Devlet Bahçeli, leader of the government ally Nationalist Movement Party (MHP), who is the architect of a call to the terrorist group PKK to lay down its arms, said the latest meeting between the group’s jailed leader Abdullah Öcalan and a political party would give momentum to a good beginning.
Bahçeli, who has been a fierce proponent of counterterrorism efforts against PKK and other terrorist groups, issued a stern warning to the group, though, in his New Year message.
“Under new circumstances, changing balance of power and against gamechanger Türkiye, PKK can only dream gaining a stronghold in northern Iraq, west or east of Euphrates River,” Bahçeli said about the group’s strongholds in Syria and Iraq. “Terrorists have no room for maneuver. They will either bury their weapons or those holding those weapons will be buried,” Bahçeli said, echoing similar remarks by President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan earlier this month.
Two lawmakers from the Peoples’ Equality and Democracy Party (DEM Party), known for its closeness to the PKK, made a rare visit to Öcalan on Saturday on his prison island Imralı.
It was the second DEM meeting with Öcalan after the PKK leader’s nephew and DEM lawmaker Ömer Öcalan met him in October.
The second meeting was recently approved by the Justice Ministry, a few months after Nationalist Movement Party (MHP) leader Devlet Bahçeli made an unprecedented call for Öcalan to be temporarily released and address a DEM Party meeting at Parliament to instruct the PKK to lay down arms.
The MHP is part of the People’s Alliance, which is led by Erdoğan’s ruling Justice and Development Party (AK Party), which endorses the process.
“It is a time of brotherhood and peace for Türkiye and the region,” Öcalan was quoted as saying. “I have the competence and determination to contribute positively to the new paradigm started by Mr. Bahçeli and Mr. Erdoğan,” Öcalan said, according to a DEM statement Sunday.
Bahçeli said in his message that excerpts from minutes of a meeting between Öcalan and DEM representatives relatively reinforced hopes of clinging to the Turkish-Kurdish brotherhood. “Now is time to switch to action from words,” Bahçeli said. The nationalist leader ruled out that Türkiye would negotiate with terrorist groups and insisted this was not a “new solution process,” as some media outlets dubbed it. In the 2010s, Türkiye sought to resolve the terrorism issue through a tentatively called “reconciliation” or “solution” process by addressing the problems the Kurdish community faced to prevent PKK from exploiting those issues. The process failed when PKK resumed its terror attacks after a brief lull.
“What is happening and should happen is that the relevant sides should act without preconditions, without deception, in the name of the nation’s future. We have no time to waste. It is a moment of truth for Türkiye. We will either live as brothers or will be subject to violent devastation imposed upon us with cracks in regional fault lines,” Bahçeli said, in reference to Israel’s expansionist policies raging in the region since 2023.