Kurdish gangs emerge in Nashville

NASHVILLE,Tenn.-A proud enclave of Kurds has lived in this city for decades,starting businesses and soccer leagues,holding down good jobs and blending into the immigrant
neighborhoods south of town.But now the Kurdish immigrant community has been shaken to see its young people joining a street gang that blends old-world customs and new-world thuggery.Police blame the gang for a string of rapes,assaults and home invasions.The gang calls itself Kurdish Pride and is made up of 20 to 30 teenagers and young adults."We don't have the phenomenon anywhere else.This is a unique situation in Nashville,"said Pary Karadaghi,president and chief executive of Kurdish Human
Rights Watch, based in Fairfax,Va.The gang members borrow from California gangster culture by adopting rap slang,scrawling "KP" graffiti on street signs,wearing gang colors and flashing hand signs in photos posted online.They also put Kurdish flags on their cars, and use yellow,from the Kurdish Democratic Party banner,as their gang color.On their Web sites,they talk about Kurdish music and culture.Unlike other gang members,most Kurdish Pride followers grew up in stable,working-class,two-parent homes,and many of their parents own successful businesses or work at universities,Nashville Detective Mark Anderson said.The Kurds,most of whom are Sunni Muslim,come mainly from Turkey,Iraq and Iran but have their own language and culture. Kurdish immigrants have sought refuge in Nashville since the 1970s,creating the largest community of Kurds in an American city,with about 10,000 members,Karadaghi said.More Kurds fleeing persecution came to Nashville in the late '90s,and many attend the city's public schools.Gang members say they formed Kurdish Pride in response to threats and harassment after the Sept. 11 attacks,Anderson said.But Anderson,who works their neighborhood,said he has never heard of any violence against the Kurds."They started out wanting to be a group of kids that would hang out and stick up for each other,"Karadaghi said."They feel they have to have a gang in order to survive."At the Salahadeen Center,a mosque and community center, Ibrahim Ahmed says he is so worried about his son joining the gang that he is pulling him out of his public school."They say it's very hard.If you don't join them,they are not going to protect you,"Ahmed said.While the gang has been around since at least 2001,the intensity of its violence has escalated recently,Anderson said...
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