“We are implementing the withdrawal of all our forces within Turkiye,” the Kurdish PKK said in a statement read on Sunday in the Qandil area of northern Iraq, according to a journalist from the AFP news agency present at the ceremony.
He published a photograph showing 25 fighters – including eight women – who had already traveled there from Turkiye.
A spokesperson for Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) published on X that the PKK’s announcement falls within the framework of the “terror-free Turkiye process.”
Ömer Çelik stated that the government considered the announcement and its continuation as a “strategic and historic step.”
The PKK, which formally renounced its 40-year armed struggle in May, is currently transitioning from armed rebellion to democratic politics in a bid to end one of the region’s longest conflicts, which has killed some 50,000 people.
But he urged Turkiye to take the necessary steps to boost the process, which began a year ago when Ankara offered an unexpected olive branch to its jailed leader, Abdullah Ocalan.
“The legal and political measures required by the process… and the laws of freedom and democratic integration necessary to participate in democratic politics must be implemented without delay,” he added.
The group has announced that it wants to carry out a democratic struggle to defend the rights of the Kurdish minority, in line with a historic call by Öcalan.
In July, the group held a symbolic ceremony in the mountains of northern Iraq, destroying a first batch of weapons, which was hailed by Turkiye as “an irreversible turning point.”
“Today is a new day; a new page in history has been opened. Today, the doors of a great and powerful Turkiye have been opened wide,” Erdogan said at the time.
The end of Turkiye’s conflict with the armed group could have broader consequences for the region, including neighboring Syria, where the United States is allied with Syrian Kurdish forces, which Ankara considers an offshoot of the PKK.