SDF welcomes Öcalan's call to disband the PKK
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The PKK leader's call comes as the SDF faces off with Turkiye in Syria, with Ankara launching drone attack on Al-Hasakah, escalating the conflict between the armed group and Turkiye.
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Pro-Kurdish Peoples' Equality and Democracy Party release a statement from the jailed leader of the rebel Kurdistan Workers' Party Abdullah Ocalan, in Istanbul, Turkiye, Thursday, Feb. 27, 2025 (AP)
The leader of the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) welcomed the call by the imprisoned Kurdistan Worker's Party (PKK) leader Abdullah Ocalan for the Kurdish militant and political group to lay down its arms and disband on Thursday.
Mazloum Abdi, head of the armed wing of Syria's Kurdish armed groups, said during a video conference that they see this initiative as positive because it is centered on peace in the region, adding that they have "nothing to do with Abdullah Öcalan's call."
Abdullah Öcalan calls to disband the PKK
Öcalan, the imprisoned leader of the Kurdistan Workers' Party, called the group to disband and disarm on February 27, urging them in a letter read by the pro-Kurdish Peoples' Equality and Democracy Party to convene a congress to formalize this decision.
"As in the case with any modern community and party whose existence has not been abolished by force, would voluntarily do, convene your congress and make a decision; all groups must lay their arms and the PKK must dissolve itself," stated the leader of the PKK.
The call to dissolve the PKK could weaken the political leverage of Kurdish groups in Turkiye and Syria, as it formed a significant strategic force in the region at a time when Ankara has been intensifying its military operations on Kurdish groups in Syria and Turkey.
Tensions between SDF and Turkiye escalated further when Turkish drones targeted their positions in al-Hasakah on February 26, as Ankara vows to continue military operations against the Syria Democratic Forces, which it deems an extension of the Kurdistan Workers' Party.
Turkish police arrested 282 members of the PKK in police raids over five days, according to an Interior Minister Ali Yerlikaya statement on February 18, as Ankara intensifies its efforts to remove elected pro-Kurdish mayors and a crackdown on the Kurdish party aiming to end the 40-year-long conflict between the two sides.
