, extended to jailed Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) leader Abdullah Öcalan and Öcalan’s recent call to the PKK to lay down its arms and disband.){kind=link}
Ömer Murat*
Without putting recent developments in Syria at the center, it may be challenging to fully comprehend the process that began with the unexpected olive branch Devlet Bahçeli, leader of the far-right Nationalist Movement Party (MHP), extended to jailed Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) leader Abdullah Öcalan and Öcalan’s recent call to the PKK to lay down its arms and disband.
It is difficult to find a satisfactory explanation for how the two sides can reach a compromise, given that the regime of President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan has intensified its repression of the Kurds and continued to appoint trustees to replace elected mayors. If there is to be some kind of compromise between the parties, why has the government continued its repressive policies?
If, however, we try to understand the whole process from a Syrian perspective, the situation becomes more nuanced: Following the collapse of the regime of Bashar al-Assad, Erdoğan declared the next step would be “to wipe out the Syrian Democratic Forces [SDF],” of which the Kurdish People’s Protection Units (YPG), known as the Syrian branch of the PKK, is the backbone, and threatened that Turkey could launch a military operation against the YPG at any moment. However, he has not yet acted on these threats. It appears that the prospect of sanctions by the US Congress, including the disclosure of his assets, has stopped Erdoğan from taking military action, and he has deemed it prudent to adopt a more cautious stance for the time being.
If Erdoğa starts military action against the SDF now without getting the blessing of the Trump administration, it will look like he thinks the current US president is less formidable than his predecessor. In this regard, it appears that the leader of the Justice and Development Party (AKP) might be hesitant to incur Trump’s displeasure. Trump’s secretary of state and national security advisor have strong views on the SDF, so it’s not hard to see why it would be tricky to get the go-ahead from Washington for such an operation at the present time.
I believe the whole process is actually being played out to create a smokescreen to prevent a negative reaction from the nationalists in Turkey, a significant part of whom give their votes to Erdoğan, if or when the government recognizes the existence of the SDF and engages with it. Indeed, the responses of Murat Karayılan, the de facto leader of the PKK, and Mazloum Abdi, the leader of the SDF (and YPG), to Öcalan’s call clearly show this.
In his call to the PKK, Öcalan made it sound as if he was asking the group to lay down its arms unconditionally, but in a separate note, which he thought necessary to send separately through Sırrı Süreyya Önder, a deputy from the pro-Kurdish Peoples’ Equality and Democracy Party (DEM Party), he did not fail to add the condition that the success of this process “undoubtedly requires the recognition of democratic politics and its legal dimension.”
Karayılan seems to be going along with this subtle message, initially stating his concurrence with the statements made by Öcalan and the PKK’s commitment to fulfill the demands of the call. However, after his apparent renunciation of violence without preconditions, Karayılan does not hesitate to delineate certain stipulations.
These conditions are as follows: (I) “No [PKK] force will take armed action unless it is attacked.” This obviously means that Turkey must halt all operations against the PKK.
(II) “We would like to emphasize that democratic politics and a legal basis must also be suitable for success.” This could possibly mean an end to the practice of appointing trustees in municipalities run by DEM Party mayors, a general amnesty for most PKK fighters and an increase in the powers of local governments.
(III) “We are ready to call a congress [to dissolve the PKK], but in order for this to happen, a suitable security environment must be created, and for the PKK congress to be successful, Öcalan must personally direct and lead it. For a successful implementation of the call, Öcalan must be able to live and work in physical freedom and have unhindered contact with whomever he wants, including his friends.” This surely means that Öcalan will be taken out of prison and given a new environment where he can have free contact with the PKK members.
The question arises as to whether Öcalan’s call was initiated in response to discreet promises made by the government in this regard. Only time will tell. Considering the fact that Turkey has turned into a one-man regime, why should the PKK consider the democratic and legal guarantees of such a government as sufficient and dissolve an organization that managed to establish an autonomous state in Syria one way or another? Erdoğan does not refrain from taking steps that even violate the existing constitution, so who can prevent him from taking steps that will disregard all democratic and legal achievements in one fell swoop if the PKK “unconditionally” disarms and disbands tomorrow?
However if the SDF is recognized by Turkey, i.e., if a Kurdish autonomous administration recognized by the Turkish government is created in Syria as in Iraq, then the PKK/YPG will have achieved a great victory: Thanks to their regular army and political power in northeastern Syria, they will be able to quickly revert to their old position if Erdoğan changes his attitude, i.e., start an armed uprising against Turkey again. In fact Mazloum Abdi, the leader of the YPG, has offered a noteworthy response to Öcalan’s call, indicating that this could be the actual plan: “Mr. Öcalan’s call was for the PKK, for the PKK guerrillas. It was not addressed directly to our region.”
Remzi Kartal, co-chairman of the PKK-affiliated umbrella organization Kongra-Gel, has expressed a similar sentiment, stating that Öcalan’s call was specifically directed at the PKK and its armed wings but did not include its Syrian or Iranian branches, the YPG and PJAK.
The Trump administration’s position appears to align with this understanding, as evidenced by a statement made to CNN by the US National Security Council spokesperson, asserting that Öcalan’s call “will help assuage our Turkish allies about US counter-ISIS partners in northeast Syria.”
This carefully worded sentence makes clear that the US does not expect the SDF (or its backbone, the YPG) to disband any time soon. On the contrary, the statement could easily be interpreted as Turkey preparing to recognize the SDF in exchange for the PKK ceasing its operations against Turkey.
I must emphasize that it would be misleading to think that Erdoğan will not take steps to change the unitary, nation-state regime in Turkey. This one-man regime cannot be said to have such ideological red lines. The fact that Öcalan was allowed to openly criticize the Kemalist nation-state but not the Erdoğan regime, even implicitly, in his call, should be seen as an indication of this.
In fact Binali Yıldırım, one of Erdoğan’s closest aides, said after Öcalan’s call that the definition of citizenship could be revised in a new constitution, adding: “This could save some ethnic groups from feeling neglected. There’s nothing stopping this, no need for chauvinism. … One of the big things the new constitution is going to address is decentralization, giving local governments more power. Instead of controlling everything from Ankara, authority should be delegated.”
The regime’s only red line is the one man himself; anyone who threatens his power is his enemy and, of course, an enemy of the state. If you engage in effective opposition that worries the government, it is only a matter of time before the regime’s propaganda apparatus and courts declare you a “traitor,” “terrorist” or “foreign agent.” The opposition isn’t banned, but it’s expected to toe the regime’s line, so the “theatre of democracy” can be played convincingly.
Now, the Kurdish political movement is also signaling that it can play Erdoğan’s game in exchange for recognition of the SDF, in other words their de facto state in Syria, which they call Rojava. This stance appears to align with Erdoğan’s narrative of successfully addressing the issue of PKK terrorism through strong leadership.
But in spite of all this, why does the Erdoğan government still insist that Öcalan’s call to lay down arms also includes the SDF? How should we understand this contradiction? Mehmut Uçum, Erdoğan’s chief legal adviser, posted on his X account this week: “It is clear that what is meant by the dissolution of the PKK in Öcalan’s statement is that the KCK [umbrella organization that includes the PKK, YPG and PJAK] will be history with all its branches, in other words, the message is that the organization will end completely with all its assets in Turkey, Iran, Iraq and Syria. Anything else is unthinkable.”
It is evident that the various parties involved interpret Öcalan’s statement in differing ways, which may be attributed to Erdoğan’s reluctance to commit prematurely, preferring to gauge the response of his base in the polls before proceeding and wanting to drag out the process until then. A significant factor that could complicate the situation is Erdoğan’s declining popularity, particularly in light of an ongoing economic crisis.
However, should the process be subject to an abrupt disruption by a sudden U-turn by Erdoğan after such a significant commitment, it could potentially lead to domestic and foreign policy challenges in Turkey that the AKP leader may find challenging to manage.
*Ömer Murat is a political analyst and a former Turkish diplomat who currently lives in Germany.