The climate that has emerged in Türkiye for peace is a historic opportunity to strengthen regional stability, according to Nechirvan Barzani, the president of Iraq’s Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG).
"We see the developments taking place for facilitating peace,” Barzani told reporters at a forum in Sulaymaniyah in northern Iraq on Wednesday.
He was referring to the recent “terror-free Türkiye initiative” launched last year by government ally Devlet Bahçeli, who called on PKK terrorists to lay down arms.
“We would like to reiterate that we welcome this process and provide all the support we can for its success. This is an opportunity to strengthen stability in the region. It also means opening a new page that will benefit the entire region,” Barzani said.
The PKK is listed as a terrorist group by the European Union, the United States and Türkiye. The group has killed thousands since the 1980s in Türkiye in a campaign of violence under the pretext of establishing "Kurdish self-rule."
The fight against the terrorist group was fought mainly in rural areas of southeastern Türkiye but is now more focused on the Qandil Mountains, located roughly 40 kilometers (24.86 miles) southeast of the Turkish border in Iraq's KRG capital of Irbil.
However, last month, the PKK declared a “cease-fire” in the 40-year terror campaign against the Turkish government, responding to a call to disarm by the group’s leader, Abdullah Öcalan.
Öcalan, who has been serving a life term on a prison island off Istanbul since 1999, urged his group to convene a "congress" and take the decision to disband.
The PKK has set conditions, including for Öcalan to be released from prison, to "personally direct and execute" a "congress."
Ankara has so far rejected the demands, including the unilateral "cease-fire" announced by the group.
Meanwhile, the leader of the U.S.-backed YPG, which is the Syrian offshoot of the PKK, said Öcalan's call to disband does not apply to his group in Syria.
The Turkish government, however, says all groups tied to the PKK – whether in Türkiye, Syria or Iraq – must disband.
Earlier this month, Syria’s post-Assad administration struck a deal with the YPG and the SDF, the umbrella group in the northeast dominated by the YPG, which agreed on a plan for the latter’s integration into the new Syria.
Ankara has welcomed the agreement, saying it would monitor the developments.
Barzani expressed his wish for the Syrian government to establish a democratic Syria based on human rights and where the rights of all components are ensured.
