Turkey Erdogan urges PKK to disband: "not unlimited patience"
One month after PKK founder Abdullah Öcalan called for the dissolution of the organization, President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has urged an end to the banned Kurdistan Workers' Party. "We do not have unlimited time and patience. We expect the organization to disband without further delay and lay down its arms completely," Erdogan said in a message at the start of Eid al-Fitr, the festival of breaking the fast.
30.03.2025, 13:41
SDA
At the end of February, founder Abdullah Öcalan had called on the PKK to disband. However, PKK leaders had linked this to quid pro quos from Turkey. Since then, Turkey has repeatedly rejected this, as well as a ceasefire unilaterally announced by the PKK.
The appeal had raised hopes among many in Turkey for an end to the decades-long conflict and a democratization of the country. The arrest of opposition politician Ekrem Imamoglu has largely dashed these hopes. The deposed mayor of Istanbul is accused of supporting the PKK, among other things. His arrest has triggered strong protests and plunged the country into one of its worst political crises for a long time.
Some observers accuse the government of wanting to cause a further split in the opposition between the pro-Kurdish and nationalist camps with the prospect of settling the Kurdish conflict. Kurdish voters played a key role in Imamoglu's election victories.
Imamoglu is not the first opposition mayor to be imprisoned. Numerous Kurdish politicians in the south-east of the country have already been ousted on terror charges and replaced by government-appointed trustees.
