Erdoğan hails ‘window of opportunity’ in terror fight

Erdoğan hails ‘window of opportunity’ in terror fight

DİYARBAKIR
Erdoğan hails ‘window of opportunity’ in terror fight

President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan on Jan. 11 described ongoing process with İmralı as a “historic chance to end terrorism" in the country.

“A new window of opportunity has opened for our country to end the scourge of terrorism once and for all,” Erdoğan told his supporters in Diyarbakır, the largest city in Türkiye's Kurdish-majority southeast.

His remarks followed a visit by Peoples’ Equality and Democracy Party (DEM Party) lawmakers Sırrı Süreyya Önder and Pervin Buldan to Öcalan on Dec. 28, 2024.

They met with the PKK leader on a prison island off Istanbul where he is serving a life sentence.

Their visit marked the first such meeting in nearly a decade. The pro-Kurdish DEM Party's predecessor, the Peoples’ Democratic Party (HDP), last met Öcalan in April 2015.

The delegation was joined by the party’s former mayor, Ahmet Türk, in subsequent talks with all major parties in parliament except İYİ (Good) Party.

"Terrorist organizations have no other choice but to lay down their weapons," Erdoğan said in televised comments. "We are not going to miss this historic chance."

He said these efforts aim to encourage the dissolution of PKK, which Türkiye considers a terror group, and the unconditional surrender of its arms.

This will also "enable the political movement which has failed to establish itself as a party of Türkiye due to the separatist organization's pressure to develop in this direction,” Erdoğan added, referencing the DEM Party.

“It is time to say 'stop' to the pain we have endured for the last half-century,” he said.

“[Past] initiatives failed because the structures we face listened to the voices of regional and global powers instead of this country and this nation."

Erdoğan vowed to continue searching for a permanent solution. "Everyone who wants to join this blessed march has a place above our heads," he said, inviting broader support for the process.

Detained 25 years ago by Turkish security forces in Kenya after years on the run, Öcalan was sentenced to death. However, Türkiye abolished capital punishment in 2004 and he is spending his remaining years in an isolation cell on the prison island.

The rare visit to Öcalan became possible after Nationalist Movement Party (MHP) Devlet Bahçeli, Erdoğan's ally, invited him to come to parliament to renounce terror and disband PKK.

Later, on Jan. 11, in a speech in the nearby city of Şanlıurfa, Erdoğan praised the opposition forces in Syria for ousting Bashar al-Assad's government.

"The era of those who exploited our region through terrorist organizations is over. The separatist organization has no choice but to dissolve itself," he said, referring to PKK and YPG.

"The victory of our Syrian brothers is also our victory. We are all one as Turks, Arabs, Kurds and Turkmens."

Abdullah Öcalan,