In a decisive shift toward peaceful change, Turkey’s long-outlawed major separatist group is disbanding. The announcement Monday by the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) brings a welcome end to four decades of armed conflict and the loss of nearly 40,000 lives.
Turkey is not the only country feeling the repercussions of this decision. Some 25 million to 35 million ethnic Kurds live in mountainous areas that share porous borders between Iraq, Syria, and Iran, as well as Turkey. Turkish forces have pursued Kurdish separatists in cross-border raids in Iraq and Syria over the years. The president of Iraq’s Kurdistan region immediately hailed the PKK’s move as signaling “political maturity” and strengthening regional stability.
Despite having 15 million Kurds – 20% of its population – Turkey did not recognize their distinct identity for most of the 20th century. Aiming to establish a Kurdish homeland, the PKK took up arms in 1984, attacking civilian and military targets. In recent years, the Turkish military has forcefully limited the PKK’s reach and abilities.
With founder Abdullah Öcalan in prison since 1999, the PKK has transitioned from seeking independence toward seeking greater rights within Turkey. On Monday, the PKK said it had “broken the policy of denial and annihilation … and brought the Kurdish issue to a point of solving it through democratic politics.”
The conflict’s end provides Turkey’s leaders with the opportunity to craft a transparent and fair agreement that enables progress and addresses legitimate Kurdish demands. The population is tired of simmering conflict and is ready for peace. But it is also tired of President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s autocratic rule, as street protests in March indicated.
Officially recognizing Kurdish rights will require amending Turkey’s Constitution. This, critics say, could create an opening for another amendment – one removing term limits, thus allowing the president to extend his rule for an unprecedented fourth term in 2028.
An official rapprochement should allow needed resources to flow to Turkey’s impoverished southeast, where much of the fighting took place. Calm there would also help neighboring Syria, which has experienced recent outbreaks of sectarian violence.
The PKK’s dismantling offers an opening for the new government in Damascus and the Syrian Kurds – and perhaps the Alawite and Druze factions – to define a path to integrating religious and ethnic minorities. It might even influence moves in Lebanon to bring the Hezbollah militia into normal, peaceful politics.
