PKK Leader Demands Reforms from Turkey, Warns of Renewed Fighting Without Political Change

QANDIL — In a televised interview with Sterk TV last Friday, Cemil Bayik, senior leader in the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) and co-chair of the Executive Council of the Kurdistan Communities Union (KCK), issued a stark warning to Ankara: unless Turkey enacts political and legal reforms to address systemic discrimination against its Kurdish population, the PKK will resume armed struggle. 

“We will not disarm further until Turkey recognizes Kurdish rights through legal reforms,” Bayik said. “As long as the Kurdish issue remains confined to the framework of war, the conflict will yield little, and more groups will entrench themselves through violence across Kurdistan.” 

Bayik reiterated the PKK’s long-standing demand that Abdullah Öcalan, the imprisoned PKK leader held on İmralı Island since 1999, be granted freedom of communication and political participation.  

“Only when Turkey enacts laws for freedom and democratic inclusion,” Bayik said, “will the PKK fully lay down its arms. Without that, no one has the right to demand disarmament from us.” 

In a symbolic move earlier this month, the PKK publicly burned weapons during a disarmament ceremony. Bayik explained the gesture was intended to send three messages: a rebuke to global militarization, a declaration of the PKK’s intent to permanently renounce violence, and a cultural tribute—invoking Kurdish traditions that associate fire with renewal and enlightenment. 

The PKK formally announced its dissolution on May 12, following a rare public message from Öcalan urging a strategic shift from armed resistance to political engagement. Ankara has long insisted on full disarmament as a precondition for any peace process.  

However, Pervin Buldan, a senior figure in the People’s Equality and Democracy Party (Halkların Eşitlik ve Demokrasi Partisi, DEM Party), noted that demobilization “cannot follow a fixed timeline—we cannot solve a 50-year conflict in two or three months.” 

Bayik’s comments follow the formation of a new parliamentary committee tasked with overseeing the peace process, an initiative enjoying broad political support with the exception of the far-right İYİ Party. 

While welcoming the committee’s formation, Bayik warned against reducing its mandate to mere disarmament. “The PKK did not take up arms by choice,” he said. “It was Turkey’s oppressive policies that left no alternative. If the state truly seeks an end to armed struggle, it must begin by changing those policies. The problem is not the weapons—it’s the reasons they were picked up.”