PKK announces complete ceasefire and disarmament
Kurdish militia follows instructions from their jailed leader and demands Turkey release him
BarcelonaThe Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) announced on Saturday a complete ceasefire and future disarmament. The announcement comes two days after the founder and imprisoned leader of the Kurdish militia, Abdullah Öcalan calls to abandon armed struggle and move towards dissolving the organisation. "To pave the way for the call of leader Apo (Ocalan's nickname) for peace and democratic society, we declare a ceasefire, effective as of today," said a statement from the PKK. "None of our forces will carry out armed actions unless we are attacked," added the text, released by the news agency linked to the organisation ANF.
Ocalan, imprisoned since 1999 in Turkey, made this call on Thursday. It was a significant first move to end a conflict that has been dragging on for four decades. But it remained to be seen whether the guerrillas would follow the call. Saturday's announcement does mark the beginning of the end of the confrontation between the Kurdish militia and the Turkish state.
The PKK has indicated that it is willing to "call a congress" of the organisation, as requested by its leader. But it adds that, to do so, "an appropriate security environment must be created" and argues that, for the process to be successful, "it must be done under the direction and coordination of leader Apo." For this reason, it stresses, "physical freedom" for Öcalan is necessary and the possibility for all his followers to be able to communicate without obstacles. "We hope that the state institutions will do what is necessary to create these conditions," the statement concludes.
It is far from clear that Ankara will listen to the demands of the PKK, an organization it considers terrorist. Justice Minister Yilmaz Tunc told CNN Turk on Friday that no amnesty, house arrest or other options are being discussed and that there are no negotiations.
More than 40 years of conflict
The PKK, which emerged in the 1970s with the aim of creating an independent Kurdish state in southeastern Turkey, has been at odds with the Turkish government since the 1980s. The armed conflict has caused more than 40,000 deaths and has marked Turkey's recent history. Repression, military attacks and persistent Kurdish resistance have turned the region into an almost constant battleground.
If successful, the PKK's decision could have implications beyond Turkey because Ocalan is a beacon for PKK operations in Syria and Iraq as well. Previous efforts to end the uprising, first between 2009 and 2011 and then between 2013 and 2015, failed and led to increased violence.
Since that last round of talks ten years ago, there has been no further rapprochement between Türkiye and the PKK. Until last October, when the leader of an ultra-nationalist party allied to President Recep Tayyip Erdogan made a surprising statement suggesting parole for Ocalan if he announced the dissolution of the group. A few days later, Ankara allowed the Kurdish leader's nephew to visit him in prison, after three years without any meeting with family members. And Erdogan confirmed in late October that a new approach was being sought to end the conflict and left the door open to "considering" his ally's proposal. Since then, Ocalan has met with members of the pro-Kurdish Peoples' Equality and Democracy Party (DEM), the third largest party in parliament, which was tasked with reading out the PKK leader's letter on Thursday marking the beginning of the end of the conflict.
