The imprisoned leader of the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK), Abdullah Ocalan, on Thursday called on the terrorist group to lay down its weapons and dissolve.
In a statement from a prison on the island of Imrali, near Istanbul, Ocalan, 75, urged the PKK to hold a congress and formally disband.
“As in the case with any modern community and party whose existence has not been abolished by force, convene your congress to integrate with the state and society voluntarily and make a decision,” Ocalan said. “All groups must lay [down] their arms and the PKK must dissolve itself.”
The statement was read out on television by a representative of the Peoples’ Equality and Democracy Party (DEM), a pro-Kurdish political party in Turkey.
“In the 1990s, with the collapse of real socialism due to internal dynamics, the dissolution of the denial of Kurdish identity in the country, and improvements in freedom of expression, led to weakening of the PKK´s foundational meaningfulness and resulted in excessive repetition,” Ocalan said. “Therefore, it has run its course like its counterparts and has necessitated its dissolution.”
Ocalan founded the Marxist-leaning PKK in 1978 with the initial aim of carving out a Kurdish state in the region. Since then, the group has moderated its stance, calling for Kurdish autonomy in southeastern Turkey.
In 1999, Ocalan was captured in Kenya by Turkish security forces. Since then, he has been held at Imrali.
The PKK is classified as a terrorist group by Ankara, Brussels, London, and Washington.
Thousands of people have been killed in fighting between the PKK and the army in southeastern Turkey since the 1980s.
In October 2024, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s coalition partner, Devlet Bahceli, leader of the Nationalist Movement Party, suggested that Ocalan could be granted parole if the PKK renounced violence and disbanded.
In his statement, Ocalan said, “The call made by Mr. Devlet Bahceli, along with the will expressed by Mr. President, and the positive responses from the other political parties towards the known call, has created an environment in which I am making a call for the laying down of arms, and I take on the historical responsibility of this call.”
In October 2024, PKK gunmen attacked the headquarters of a Turkish defense firm in Ankara, leaving at least five people dead, along with the alleged perpetrators.
In response, the Turkish Air Force struck PKK positions in northern Iraq, where the group is based, and in Syria, where an affiliated group—the YPG—maintains a significant presence.
Since local elections were held last year, eight DEM Party-affiliated mayors in eastern Turkey, where Kurds account for much of the population, have been removed from office following terrorism-related convictions.
The PKK allegedly has support from members of the Kurdish diaspora in various European countries.
‘Historic, Powerful’
Ocalan’s statement was described as historic and powerful by Hoshyar Zebari, an Iraqi-Kurdish politician who served as Iraq’s foreign minister between 2003 and 2014.Zebari, whose Kurdistan Democratic Party has maintained good relations with Ankara for years, said, “Its timing was appropriate and it will have a positive impact in northeastern Syria, Iraqi Kurdistan and Turkey as well.”
Hundreds of people took to the streets in the Kurdish-majority city of Qamishli in northeastern Syria to celebrate a statement that they hoped might bring to an end a conflict between the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) and Turkish-backed groups in Syria.
An estimated 15 million Kurds live in Turkey, but they are not recognized as a separate ethnic minority.
Millions more live in northeastern Syria, northern Iraq, and northwestern Iran, as well as in Germany, Britain, and other European countries.
In 2005, after the overthrow of Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein, a new constitution designated Iraqi Kurdistan as a federal entity within Iraq and granted Kurdish sole official language status.
