.” They are in a state of resistance against the geothermal power plant project planned by the American company IGNIS H2 in the village of Qerkh Bazar in the Kani Rash (Karliova) district of Golik,as well as in the surrounding villages and the village of Khuark in the Kımkım district of Muş.

 

Protests have been organized in Kımkım and Kani Rash against the project, and residents affirm that they will continue their struggle until it is stopped. Elif Şahin affirmed that they will resist geothermal energy projects and will not allow them, pointing out that making the residential areas of Kurds and Alevis available for exploitation is "an extension of the state's displacement policy."

She reminded that the Kani Rash region and its surroundings witnessed a large wave of displacement in the 1990s as a result of state pressures. "What is happening today is a new attempt to force people to leave their lands. Forcing residents to migrate from their villages and destroying them is part of a policy that has continued for years. Today's protests are just the beginning, and we will continue our resistance until the project is cancelled. We will not surrender, and we will not abandon this issue."

"We will protect our lands until the end."

 

For her part, Niloufer Aslan considered what is happening as a form of plunder and looting. “ they want to seize lands that residents have preserved for hundreds of years,” she affirmed, stating that geothermal energy spreads toxins. She added that the region’s inhabitants live in harmony with nature, and there is an attempt to sever this relationship. “They want to destroy the areas of life.”

Niloufer Aslan pointed out that the region’s residents depend on agriculture and animal husbandry, and thet implementing the Project would maket hat impossible. “it isn’t only humans who will be harmed. What about the butterflies, birds, frogs, and turtles?Is this not their habitat as well?”

She explained: "Do we not need animals for the continuation of the ecosystem? Even the fish has a known role in nature. In such a situation, not only will our living areas be destroyed, but we will also die. We will not be able to breathe. We completely reject this, and we will protect our lands until the end."

She affirmed that they will preserve the lands they inherited from their ancestors. "This land that we have cared for with our effort cannot be destroyed by a company. We received it as a trust, and we will pass it on to our children. They will not be able to silence this people."

Environmental Occupation

  

For her part, Türkan Ağar, a member of the Beri Valley Environment Association, said that they reject the "occupation" of their lands by an American company, adding, "They want to suffocate us. Our struggle has just begun and we will expand it, and we will not allow our nature to be destroyed, for this project aims to uproot our breath.

 

" As for Cehriban Yılmaz, who works in livestock breeding, she affirmed that geothermal energy projects will take away their only source of livelihood. "We will not allow our nature to be destroyed. This region is already an earthquake zone, and such a project will cause even greater damage. We will not leave our region and our village to them."