Three weeks after jailed Kurdish leader Abdullah Öcalan urged his militants to disband, Turkey’s Kurds were celebrating their Nevruz New Year on Friday with the prospect of peace still remote.
The efforts to broker a solution to the decades-long Kurdish conflict have likely been complicated by the widespread unrest provoked by Wednesday’s detention of İstanbul Mayor Ekrem İmamoğlu, a key opposition figure.
“The government is dragging the country into increasing violent upheaval with its silencing of the opposition,” said Tuncer Bakırhan, co-chair of the pro-Kurdish Peoples’ Equality and Democracy Party (DEM Party), the third largest party in Turkey’s parliament.
In Diyarbakır and the main cities in the Kurdish-majority southeast, thousands of people — women in traditional dresses, men in shawls — gathered to dance and celebrate Nevruz, marking the arrival of spring.
Many had hoped for a message from Öcalan, who has been jailed on a prison island near İstanbul since 1999 but who still garners widespread respect, his image present at every rally.
But the DEM Party said there would be no message from the 75-year-old as the government had not answered their request to pay him another visit.
Women dance in traditional Kurdish clothes during a gathering for Nevruz celebrations marking the New Year of the Persian calendar and the first day of spring in Diyarbakır, southeastern Turkey, on March 21, 2025. (Photo by Ilyas AKENGIN / AFP)
A DEM Party delegation has visited Öcalan three times in recent months, relaying his messages to the Turkish authorities and transmitting his historic February 27 call for his outlawed Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) militants to disband.
The PKK, designated as a terrorist organization by Turkey and its Western allies, has led a decades-long war against the Turkish state that has claimed tens of thousands of lives since 1984.
“Since the delegation’s application [for a new visit] received no response, there was no message from Mr. Öcalan for this year’s Nevruz,” the DEM Party said.
The PKK’s military leadership, which is based in mountainous northern Iraq, accepted Öcalan’s call, declaring a ceasefire and pledging to hold a congress to formally disband.
But last week, the PKK said it was impossible for its leaders to safely meet given the ongoing attacks by Turkey’s military.
President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan warned earlier this month there would be harsh consequences “if the promises are not kept” or the militants delayed their pledge to disarm.
To date, there has been no suggestion of when the PKK leaders will meet or whether Öcalan would be able to “direct and lead it” as they requested.
Lost momentum?
On Thursday Erdoğan’s nationalist ally Devlet Bahçeli — a key figure in efforts to resume talks — proposed that they meet in Malazgirt near Lake Van in Turkey’s east on May 4.
“The separatist terrorist PKK organization must immediately convene its congress to disband and lay down its weapons, handing them over to the authorities in order to avoid spoiling the February 27 appeal,” he said.
Since Öcalan’s call, the Turkish military has continued its assault on Kurdish militant positions, with the PKK’s co-leader Cemil Bayık on March 14 saying that holding a meeting under such conditions would be “very dangerous.”
Ankara is also concerned about the Kurdish fighters in northeastern Syria, who form the bulk of the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF).
When the SDF reached a deal with Damascus’ new leadership in mid-March to integrate into the national government, Erdoğan said it would “serve peace.”
But the process has since run into difficulties.
And Ankara’s growing crackdown on the opposition — notably the detention of İstanbul’s mayor and its removal of 10 DEM Party mayors in recent months — risks jeopardizing efforts to end the conflict with the Kurds.
“What’s happening with İmamoğlu, with the Turkish pro-democracy movement and in Syria, really complicates the process that has been launched with Öcalan,” said Gönül Tol, head of the Turkish studies program at the Washington-based Middle East Institute.
“Right now, [the PKK] has zero motivation to do anything, given the chaos happening in Turkey,” she told Agence France-Presse.
“If things go more smoothly in Syria, that could give them an opening.”
© Agence France-Presse