Jailed PKK leader Ocalan expected to call for peace with Turkey

Jailed PKK leader Abdullah Ocalan expected to make historic peace declaration, ending decades-long Kurdish-Turkish conflict.

Jailed PKK leader Abdullah Ocalan was expected to make a "historic declaration" on Thursday (February 27, 2025) on ending the decades-long conflict between Kurdish groups and the Turkish State.

A delegation from the pro-Kurdish DEM party held a three-hour meeting with him early Thursday on Imrali prison island, where the founder of the Kurdistan Workers' Party has been jailed there in solitary confinement since 1999.

They have pledged to deliver his message at a news conference at 5:00 pm (1400 GMT) inside an Istanbul hotel emblazoned with slogans reading: "A call for peace and democratic society".

The visit comes after Ankara offered an olive branch to the 75-year-old militant leader aimed at drawing a line under a decades-long insurgency that has claimed tens of thousands of lives.

"If everything goes smoothly, we expect Ocalan to make a historic declaration (on Thursday)," the party said late Wednesday.

With hopes high that he would issue a landmark call for peace, DEM was planning to set up large screens in Diyarbakir, Van and Mersin, the main cities in the Kurdish-majority southeast where large crowds began gathering, dancing and singing, AFP correspondents said.

But they were forced to change their plans after the screens were not approved by the Turkish authorities.