Analysis
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A DEM Party delegation traveled to İmralı Island on Aug. 28 to meet with jailed PKK leader Abdullah Öcalan, the first visit since Parliament formed the National Solidarity, Brotherhood and Democracy Commission.
The DEM Party delegation will visit Abdullah Öcalan, the jailed PKK founder, on İmralı Island on Aug. 28, following weeks of criticism over limited access.
Jailed Istanbul Mayor and CHP presidential candidate Ekrem İmamoğlu said his arrest was designed to undermine the government’s “Terror-Free Turkey” initiative, which foresees the PKK’s disarmament.
Mustafa Karasu, a leading figure in the PKK, has said MHP Chair Devlet Bahçeli should keep his promise regarding the “right to hope” for PKK leader Abdullah Öcalan.
A political feud has erupted between Turkey’s two largest ultranationalist parties—the MHP and its breakaway rival the İYİ Party—over the establishment of a parliamentary commission tasked with preparing for the potential disarmament of the PKK.
The dissolution and disarmament of the PKK, so far managed through security institutions, will be brought to Parliament’s agenda next week through a newly established commission. Although framed as “above politics” and “beyond party interests,” the “process” is creating new political maneuvering room for all parties. From the government to the opposition, political actors are repositioning themselves and recalculating strategies with an eye on the 2028 elections.
Twelve Turkish soldiers died from gas exposure in a PKK-used cave in northern Iraq on July 6, and two more from excessive fluid loss in Hatay on July 25, but key questions about both incidents remain unanswered.
Ahead of renewed hopes for a peace process, Sözcü — known for its opposition stance — has stirred controversy with successive headlines alleging the mass release of PKK-linked prisoners. The Justice Ministry has twice rejected the newspaper’s reports, which first claimed 200 prisoners had been released and later suggested an additional 700 would follow.
After 47 years, the PKK has decided to disband and lay down arms. According to the group’s founder, Abdullah Öcalan, this marks a paradigm shift: the struggle will now continue through strengthened political engagement. Following what both the government and opposition have called a “historic” decision, change is now expected within the DEM Party—the Kurdish political movement’s representative in Turkish Parliament. As one MP who recently visited Öcalan on İmralı Island put it: “Even the PKK is changing—why wouldn’t the DEM Party?”
The PKK’s disarmament is set to begin, two months after the group announced its dissolution on May 12—marking the symbolic end of nearly half a century of armed conflict. Attention is now turning to Turkey’s Parliament, which political parties across the spectrum have identified as the proper venue to address the Kurdish issue.
The Defense Ministry announced that 12 soldiers died on July 6 from methane gas during a search of a cave previously used as a hospital by the PKK in northern Iraq. Opposition parties called for a parliamentary commission to investigate whether the necessary precautions, including the use of gas masks and detectors, were taken when the soldiers entered the cave, but this proposal was rejected by AKP and MHP votes.
Ankara is entering what officials describe as the final phase of the PKK’s disarmament, with expectations that images of surrendered weapons could be released in the coming days.