ROME, Italy - Abdullah Ocalan, jailed leader of the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) on Thursday called on his party to lay down arms against the Turkish state and dissolve itself in a historic declaration from Imrali Prison, where he has been held for 26 years.
The call is to end the decades-long conflict between the Turkish state and the Kurdish group that has claimed tens of thousands of lives.
"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,” Ocalan calls in an address delivered by pro-Kurdish DEM Party after they met him earlier today, for the third time in three months to resume the peace process in Turkey.
"As in the case with any modern community and party whose existence has not been abolished by force, would voluntarily do, convene your congress and make a decision; all groups must lay their arms and the PKK must dissolve itself,” DEM Party quoted Ocalan as saying.
"I convey my greetings to all those who believe in co-existence and who look forward to my call,” Ocalan says.
Ocalan’s message was first read in Kurdish by Ahmet Turk, 82, who has spent years trying to resolve the Kurdish issue.
Among those who travelled to Imrali on Thursday were DEM co-chairs Tulay Hatimogullari and Tuncer Bakirhan, and veteran Kurdish politician Turk.
Crowds from several predominantly Kurdish provinces in Turkey and neighboring Kurdistan Region and the predominantly Kurdish regions of northern Syria watched the announcement on big screens.
In a major move, Devlet Bahceli, head of the far-right Turkish Nationalist Movement Party (MHP), in October proposed allowing Ocalan to appear before the legislature and declare the dissolution of the PKK, an initiative immediately endorsed by Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and the Turkish political landscape.
This initiative led to the DEM Party MPs Sirri Sureyya Onder and Parvin Buldan being granted the rare permission to meet with Ocalan at Imrali prison previously twice amid a shift in Ankara’s stance of prohibiting contact with the PKK founder.
Ocalan, 75, has been serving a life sentence at Imrali prison, a small but high-security facility on Imrali Island in the Sea of Marmara, since February 1999.
"There is no alternative to democracy in the pursuit and realization of a political system. Democratic consensus is the fundamental way,” Ocalan said in his landmark call for peace.
"The language of the epoch of peace and democratic society needs to be developed in accordance with this reality,” the jailed leader added.
In 2013, the Turkish government, led by then-prime minister and current President Erdogan, entered a peace process with the PKK aimed at ending the decades of conflict and bloodshed. The truce was short-lived and collapsed in July 2015, leading to violent clashes in Turkey’s southeastern Kurdish areas.
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.
Updated at 05:50pm with additional quotes from Abdullah Ocalan
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