Peace commission to review İmralı visit next week

ANKARA

A parliamentary commission overseeing Türkiye's latest peace initiative will convene on Dec. 4 to review the findings of a delegation that visited jailed PKK leader Abdullah Öcalan on the İmralı prison island earlier this week.

Representatives from the ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP), the Peoples’ Equality and Democracy Party (DEM Party) and the Nationalist Movement Party (MHP) traveled to the island on Nov. 24.

The talks yielded “positive results” for social cohesion and regional stability, according to commission chair and Parliament Speaker Numan Kurtulmuş’s office.

Hüseyin Yayman of the AKP, Gülistan Kılıç Koçyiğit of the DEM Party and Feti Yıldız of the MHP are expected to brief the National Solidarity, Brotherhood and Democracy Commission on the discussions held with Öcalan. The commission plans to finalize its report next month.

The main opposition Republican People’s Party (CHP) and the New Path group — an alliance that includes the Democracy and Progress Party (DEVA Party), Felicity Party (SP) and Future Party — declined to send representatives for the İmralı visit.

The DEM Party has long maintained channels to Öcalan and initially proposed the delegation’s trip, a move that quickly secured support from the MHP.

Since its formation, the commission has gathered testimony from ministers, unions, business groups, academics, legal scholars, civil society organizations and families of fallen soldiers.

The panel was established after Öcalan issued a call for PKK to disarm. A first group of members burned their weapons in July, and the terror group announced a withdrawal from Turkish territory in late October.