Representatives from the Peoples’ Equality and Democracy Party (DEM Party) met with Justice Minister Yılmaz Tunç on Thursday to go over the outline of the terror-free Türkiye initiative following a visit to PKK leader Abdullah Öcalan on the prison island of Imralı.
DEM Party Group Deputy Chairs Gülistan Kılıç Koçyiğit and Sezai Temelli, along with Deputy co-Chair Öztürk Türkdoğan, held a closed-door meeting with Tunç in Ankara.
The meeting had been delayed after DEM Party lawmaker and Deputy Parliament Speaker Sırrı Süreyya Önder, part of the delegation involved in the initiative, suffered a heart attack on April 15. Önder, currently hospitalized in Ankara, remains in critical condition.
Tunç, sending his well wishes and thanks to Önder, has assured Önder that his condition would not disrupt the initiative.
Speaking to reporters outside the Justice Ministry, Koçyiğit said the meeting focused on the legal regulations and the process that began on Oct. 1 last year.
Devlet Bahçeli, a government ally, spurred the initiative last year by first exchanging greetings with DEM Party lawmakers at Parliament and later calling on the government to grant a temporary release for Öcalan so that he could address a parliamentary meeting of the DEM Party and urge the PKK to dissolve itself.
“We also discussed Öcalan’s health and working conditions in Imralı,” Koçyiğit told reporters.
Tunç said on Wednesday that the relevant institutions have “done whatever they had to in line with the law” regarding prison conditions.
Koçyiğit argued there were “problems” in the Turkish justice system and said she and Tunç “discussed these comprehensively.”
When asked whether “the right to hope,” a legal concept that grants parole hearings for people sentenced to aggravated life imprisonment like Öcalan, came up at the meeting, Koçyiğit repeated that they discussed Öcalan’s “working, health and security conditions.”
She also said they did not discuss any regulations for PKK members if the terrorist group disarms and dissolves itself.
Regarding whether the DEM Party delegation would revisit Imralı, Koçyiğit stated that a meeting had already taken place on Monday.
“We expressed that not just our delegation but other individuals too can visit Imralı from now on,” Koçyiğit said. “I believe there will be such developments in the coming period.”
The PKK, which has killed thousands since it launched its first terrorist attacks in the 1980s, claims to fight for Kurdish self-rule and brainwashes the Kurdish population concentrated in southeastern Türkiye to draw recruits.
Türkiye has maintained a robust military crackdown on the terrorist group in the past four decades.
Through the DEM Party delegation, Öcalan, in late February, called on his group to lay down their arms.
The PKK is expected to hold a "congress" this spring to announce its full compliance with Öcalan's call.
However, the terrorist group has set conditions, including Öcalan's release.
Ankara has so far rejected the demands, including the unilateral cease-fire announced by the group.
