 will soon destroy their weapons as a "goodwill gesture" to signal their commitment to lay down their arms after decades of conflict with Turkey, two PKK executives said.){kind=link}
Militants from the outlawed Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) will soon destroy their weapons as a “goodwill gesture” to signal their commitment to lay down their arms after decades of conflict with Turkey, two PKK executives said.
The planned laying down of arms marks a turning point in the militant group’s transition from armed insurgency to political negotiation, part of a broader effort to end one of the region’s longest-running conflicts.
The group declared an end to its armed campaign in May — a conflict that has claimed more than 40,000 lives since 1984 and has long strained Turkey’s relations with its Kurdish population and regional neighbors.
“As a gesture of goodwill, a number of PKK fighters who had taken part in fighting Turkish forces in recent years will destroy or burn their weapons in a ceremony in the coming days,” the PKK executive said, requesting anonymity because he is not authorized to speak to the media.
The move was confirmed by another commander who also spoke to Agence France-Presse on condition of anonymity.
The PKK has led a decades-long armed campaign for Kurdish rights in Turkey and is considered a terrorist organization by Ankara and its Western allies.
Representatives of political parties, local observers and the media will attend the ceremony, which will take place in the autonomous Kurdistan region in northern Iraq.
The commander said the PKK had yet to decide on the exact number of fighters — men and women — who would disarm, the location and the timing of the event.
In recent months the PKK has taken several historic steps, starting with a ceasefire and culminating in its formal dissolution announced on May 12.
The shift followed an appeal by its founder, Abdullah Öcalan, delivered in a letter from Imralı Prison, on an island south of İstanbul, where he has been held since 1999.
The first commander said a new statement from Öcalan was expected soon.
A delegation from the pro-Kurdish Peoples’ Equality and Democracy Party (DEM Party), which has played a key role in facilitating contacts between Öcalan and Ankara, is expected to meet with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan next week before visiting Öcalan in prison.
Most of the PKK’s militants have spent the past decade in the mountains of northern Iraq, where Turkey also maintains military bases and has carried out frequent operations against Kurdish fighters.
Meanwhile, Ömer Çelik, a spokesman for Turkey’s ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP), said on Tuesday that the PKK could start handing over its weapons “within days.”
Asked by reporters whether there was a timeline for the PKK militants to lay down their arms, Çelik said: “I don’t want to give a definite timeline at this stage. … Now we’ve reached a stage where it could happen in a matter of days.”
Çelik added that the coming days would be “extremely important for a Turkey free of terrorism.”
Until now, there has been little detail about how the dissolution mechanism would work, but Ankara has said it would carefully monitor the process to ensure full implementation.
© Agence France-Presse