The Kurdistan Workers' Party lays down its arms

Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) has announced that it is ending the armed struggle and disbanding its organizational structure, it writes Deutsche says.

For decades, it has clashed with the Turkish state, and this decision follows the call of its embattled leader, Abdullah Ocalan.

The announcement states that the extraordinary congress held from May 5 to 7 concluded that the long-standing resistance "succeeded in ending the policy of denial and destruction of the Kurdish identity."

The PKK believes that the way to a political solution is open and that its historical mission has been fulfilled.

The Congress therefore decided to dissolve the structures led by Öcalan, officially end the armed struggle and stop operating under the name of the PKK.

An unexpected boost from a Turkish nationalist

The decisive impetus for this turn was given in October 2024 by the leader of the ultra-nationalist National Movement Party (MHP), Devlet Bahceli.

He caused surprise in the public when he shook hands with the deputies of the pro-Kurdish Party for Equality and Democracy (DEM), calling the act normal for a party that promotes the unity of Turkey.

Bahçeli, a close ally of President Erdoğan in the ruling coalition, made an unprecedented appeal to Ocalan in mid-October - he called on him to encourage the PKK to hand over its weapons.

Already a week later, he went a step further by proposing that Öcalan announce the dissolution of the organization in person in front of the parliament.

"Turkey needs sincere steps to strengthen the thousand-year-old brotherhood. Turkey's problem is not the Kurds, but the separatist terrorist organization. Let it come to the parliament and clearly say that the PKK has dissolved," said Bahceli.

Such a step was unprecedented for an ultra-nationalist leader.

Two evenings later, Öcalan replied from prison: "I have the power to end the conflict and violence and bring it to the legal and political level."

This was followed by contacts between Kurdish politicians and various actors, including President Erdoğan and his circle.

On February 1999, Öcalan, who has been in the high-security prison on Imrali Island since 27, publicly called on the PKK to disband and lay down its arms. He emphasized that after decades of bloody conflicts with the Turkish state, a political path should be taken.

President Recep Tayyip Erdogan took the initiative and presented this development as his government's contribution to creating a terrorism-free Turkey.

What was the PKK?

The relationship between the Kurds and the Turkish state is an age-old problem. For decades, many Kurds have sought more cultural and political rights under Turkey's centralized system, which often sees such demands as a threat to national unity.

Kurds make up 15 to 20 percent of Turkey's population. Although they live throughout the country, the most numerous communities are in the southeast. Important Kurdish minorities also live in neighboring countries - Syria, Iraq and Iran. In Iraq, they have partial autonomy, and in northern Syria, the Kurdish forces (SDF) control certain territories.

In Turkey, Kurdish interests were mainly represented by two groups: a party that seeks a political solution and operates in parliament, and the PKK, a Marxist-Leninist organization that had an armed wing and considered itself a guerrilla movement.

Autonomy instead of independence

The PKK was founded in 1978, and in 1984 it launched an armed rebellion against the Turkish state. The conflict, which some political scientists describe as a "low-intensity war", lasted for decades and claimed many lives, both civilians and soldiers.

Thousands of civilians were killed in PKK attacks. Turkey, the US and the EU consider that organization to be terrorist.

The original goal was the establishment of an independent Kurdish state, but since the mid-1990s, the PKK has focused on autonomy and cultural rights within Turkey. The idea of ​​complete independence has largely been abandoned in favor of a self-governing model.

It is estimated that the PKK had around 60.000 supporters, including fighters, sympathizers and civilians who provided logistical assistance. Their main stronghold was the Qandil Hills in northern Iraq, from where they conducted military operations and procured equipment.

The founder of the organization, Abdullah Ocalan, was arrested in 1999 and the same year sentenced to death for high treason. After the abolition of the death penalty in 2002, his sentence was replaced by life imprisonment.

Behind bars, he maintained considerable influence on the PKK, mostly through public messages delivered by lawyers and mediators.

Over the years, attempts have been made to end the conflict. Especially in the early years of Erdoğan's AKP rule, Kurdish rights were expanded: teaching in the mother tongue was introduced and state media was launched in Kurdish. But lasting peace was not achieved until the latest events.

Criminalization of Kurds

In the last decade, Erdogan's government has increasingly linked Kurdish politics with terrorism. DEM and its predecessors are regularly associated with the PKK, although they officially advocate a peaceful solution and distance themselves from that organization.

A number of Kurdish politicians, including former HDP leader Selahattin Demirtaş, are in prison on terrorism charges. Some MPs, like Omer Ocalan, the nephew of the founder of the PKK, have family ties to the organization.

In recent months, DEM politicians played a key role in peace initiatives and acted as mediators of PKK leader Ocalan.

Source: Deutsche Welle (DW)