The Kurdish guerrilla group held a symbolic ceremony in which a portion of their weapons was set on fire, marking the start of their disarmament process. This gesture was welcomed by the Turkish government, which has experienced over four decades of ongoing conflict with Kurdish forces.
The end of an era of violence?
In northern Iraq, a handful of guerrillas belonging to the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK by its initials in Kurdish), initiated a ceremony involving the surrender of their weapons, in what they considered a symbolic but significant first step on the road to the end of the insurrections that occurred in Turkey during the last decades.
The PKK maintained a constant conflict with the different administrations of the Turkish State, which led to its illegalization in the country since 1984. In May of this year, its main leaders agreed to disband and disarm, putting an end to its war campaign after a public appeal by its leader, Abdullah Ocalan, who has been under arrest for several years.
In total, around 40 PKK militiamen and their respective commander surrendered their weapons at the ceremony held in the city of Solimania in northern Iraq.
The military equipment was destroyed at a subsequent meeting, which included members of the Turkish and Iraqi intelligence services, Iraqi Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) bishops and leaders of the pro-Kurdish Turkish DEM party, who played a key role in reaching the decision to disarm the PKK.
“As a sign of goodwill and our determination for the practical success of the peace process and with the aim of continuing our struggle for freedom, democracy and socialism through democratic politics and legal ways, we come here today to destroy our weapons of our own free will,” explains the PKK statement published by the Kurdish news agency ANF.
PKK Disarmament Begins
For his part, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan expressed his joy at the beginning of the PKK disarmament process, after more than 40 years of military conflicts with the Turkish army, in what the Ankara administrator described as the beginning of a “new day” for Turkey.
“As of yesterday, the scourge of terrorism has entered the process of coming to an end. As of yesterday, Turkey has begun to close a long and painful page full of tears,” the Middle Eastern leader declared, in a speech unusual for its self-critical tone.
Unexpected self-criticism
Interestingly, the Turkish leader was far from claiming a categorical and absolute victory over the PKK, acknowledging in his speech that the Turkish state bears its share of responsibility for the deepening violence and the radicalization of pro-Kurdish organizations.
“Many governments have come to power and each one has claimed that it was going to eradicate terrorism, without succeeding. The state itself has also made some mistakes,“ explained Erdogan, alluding to cases such as the ”dirty war” carried out by Turkey during the 1990s, in the midst of one of the biggest escalations in the fighting against the PKK.
“Unsolved murders, burned villages and families forced to flee overnight were just some of the crimes committed by the state. Instead of ending terrorism, it exacerbated it. We all paid the price for these mistakes”, added the President, who since his arrival to power has made gestures in favor of a rapprochement with the Kurdish position, by meeting with mothers of the Kurdish people, whose children were victims of extrajudicial detentions and disappearances.
“In recent years, we have practically annulled the maneuverability and operational capacity of the terrorist organization thanks to our cross-border operations in Iraq and the revolution in Syria on December 8,” assured the leader of one of the NATO members.