Eurasia Press & News
Kurdish rebels are ready to re-enter Turkey from northern Iraq, the head of the group’s political wing said at his mountain hideout, threatening to rekindle an insurgency unless Ankara resuscitates their peace process soon.
Accusing Turkey of waging a proxy war against Kurds in Syria by backing Islamist rebels fighting them in the north, Cemil Bayik, a founding member of the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) said the group had the right to retaliate.
Syria’s civil war has complicated Turkey’s efforts to make peace with Kurdish militants, but Ankara strongly denies backing any rebel faction against Kurds in Syria and has held regular talks with the head of a Syrian Kurdish group close to the PKK.
Bayik, the group’s most senior figure at liberty, spoke at a small, heavily guarded house in the Qandil Mountain range in Iraq’s Kurdish north, a badge featuring jailed PKK leader Abdullah Ocalan pinned to a pocket on his guerilla uniform.
Imprisoned on an island south of Istanbul, Ocalan commands unswerving loyalty from a fervent cadre of guerillas – both men and women – who live in the mountains that straddle the borders between Turkey, Iran and Iraq.
Ocalan began talks with Turkish officials last year to halt a conflict that has left more than 40,000 people dead over the past three decades and earned the PKK a place on a list of terrorist organisations as designated by Turkey, the United States and European Union.
In March, a ceasefire was called and Ocalan ordered his guerillas to retreat from Turkey to Iraq’s autonomous Kurdistan region, but the withdrawal was suspended last month as the rebels said Ankara had not held up its side of the bargain.
