Turkey’s military has killed 26 militants of the outlawed Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) in Iraq and Syria since jailed PKK leader Abdullah Öcalan called for his militant group to lay down arms and disband, the state-run Anadolu news agency reported on Thursday, citing the Defense Ministry.
“The Turkish Armed Forces will continue its operations and search and scanning activities in the region for the survival and security of our country,” the ministry said in its statement.
Öcalan last Thursday made the historic call to his organization, which he founded in 1978, in a historic statement read out in İstanbul that raised hopes about the end of the decades-long conflict between the Turkish state and the PKK.
The PKK declared a ceasefire on Saturday.
“In order to pave the way for the implementation of leader Apo’s [Öcalan’s] call for peace and a democratic society, we are declaring a ceasefire effective from today,” the PKK executive committee was quoted by the pro-PKK ANF news agency as saying.
The militant group said it agrees with the content of Öcalan’s call and will abide by it, adding that its forces will not take armed action unless attacked.
Meanwhile, the PKK’s armed wing, the Kurdish People’s Defense Forces (HPG), announced that Turkey has carried out 828 attacks against the PKK despite the group’s ceasefire, ANF reported on Thursday.
According to a statement from the HPG’s press office, Turkish air and ground attacks have continued in Iraq’s Kurdistan region. The HPG said it responded within the framework of “legitimate self-defense.”
The PKK, designated a terrorist group by Turkey and its Western allies, has waged an insurgency since 1984 with the aim of carving out a homeland for Kurds, who account for around 20 percent of Turkey’s 85 million people.
But more recently, the group has called for autonomy and cultural and linguistic rights rather than independence.
Since Öcalan was jailed in 1999 there have been various attempts to end the bloodshed, which has cost more than 40,000 lives.