If President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan is defeated in May’s presidential election, the PKK/YPG terror group will have taken its revenge for Turkish military operations in Syria, a member of the terror group has declared.
Speaking to a propaganda network based outside of Türkiye, Salih Muslim, one of the key leadership figures in PKK's Syria affiliate YPG, revealed the terrorists’ discomfort over Turkish counterterrorism operations that have been ongoing against PKK/YPG and Daesh in northern Syria since 2016.
“The Turkish army has been in the field since 2016,” Muslim recalled, and referring to the runoff vote on May 28, he added, “Now we have an opportunity in our hands. It’s the first time we have such a thing happening in elections.”
For months, the terror group has been vocal in its eagerness to see Erdoğan unseated this year. Several so-called senior members have even expressed open support for the president’s main challenger Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu, the leader and joint contender of a six-party opposition bloc, and championed him in “ending the AK Party fascism.”
The Justice and Development Party (AK Party) is helmed by Erdoğan and has been in power since 2002.
Ankara has led intensifying efforts to crack down on PKK elements both at home and abroad for years now, managing to eliminate thousands of terrorists and regain territory in Türkiye’s southeast ravaged by PKK violence for years, but since 2016, three key cross-border operations have stamped out terrorist elements in northern Syria to near extinction, taking out tens of thousands of PKK/YPG members and clearing large swaths of territory for the resettlement of local Syrians.
The PKK’s bloody insurgency over its separatist agenda and so-called Kurdish self-rule has left over 40,000 people dead in Türkiye since the 1980s and a reconciliation process has also been a part of key steps Erdoğan’s government took to ease the strain.
Since negotiations broke down in 2015, the terror group resumed attacks in the southeast and withdrew to bases in northern regions of neighboring Syria and Iraq.
While months leading up to the May 14 polls were largely uneventful in terms of attacks from the PKK/YPG, the group’s activities have remained the main themes of election campaigns.
Erdoğan, who narrowly missed a first-round win last Sunday by receiving 49.5% of the vote, often lambasts Kılıçdaroğlu for “colluding with terrorists” and threatening to undo Türkiye’s achievements in its war on terror.
