Koolmijnlaan after the riots: “Kurds and Turks live together peacefully here” (Heusden-Zolder)

Sevim Kiliçlioglu has been living and working in Heusden-Zolder for 28 years. Her fruit shop in Koolmijnlaan was still open on Sunday evening when the convoy of PKK supporters drove through the street. “I didn’t recognize the flag at first and initially thought it was about football supporters,” says the lady with Turkish roots. Sevim serves everyone in her shop with a broad smile. “Turks, Kurds, Moroccans, Flemish,… customers from all over the world come here. In Heusden-Zolder we live peacefully together with so many nationalities. There are no tensions here between Kurds and Turks. If I need bread, I go to the bakery nearby, which is a Kurd. He can always ask me for help, that’s how we do it here. But there were no people from Heusden-Zolder in the cars that drove around on Sunday evening. I didn’t recognize anyone. It is terrible that provocateurs from outside our municipality are causing unrest. I can only hope that peace will return soon, because no one wanted this.”

Live together peacefully

“Violence between Kurds and Turks in Turkey is a thing of the past, but we have nothing to do with that here in Flanders,” agrees Mustafa (82). “I have lived here for more than half a century and have worked in the Zolder mine for 23 years, with boys of all nationalities. My life is here in Heusden-Zolder, not in Turkey. And then I think it is very bad that some people bring foreign violence and provocations here.”

A Kurdish trader shares the same opinion. “My children went to play with my Turkish neighbor yesterday. The tensions that you have in Turkey are not there here. Very unfortunate what happened. Hopefully this will stop soon.” Yet another trader from the neighborhood regrets that this Syrian Kurdish family in Kolderstraat allowed the people who provoked it into their home. “That family has only been living in Heusden-Zolder for a year. They are not well off, but we helped them with the entire community at the time by donating items. I don’t know if they were in the cars, but it is with them that the provocateurs took shelter.”

Not going to school

However, several residents fear that peace will not return soon. “I constantly read messages on social media from PKK supporters who want to go to Heusden-Zolder for retaliation,” say Nese and Melissa Dogan, mother and daughter. They themselves have Turkish roots and live in Lindeman, the neighborhood where things went off the rails on Sunday evening. “We are all still in shock,” says Melissa, who fears more violence in the coming days. “My sisters did not go to school today and I hear that many mothers have kept their children at home as a precaution. It’s a shame how it all turned out, because here in Heusden-Zolder we are showing that Turks and Kurds can live together perfectly.”