Erdoğan meets with DEM Party in rare dialogue

ANKARA

President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan met with a Peoples' Equality and Democracy Party (DEM Party) delegation on April 10 as part of an initiative aimed at securing a "terror-free Türkiye."

The meeting at the presidential complex in Ankara included DEM Party lawmakers Sırrı Süreyya Önder and Pervin Buldan, along with Türkiye's intelligence chief İbrahim Kalın and ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) deputy leader Efkan Ala.

"We believe that both the democratic political arena and peace-related activities will continue with much more rapid, much faster and much more qualified steps from now on," Önder told reporters ahead of the talks.

This marked the first direct contact between Erdoğan and pro-Kurdish party representatives since June 12, 2012, when he was prime minister. He met with then Peace and Democracy Party (BDP) co-chairs Selahattin Demirtaş and Gültan Kışanak on that occasion.

The DEM Party has visited jailed PKK leader Abdullah Öcalan three times at the İmralı prison island off Istanbul since December.

Party officials later read a televised statement on Feb. 27 to convey Öcalan’s message urging PKK to disarm and dissolve.

The process became possible after Nationalist Movement Party (MHP) leader Devlet Bahçeli invited Öcalan to renounce terrorism in parliament, an appeal later endorsed by Erdoğan as a “historic window of opportunity.”

“We will reaffirm our will to achieve our goal of a terror-free Türkiye,” Erdoğan told lawmakers on April 9, announcing his meeting with the DEM Party.

PKK is listed as a terrorist organization by Türkiye, the United States and the European Union. Öcalan, meanwhile, has been held in solitary confinement since his capture in 1999.

In recent months, the PKK leader has been allowed visits, including one last October, when his nephew Ömer Öcalan made the first family visit in 43 months.

Additional visits took place during recent Eid al-Fitr celebrations, when he met with a broader group of relatives and associates.

Meanwhile, the MHP and DEM Party exchanged Eid visits for the first time on March 31. This year also marked the first such exchange in a decade between Erdoğan's AKP and the DEM Party or its predecessor.