ERBIL, Kurdistan Region - Turkey's parliamentary commission will visit jailed Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) leader Abdullah Ocalan in his Imrali island prison, the pro-Kurdish Peoples' Equality and Democracy Party (DEM Party) confirmed on Friday.
“We welcome the decision taken today by the National Solidarity, Brotherhood and Democracy Commission to go to Imrali as the most concrete expression of Turkey's democratic maturity and will for peace,” DEM Party co-leaders Tuncer Bakirhan and Tulay Hatimogullari said in a statement.
The National Solidarity, Brotherhood and Democracy Commission was formed in the parliament to draft legislation as part of talks between the PKK and the Turkish state to end four decades of conflict.
The PKK has announced its dissolution and intention to lay down arms and is demanding a democratic resolution to its long struggle for Kurdish rights.
The decision to visit Ocalan, who has been kept in an isolated island prison since 1999, was approved by 32 members of the commission, while three people opposed the proposal and two abstained, Iskender Bayhan, a member of the Labour Party, told pro-opposition media Anka Haber. Four representatives will travel to the island from the ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP), its government ally the Nationalist Movement Party (MHP), the DEM Party, and the New Path Party.
The visit will be pivotal to the peace talks, according to the DEM Party.
“The dialogue ground to be established in Imrali and the transparent contact channels to be developed offer a unique window of opportunity for the solution of the Kurdish issue and the democratization of Turkey,” the DEM Party statement said.
"We have full faith that the meetings to be held with Mr. Ocalan will play a decisive role in the healthy and safe progress of the process,” it added.
The PKK dissolved itself and declared it would lay down arms earlier this year, after being urged to do so by Ocalan. The group has since taken additional measures to support the peace process, most recently withdrawing its fighters from a strategic mountain in the Kurdistan Region on Monday.
The DEM Party thanked Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and MHP leader Devlet Bahceli who initiated the peace talks in October 2024, for “courageously putting forward the will to go to Imrali.”
Bahceli on Tuesday called for the commission to visit Ocalan, saying he and some colleagues would meet the PKK leader themselves if the commission did not.
The DEM Party statement also said they “regretfully received the distant approaches of some political circles to this historic step.”
Turkey's main opposition Republican People’s Party (CHP) announced earlier on Friday that it will not send members to the delegation, criticizing Parliament Speaker Numan Kurtulmus for hosting the meeting about the trip behind closed doors.
The commission decided in August that it would meet under confidentiality rules, keeping the record sealed for 10 years.
"I would like to express that it is not right to hold a meeting where the visit to Imrali will be discussed by concealing it from our nation. It is important for everyone here, every political party, to clearly state their position,” CHP group deputy chairman Murat Emir said on X.
DEM Party member Saruhan Oluc told Rudaw’s Nalin Hassan on Friday that the CHP’s decision to not take part in the visit is due to "fear of the reaction of voters.”
Gulistan Kilic Kocyigit, deputy head of the DEM Party's parliamentary bloc, said that “Whether the vote is open, secret, or closed has no bearing on us,” Anka Haber reported.
“We believe that a complete visit to the island is necessary and Mr. Ocalan must be heard,” she said, adding that “It's impossible for this process to progress or deepen without listening to Mr. Ocalan. This would be a major shortcoming.”
Kocyigit criticized a lack of legal preparations for returning demobilized fighters after a group of PKK members symbolically burned their weapons in Sulaimani province in July.
“But those who burned their weapons could not return to this country. Why? Because we were not prepared, we had no law. We are still not prepared,” she said.
The initiative marks a renewed attempt by Ankara to resolve the decades-long conflict with the PKK through political and strategic measures rather than military confrontation.
The PKK, founded in 1978, initially sought Kurdish independence before shifting to demands for political and cultural rights. Ankara and several Western governments classify it as a terrorist organization.