Main opposition CHP: Panel, not state should talk to Öcalan

ANKARA

The ‘Wise-People Commission’ we suggested is totally different from the government’s suggestion,’ Kılıçdaroğlu says. DAILY NEWS photo, Selahattin SÖNMEZ

Instead of intelligence officers, a parliamentary commission should have had talks with jailed leader of the outlawed Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) Abdullah Öcalan, according to the main opposition leader.

The government’s suggestion to form a “wise-people commission” to guide the ongoing peace process has no parallel with the main opposition Republican People’s Party’s (CHP) similar suggestion, CHP leader Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu told private news channel CNN Türk yesterday.

The CHP had proposed the establishment of a “Societal Conciliation Commission” in Parliament to work on the resolution of the Kurdish issue.

Kılıçdaroğlu met Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan on June 6, 2012 to discuss the CHP’s 10-point “road-map” foreseeing the establishment of two commissions, inside and outside Parliament, to shape the way to solve the Kurdish issue. However, after Nationalist Movement Party (MHP) leader Devlet Bahçeli spurned the CHP’s request for a meeting, denouncing the move as “treason,” the CHP’s efforts failed to bear fruit despite the ruling party’s suggestion to form a two-party panel.

“The ‘Wise-People Commission’ we suggested is totally different from the government’s suggestion. They are 180 degrees opposite,” Kılıçdaroğlu, adding that the commission the government is considering establishing will be a “government-commanded commission.”

Kılıçdaroğlu was commenting on the government’s plans to establish a ‘wise-people commission’ as part of recent peace efforts. Erdoğan recently revealed that they are planning to form three or four ‘wise-people commissions,’ each comprised of seven representatives of civil society.

Linked to joint panel

Kılıçdaroğlu recalled that their suggestion was to establish a “wise-people commission” linked to the joint parliamentray panel, which could “talk to anybody” in efforts to solve the Kuridsh problem.

CHP deputy chair Faruk Loğoğlu also said that the government’s suggestion of a “wise-people commission” was far different from the CHP’s suggestion. “We suggested a ‘wise-people commission’ comprised of 12 people, three people to be proposed by all four parties. But the mentioned commission would serve under the government, that’s totally different,” Loğoğlu said at a press conference in Parliament.