The Kurdish PKK group says it is weapons and solved

The banned Kurdish group, the Kurdistan Workers Party, which launched a 40 -year -old rebellion against Türkiye, has announced that it is putting and solving its arms.

This step followed a call in February by the Prisoner Group Leader, Abdullah Oaklan, until the organization is dissolved. The group was banned as a terrorist group in Türkiye, the European Union, the United Kingdom and the United States.

The rebellion in the Kurdistan Workers Party aims at the beginning to create an independent homeland for the Kurds, who represent about 20 % of Türkiye’s population. But since then it has moved away from its separatist goals, with a focus instead on more autonomy and the rights of the Kurds.

More than 40,000 people were killed during the conflict.

In February, Oaklan, 76, called for his movement to put her arms and dissolve herself. The leader of the Kurdistan Workers Party has been in solitary confinement in prison on an island in the Marmara Sea, southwest of Istanbul, since 1999.

“There is no alternative to democracy in the pursuit of a political system and its perception. Democratic consensus is the basic way.”

It is not clear what Ocalan and his supporters will get for a solution, but there is speculation that he may be released.

Kurdish politicians hope to hold a new political dialogue and a path towards greater Kurdish rights.

Both sides had reasons to make a deal now.

The Kurdistan Workers Party has been subjected to the Turkish army in recent years, and has made regional changes difficult for them and their companies at work in Iraq and Syria.

President Erdogan needs to support the Kurdish professional political parties if he can run again in the upcoming presidential elections in Türkiye, scheduled for 2028.

A spokesman for the AK party in Reuters, according to Reuters news agency, said that the decision to resolve it was an important step towards “Turkey free of terrorism”, and the operation will be monitored by state institutions, according to a spokesman for AK, President Tayeb Erdogan, according to Reuters.

Winsheroub Rodgers, of international affairs, Chatham House, said it would take a “great democratic transition from Türkiye” to accommodate the demands of Kurdish political parties.

Rodgers said there were “some goodwill” from some Turkish leaders in recent months, allowing PKK to play to play.

He added: “But whether this extends to the main changes necessary to ensure full Kurdish participation in politics and society is less clear.

“In many ways, the ball is in the Turkish court.”