ERBIL, Kurdistan Region of Iraq - Turkey’s pro-Kurdish People’s Equality and Democracy Party (DEM Party) on Tuesday met with Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK) leader Bafel Talabani and Kurdistan Region Deputy Prime Minister Qubad Talabani in the party's stronghold in Sulaimani’s Dabashan.

The DEM Party delegation arrived in the Kurdish capital Erbil on Sunday, and held meetings with top Kurdish officials and leaders, including Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP) leader and former President of the Kurdistan Region Masoud Barzani, the day after, to discuss the ongoing peace efforts between the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) and Turkey.

“We support any initiative that protects the rights of our people in Turkey and as the PUK we will help make this historic effort a success,” Bafel Talabani’s office cited the PUK leader as saying during the meeting.

The PUK leader stressed that resolving the Kurdish issue can only be done through “serious discussions and dialogue,” not weapons, hoping that all parties “work diligently to make this historic opportunity a success on the basis of partnership, brotherhood, and commitment to achieve peace and tranquility.”

DEM Party said in a statement that their meeting with the PUK delegation lasted around an hour and 15 minutes, during which they provided information on their meetings with jailed PKK leader Ocalan, and received “the views, suggestions, and thoughts” of the PUK and the Talabanis regarding the process.

The delegation is set to fly back to Turkey on Wednesday.

“We are very pleased with the outcome of our meetings [in the Kurdistan Region]” Keskin Bayindir, a member of the DEM Party delegation, said in a press conference after the meeting with the PUK.

The DEM Party delegation’s meetings in the Kurdistan Region aimed at obtaining the perspective and opinions of the Region’s leaders on the peace process in Turkey, which would later be conveyed to Ocalan.

A proposal to allow Ocalan to appear before the legislature and declare the dissolution of the PKK was put forward in October by Devlet Bahceli, head of the far-right Turkish Nationalist Movement Party (MHP). The initiative was immediately endorsed by Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and the Turkish political landscape. 

The PKK is an armed group that has fought for increased Kurdish rights in Turkey for decades. The group is designated a terrorist organization by Ankara.

Bahceli’s initiative led to DEM Party MPs Pervin Buldan and Sirri Sureyya Onder being granted the rare permission to meet with Ocalan at Imrali prison in December amid a shift in Ankara’s stance of prohibiting contact with the PKK founder.

Following the delegation’s meetings with Ocalan, Tuncer Bakirhan, a Kurdish lawmaker in the Turkish parliament revealed that Ocalan is set to make “a historic call” for a permanent solution to the Kurdish issue in Turkey.

Ocalan’s “historic call” is expected to take place “within this month” after the meetings in the Kurdistan Region are concluded and the input of Kurdish officials have been relayed to the PKK leader, according to DEM Party co-chair Tulay Hatimogullari, who added that they expect the call to emphasize solving the Kurdish issue “through law and politics.”