The PKK's imprisoned leader Abdullah Öcalan has called on PKK to lay down their arms. Öcalan's message was shared with the public by the pro-Kurdish Peoples' Democratic Party (HDP) during a press conference on Saturday.
The conference took place after the Deputy Prime Minister Yalçın Akdoğan held talks at the Prime Minister's Office in Istanbul with the Peoples' Democratic Party (HDP) committee, including HDP Vice Chair İdris Baluken and HDP deputies Sırrı Süreyya Önder and Pervin Buldan, over the reconciliation process between Ankara and Kurds.
Both sides emphasized the importance of ceasefire and said that Turkey is closer to peace than ever.
HDP deputy Önder said that the dialogues between the two parties over the reconciliation process has come to a "serious" stage, and shared the PKK's imprisoned leader Abdullah Öcalan's message, in which he invited the PKK to hold a congress in spring to make its historical decision to find common ground on the issue of laying down arms.
Önder said that the invitation is a historic declaration of intention to resolve the issue through democratic politics instead of an armed struggle. He said that their main target is to reach a democratic solution while trying to resolve the 30-year conflict permanently.
He said, "We call on all pro-democracy fronts and peace supporters to back the democratic debate in the reconcialiation process in Turkey."
Following Önder's talk, Deputy Prime Minister Akdoğan also commented over the success of the reconciliation process. He said that HDP had paid a visit to the PKK's imprisoned leader Abdullah Öcalan on Friday on the İmralı island (located in the Sea of Marmara).
Öcalan's call and thereby PKK's laying down arms will further develop democracy in Turkey, according to the Deputy PM Akdoğan.
He said, the government sees HDP's statements on acceleration of disarmament process important. The government is determined to conclude the reconciliation process with full support of the public, Akdoğan further said.
The reconciliation process was initiated by the Justice and Development Party (AK Party) government and began when a cease-fire was signed between the government and the PKK in 2013, followed by a series of democratic reforms to improve the rights of Turkey's Kurdish population. It is reported that over 50 percent of people in the country are in favor of the initiative.
The PKK has fought for an independent Kurdish state since 1984, and its attacks have claimed around 36,000 lives in Turkey.
