The Kurdistan Workers’ Party has said it is withdrawing all its forces from Turkiye to northern Iraq as part of a peace process with Turkiye, bringing an end to a months-long disarming process following a four-decade armed conflict that killed tens of thousands of people.
“We are implementing the withdrawal of all our forces within Turkiye,” the Kurdish PKK said in a statement read out on Sunday in the Qandil area of northern Iraq, according to a journalist with the AFP news agency present at the ceremony.
A spokesman for Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) party posted on X that the PKK’s announcement falls within the framework of the “Terrorism-Free Turkiye process.”
The PKK, which formally renounced its 40-year armed struggle in May, is currently making the transition from armed rebellion to democratic politics in a bid to end one of the region’s longest conflicts, which killed some 50,000 people.
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Kurdish PKK Announces It Is Withdrawing Fighters from Turkiye to Iraq
10/26/2025
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